Research Data Manager

The Department of Theory and Practice in Teacher Education at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, (UTK) invites applications for our Research Data Manager position supporting for the Boyd Center for Community School Excellence. We are seeking candidates who can contribute in meaningful ways to the mission and goals of the Department and University.

The position will start July 1, 2024. The appointment is for up to five years, with renewal after the fifth-year contingent on funding availability and role performance. This position will have the opportunity to work on projects that aim to support Title 1 Community Schools evaluation, provide technical assistance, and help build our state-wide and regional network through a community-engaged approach.

The University and Region

UTK is the state's flagship, land-grant university. We are a Research 1 university with 11 colleges and more than 30,000 students. With strong leadership at the system, university, and college levels, UTK is poised for dramatic positive change focused on solving some of the most audacious, pressing problems our country and world face today. The city of Knoxville is a hidden gem surrounded by eight gorgeous lakes, with a beautiful and walkable downtown, a diverse music scene including internationally recognized festivals, active neighborhoods, unique restaurants, and a robust offering of cultural and outdoor activities. UTK is located within easy driving distance to the Great Smoky Mountains, Atlanta, Nashville, Asheville, Charlotte, Louisville and Cincinnati. It is only a day's drive to Memphis, Chicago, and Washington D.C. Knoxville and the surrounding counties have a population of more than 850,000 people.

The Department

The Department of Theory and Practice in Education includes 4 research professors, 27 tenured and tenure-track faculty, 15 clinical-track, and 7 lecture-track faculty. The department provides undergraduate majors in education and audiology and speech pathology, deaf studies, and special education with multiple minors offered. The graduate programs offered are a Master of Science with 12 concentrations, an EdS, or Specialist in Education, and a PhD with three concentrations and several specializations. The mission of TPTE is to benefit local, regional, national, and global communities by conducting research, preparing teachers, and engaging in outreach and service.

Promoting community-university partnerships and research are foci of our department. At the university level, the Office of Community Engagement and Outreach supports community-university partnerships; and within the College of Education, Health and Human Sciences, Associate Dean for Community Engagement, Kristi Gordon, supports CES across education, health, and social work fields. The department of Theory, Practice, and Teacher Education (TPTE), led by Dr. Lynn Hodge, supports school partners in a wide range of capacities including but not limited to World Languages, Deaf Studies, Literacy, and Cultural Studies. Each branch has associated initiatives that foster partnerships, build local knowledges, and support our regional community.

The Boyd Center for Community Schools Excellence (BoCCE) UT prides itself on embodying a modern land grant mission inspired by the "Volunteer Spirit" of service and leadership (). The Boyd Center for Community School Excellence (BoCCE) brings the land grant mission to life through supporting community schools across the state of Tennessee. Coming from a 15-year history as the University-Assisted Community Schools initiative supporting individual public-school communities, The Boyd Center for Community School Excellence (BoCCE) will debut in July of 2023. BoCCE will provide technical assistance, outside evaluation, and serve as a convener and connector for state-wide impact, regional cooperation, and promotion of university-community partnerships both within and beyond academe. BoCCE (1) involves collaboration among academic researchers and community members; (2) values the multiple sources of knowledge brought and produced by academic and community partners; and (3) includes goals for both knowledge production and social action or change towards the public good (Warren et al., 2018). Our goals are to enhance community school practice and ensure the sustainability of community schools in our region.

The Position: Research Data Manager

This position will support the Boyd Community School Center for Excellence (BoCCE) and other related projects with research database management. Co-creating and managing all data processes for BoCCE, this role will interface regularly with the Director, student workers, our quantitative data partners, and UACS research team to implement processes internally. They will also serve as an external facing role, ensuring high quality data is collected. Collaboratively with our quantitative data partners, this role will validate the integrity of datasets received from external partners and imported from electronic collection systems; design queries and authenticate data, resolve differences working with external partners; collaborate with external partners and internal research team to build data validity checks and make policy recommendations regarding data collection. They will also create and maintain a catalog of data to include definitions and procedural steps; construct and maintain graphs, tables, and other data visualizations for the internal research team and external partners; import, clean, standardize, concatenate, and archive data from multiple sources; advise and create literature reviews; seek data sources and create ad hoc queries to support decision making. The majority of this role will be focused on process improvement, data quality/validation, and co-leading qualitative data collection and analysis. The role will also require stakeholder reporting, and meeting facilitation.