Instructional Design Specialist

• Remote
• New York, New York, United States
• $75,000 - $85,000 per year
• Education

CDI seeks a detail-driven Instructional Design Specialist to maintain our growing catalog of online and live programs, keeping content accurate, accessible, and ready to help partners bridge divides.

The Constructive Dialogue Institute (CDI) is a non-partisan, non-profit dedicated to equipping the next generation of Americans with the skills to communicate and collaborate across lines of difference. We work with U.S. colleges and universities by providing co-curricular programming for students, professional development for faculty and staff, and strategic guidance to leadership. Our goal is to foster constructive dialogue at every level of the institution and to create the conditions for lasting organizational change.

CDI was co-founded by psychologist Jonathan Haidt, the bestselling author of The Righteous Mind and The Anxious Generation.

The Instructional Design Specialist keeps CDI's growing catalog of learning experiences accurate, accessible, and current. Reporting to the Senior Director of Education, this role independently manages maintenance and version control for Perspectives, our flagship online program, and our established live programs.

You’ll work closely with the Education team and serve as a key link to the Live Programs team, turning feedback from facilitators, partners, and learners into clear, tracked content updates. You’ll also partner with Product on platform QA and support Senior Curriculum Designers on partner-facing design projects. This is a hands‑on role with a clear growth path. It’s well suited to someone early to mid-career in instructional design who is exceptionally precise, enjoys building systems as much as applying learning science, and wants their work to help campuses bridge divides.

• Plan and implement approved revisions to established live programs, managing the release schedule in coordination with the Live Programs team.
• Keep supporting materials in sync when source content changes, including facilitator guides, slide decks, participant handouts, and survey items.
• Support version control for Perspectives: including maintaining the changelog, archiving superseded versions, and making sure any cohort’s content can be reconstructed on request.

• Draft and revise module text, discussion prompts, activities, and assessments grounded in CDI’s research base and instructional design standards, for review by the Senior Director of Education.
• Support Senior Curriculum Designers on partner-facing design projects, with room to take on more design ownership over time.

• Run pre‑release QA for Perspectives in partnership with Product: proofread, verify links and media, check accessibility (alt text, captions, plain language, WCAG conformance), and test the learner experience end to end before content goes live.
• Own the content feedback backlog, working with the Live Programs team to consolidate input from facilitators, partners, learner surveys, and support tickets into one tracked queue. Categorize requests, flag recurring issues, and recommend fixes.

• 3+ years of professional experience
  • At least 1+ years of experience building or maintaining learning content in instructional design, curriculum development, ed tech, or a related role. Graduate assistantships, practicums, and substantial volunteer work count.
• Grounding in instructional design fundamentals
  , such as backward design, measurable learning objectives, and adult learning principles.
• Hands‑on experience with an…