Research & Impact Officer

Reports to:

Executive Director

Mission Fit

A mission this large is easy to claim and hard to prove. The Research & Impact Officer designs and runs the research agenda that lets the Foundation say, with evidence rather than assertion, what its work is actually doing to civic participation — and to publish that honestly, including where it falls short.

What You'll Own

Design and execute the Foundation's civic impact research agenda.

Define what "impact" means in measurable terms for each Foundation program, and build the measurement into the program rather than bolting it on afterward.

Publish findings — to funders, partners, and the public — with the same honesty standard the Foundation holds everywhere else: specific, verifiable, and unafraid to report a disappointing result.

Ensure the platform's effect on civic participation is rigorously documented, not just narratively claimed.

What Success Looks Like

Research output that the Grants Specialist can put directly into a funder report and that the Communications Director can put directly into public-facing content, because it's already rigorous and already honest. A body of evidence that grows over time — the Foundation's own accountability record, not just its marketing.

You'll Thrive Here If

You have real research chops — program evaluation, civic engagement research, or applied social science — and you're allergic to research that's designed to justify a conclusion rather than test one.

You can write for two audiences at once: a footnoted methodology for funders and a plain-language finding for everyone else.

You're comfortable publishing a null or negative result if that's what the data says.

Reporting & Structure

Reports to the Executive Director. Coordinates with the Grants Specialist (funder reporting) and the Communications Director (public-facing findings).

Structure & Compensation

This role's shape isn't fixed in advance. Full-time is the default assumption, but we're open to part-time or contract structures for the right expertise. Compensation is scoped individually based on experience and the shape of the engagement, not a pre-set band. Tell us what availability and structure would let you do this well, and we'll build the role to match.