Field Organizer, Rural Listening Project

United Today, Stronger Tomorrow Rural Listening Project
1099-Eligible, Short-Term Field Organizer Position January 2026 through March 2026AK, IA, SD, NE, and COThis position is remote but includes local travel. Applicants must be located in Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota, Colorado, or Alaska

UTST is seeking to hire a short term Rural Listening Project (RLP) Field Organizer to support RLP 2.0.UTST

UTST is a community power building hub and distributive organizing initiative that improves the lives of people living in rural and remote areas across the Upper Mid- and Mountain West and Alaska. We restore trust in democracy and mediating institutions by helping people understand their own agency in the decision making that impacts their lives and engaging them in strategic local, state, regional, and federal campaigns and programs that deliver concrete benefits.

Simultaneously, we are building the next generation of rural and remote leaders, many of whom hail from conservative communities, to meet the current political moment and lay the foundation for long term power building over the next decade.

This multi-state research initiative will investigate the attitudes and values of rural and remote Americans across eight states:
Alaska, Iowa, Utah, Wyoming, South Dakota, Nebraska, Colorado, and Montana. At a moment of national political transformation and technological disruption, this project seeks to identify the perspectives of rural residents in the states on a range of issues, including: energy and climate; artificial intelligence and emerging technology; corporations and the economy; trust in governing systems, like democracy, mediating institutions, civil society;

and immigration. By centering the perspectives of rural residents—especially moderates, Republicans, and independents—on economic, political, and technological shifts, the project will produce actionable findings that will help UTST and the broader field develop effective messaging and strategic organizing in rural communities.

On a short-term, 1099-Eligible Contract, RLP Field Organizers will listen, learn, and hope to understand how rural, small town, and remote community members (mostly conservative and independent) see the current moment. They will help find and probe people in rural communities and participate in one or more aspects of our research, including surveys, focus groups, or one-on-one interviews. They will also be responsible for helping follow up with research participants, and identify individuals for further leadership development or participation in UTST or our partner groups’ campaign work.

This will be a hybrid organizing project composed mostly of Zoom and virtual work, but will include opportunities for offline work and in-person engagement.

Field Organizers will be working with individual community members, grasstops leaders, and other stakeholders.

Working with the Project Lead, and directly supervised by the Field Coordinator, this position will help identify and recruit rural community members in our targeted states to participate in our research — including surveys, focus groups, and one-on-one conversations. Field organizers will also be responsible for following up with research participants in one-on-one conversations, via Zoom, phone, or in person, to identify individuals for further participating in UTST’s work at the local, state, or federal level.

The field coordinator will also work with the research team to help identify key stakeholders, elected officials, public safety officers, business and industry leaders, faith leaders, and civic and educational institutions who would be good candidates for inclusion in this research project.

• Help recruit participants into focus groups in our target rural communities. These will each be about 2 hours in length, mostly conducted via Zoom, with some in-person opportunities. The entire project will include between 12-16 focus groups, each of which should have between 8-15 participants.
• Reach out to 100-300 community leaders, organizational partners, and/or research participants, resulting in 10-20 one-on-one conversations…