Research Officer - Special Projects

The Research Officer – Special Projects reports to the Director, Quality Assurance and Institutional Research.

The person is responsible for conducting applied research, analyzing statistical data designed to support strategic planning, programme evaluation, resource development, marketing, student recruitment and curriculum planning, and to generally support college-wide administrative decision making with research findings.

Key Responsibilities:

• Undertake research and data analysis for the facilitation of presentations, conferences, and academic publications.
• Prepares reports of completed projects for publication in technical journals, for presentation to agency requesting project, or for use in further applied or theoretical research activities.
• Conduct literature reviews; Collect and analyze data
• Plans, organizes, and conducts research in scientific, cultural, historical, or artistic field for use in own work or in project of sponsoring institution: Develops plans for project or studies guidelines for project prepared by professional staff member to outline research procedures to be followed.
• Prepare materials for submission to granting agencies and foundations
• Prepare oral and written paper presentations based on research completed
• Work closely with the Office of the President to collate key statistics from database and selected findings from surveys.
• Assist in the determination of key performance indicators and benchmarks for divisions and departments across College.
• Assist in the collection and preparation of data and calculating key institutional statistics internal and externally e.g. retention rates, graduation rates, time to completion statistics, average GPAs etc.
• Perform relevant benchmark research to ensure that research methodologies reflect best practice.
• Analyze data using appropriate statistical methods.
• Produce comprehensive reports to highlight findings from surveys and research initiatives for distribution to relevant stakeholders.
• Assist the Office of the President and academic deans in analyzing and interpreting community educational need surveys and comparative studies across institutions relative to quality and efficiency of programme offerings and programme mix.

Requirements:

• Bachelor’s degree in Statistics, Mathematics or Social Science.
• A Master’s degree in Statistics, Education or any Social Sciences will be an asset.
• At least three (3) years’ experience with increasing responsibility in the areas of institutional research, educational research or market research.
• Ability to design quantitative and qualitative survey instruments, focus group and field interview questionnaires.
• Strong analytical and writing skills for purposes of presenting relevant findings and recommendations in reports.
• Sound knowledge of statistical methodology and the ability to use statistical software such as SPSS and R.