Social Science Researcher

San Marcos, TX

Texas State University

Posting Number: 2026757

Location:

San Marcos

Department:
Texas School Safety Center

Recruitment Type:
Open Recruiting

Job Type: Full-Time

Monthly Salary: $4,250-$6,117

Job Category:
Exempt

• Master's Degree in criminology, education, psychology,sociology, public policy, or related field.
• A minimum of three (3) years of professional experience conducting applied social science research or educational research.
• Demonstrated experience designing and applying social science research methodologies.
• Demonstrated experience developing data collection instrumentsfor social sciences (e.g., surveys, interview protocols, orrubrics, etc.), including managing surveys with standard surveysoftware (e.g., Qualtrics).
• Demonstrated experience applying quantitative social sciencetechniques (e.g., regression, ANOVA, etc.) using software packages(e.g., SPSS).
• Demonstrated experience with qualitative analysis technique sand software packages (e.g., NVivo).
• Highly attentive to detail and organization.

• Demonstrated experience conducting research directly related toeducational environments.
• Five (5) or more years of professional experience conductingapplied social science research or educational research.
• Documented educational training or research experience relatedto one or more of the following fields: mental health inschool-aged children, youth involvement in school safety,school-based law enforcement, or behavioral threat assessments.
• Demonstrated experience in technical, public policy, and/or legislative writing (outside of work related to academicdegree).
• Demonstrated experience with one or more of the followingtechniques: meta-analysis, advanced statistical sampling, andsurvey validation.
• Experience navigating Institutional Review Board (IRB) processes and human subjects protection protocols in educational or community settings.
• Documented authorship in peer-reviewed journal(s).
• Documented experience writing grant proposals.
• Demonstrated knowledge of Chapter 37 of the Texas Education Code.
• Demonstrated experience working with external collaborators and/or research participants on projects not associated with coursework.

The Texas School Safety Center (TxSSC) is an officialuniversity-level research center at Texas State University. TheTxSSC is tasked in Chapter 37 of the Texas Education Code and the Governor's Homeland Security Strategic Plan with key school safetyinitiatives and mandates. The TxSSC serves as the clearinghouse forthe dissemination of safety and security information through research, training, and technical assistance for K-12 schools andjunior colleges throughout the state of Texas.

As a result, Texashas become a national leader in school safety practices and isrelied upon for assistance and guidance from jurisdictionsthroughout the nation.

The TxSSC welcomes highly qualified candidates to apply for a Social Science Researcherposition in the Research and Evaluation (R&E) Division. The primary responsibility of this position is to conduct scholarly research focused on school safety and security. The R&EDivision is currently involved in projects connected to leadership and incident command during emergency situations, securitypersonnel on school campuses, emergency planning for students, gunstorage practices, teacher victimization, and school behavioralthreat assessment.

The successful candidate will expand thecapabilities of the TxSSC and have the unique opportunity to bepart of a collaborative team who support each other in projectconceptualization, study design, field implementation(quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods), analysis, anddissemination of research and evaluation findings to various stakeholder groups. All research and evaluation efforts aimto ensure that schools and communities across Texas are safe,secure, and healthy learning environments.

• Design appropriate methodologies to address topics related toschool safety and security.
• Conduct literature reviews on topics related to school safetyand security.
• Design and administer data collection procedures includingsurveys, focus groups, and interview protocols, as well as other appropriate data collection procedures.
• Conduct rigorous mixed-methods analysis, synthesizingquantitative survey results with qualitative narrative data.
• Stay current on innovative social science research methodologies and field-based data collection strategies.
• Disseminate information clearly and concisely in verbal and written formats to a variety of stakeholders including researcher sand practitioners.
• Develop and contribute to written reports for internal and external stakeholders, scholarly articles for peer-reviewed journals, grant proposals for private and government entities,scholarly presentations for national and state conferences, andother research-related products.
• Organize project materials by keeping detailed records toensure research activities are well-documented.
• Provide…