Department: University of Cincinnati School of Criminal Justice

Rank: Research Associate

Review of Applications

The review of applications will begin immediately and continue until the position is filled.

Department Summary

The top-ranked School of Criminal Justice (SoCJ) is home to over 1,000 students pursuing Bachelor’s, Master’s, and Doctoral Degrees. Through classroom instruction, engaged and interactive mentoring, and close connection with agencies nationally and internationally, the highly productive and experienced faculty foster the production, translation, and dissemination of rigorous, multi-disciplinary science to drive impactful change and improve theoretical understanding and practical action across many sub-disciplines of criminal justice and criminology.

Job Overview

The research associate selected for this opportunity will coordinate evaluation services and conduct mentored research under both Dr. Sarah Manchak and Dr. Cory Haberman and will serve his/her appointment jointly within the Center for Criminal Justice Research (CCJR) and the Institute for Crime Science. The candidate’s primary responsibilities will be to (1) provide technical assistance to, and coordinate the evaluation of, Hamilton County, OH and Region 2 grantee sites for the One Ohio Recovery Foundation (Manchak/CCJR), and to (2) assist the PI (Haberman/ICS) on several evaluation and research projects related to policing. Responsibilities across both roles includes (a) attendance at all relevant trainings and webinars related to the funded projects; (b) supervision of graduate assistants and undergraduate students assigned to assist with the projects; (c) oversight of data safety and integrity; (d) attendance at evaluation-relevant team meetings and meetings with grantee sites; (e) training and oversight of data collection and analysis, (f) lead or contribute to interim reports, final reports, and project presentations. Evaluation service include but are not limited to: survey administration and analysis; analysis of secondary data across a variety of data sources; conduction of focus groups and interviews; and observations and content coding.

Essential Functions

• Assist with the coordination of research studies in a particular discipline.
• Make independent contributions to projects and studies based on professional training or functional experience.
• Solve problems using combined research knowledge.
• Independently works on whole projects/problems.
• Contribute to the collective team effort.
• Perform statistical and graphical analysis of data, interpret data and assist in judging validity of data.
• Analyze research results.
• Organize data search and analysis procedures.
• Assist in establishing test controls, criteria and research standards.
• Assist in the design of complex data processing systems to analyze research data.
• Accomplish assigned results for project/studies, or for significant aspects of larger, complex assignments.
• Serve as a seasoned level researcher.
• May provide direct and/or indirect supervision to exempt and non-exempt staff (i.e., hiring/firing, performance evaluations, disciplinary action, approve time off, etc.). 
• Perform related duties based on departmental need. This job description can be changed at any time.

Required Education

Bachelor’s Degree required in a related field.

Required Experience

• In-depth knowledge of specialized field, process or discipline.
• May require experience with specialized software programs. 

Additional Qualifications Considered

• PhD from an accredited institution of higher education in Criminal Justice or related discipline; or MA/MS + doctoral level training that includes completion of coursework and completion of dissertation proposal defense (i.e., student is ABD)
• In-depth knowledge of program evaluation
• Experience providing technical assistance regarding data collection, measurement, and records management
• Experience working with criminal justice agencies and community partners
• Demonstrated research and evaluation skills, including report writing
• Demonstrated data management and analysis experience
• Demonstrated verbal and written communication skills
• Ability to work collaboratively as part of a team

Physical Requirements/Work Environment