Careers Job Description
General Description
About the Data Collaborative for Justice (DCJ)
The Data Collaborative for Justice (DCJ) is a research institute launched at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in 2013. DCJ seeks to advance justice and equity through rigorous research and data-driven policy analysis on mass incarceration, racial disparities, bail reform, case backlog, pretrial diversion, low-level enforcement, and other justice reform topics. DCJ partners with reformers, think tanks, and government agencies in New York and maintains a small portfolio of partnerships around the nation. DCJ also provides technical assistance to the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice (MOCJ) of New York City to process administrative data and conduct criminal justice research, including data analysis, data engineering, and data science work. DCJ operates under the Research Foundation of the City University of New York (RF-CUNY).
About the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice (MOCJ)
The successful applicant will work closely with research, technical, and policy staff at the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice (MOCJ). MOCJ advises the Mayor of the City of New York on criminal justice policy. MOCJ develops and implements strategies to reduce crime and incarceration and promote fairness and legitimacy. MOCJ works with other city agencies, law enforcement, nonprofits, foundations, and others to implement data-driven strategies that address current crime conditions, prevent offending, and build the strong neighborhoods that ensure enduring safety. Over the past decade, the office has an extensive record of quality in-house research, funding, support for research by partner agencies, and publication of important data on criminal justice reforms and trends.
The Current Position
Overview
This position is for a Data Scientist who is capable and interested in using their analytical engineering tasks to inform NYC’s criminal justice policies under the MOCJ technical assistance project. The successful applicant would provide technical support in coding and data analysis to assist MOCJ in its large-scale anti-violence prevention and criminal justice reform efforts. Ideal candidates should have a strong interest in criminal justice research, excellent data science skills, and proven expertise with commonly used data science tools, such as SQL, R, and Python. Among other data sources, the position involves working with a highly complicated relational database that integrates data from both criminal justice agencies and nonprofit service providers. The definition of success is grasping what types of measures it is essential to track and analyze; coding in SQL and R to create such measures and merge them with others to create analysis-ready datasets; and having the necessary attention to detail to create informative results that are visually and conceptually clear to policymakers and practitioners.
Although the primary assignment would be to the MOCJ project, the applicant would also likely maintain at least one assignment at all times resulting in independent DCJ research publications, with subjects along the lines of those represented under the “Our Work” tab of our website. This added work may be delayed at the start of the position to prioritize database progress for MOCJ.
We would consider a Data Scientist at multiple points on the experience spectrum, but the position requires a high coding proficiency and commitment to DCJ’s focus and mission.
Other Duties
Responsibilities
Beyond the responsibilities outlined above, the Data Scientist’s work would also include the following:
- Design and implement analytical structures and reporting products in database environment on the cloud.
- Develop insightful reports to answer key criminal justice policy questions with advanced data science methods, such as text mining, functional programing etc.
- Integrate various data sources with sensitive information for research.
- Maintain and improve existing data products such as analytical reports, interactive documents, and dynamic data dashboards—with an eye to visual clarity, accuracy, and relevance to the policy issues at stake.
- Identify data opportunities to support the efforts of criminal justice reform.
- Design data-driven presentations and documents to translate findings to a policy audience.
- Contribute to independent DCJ research publications and to conversations within the DCJ team (as well as spanning the MOCJ partnership) about future research and policy ideas.
Qualifications
Qualifications
The successful candidate must have a broad range of skills, but above all, they must be curious, flexible thinkers who love learning new things and tackling challenges on a daily basis. In addition, the successful applicant should possess the following:
- Degree and experience:
- Bachelor’s degree in computer science, statistics, quantitative social science (public policy, criminal justice/criminology, or sociology), or other relevant discipline with minimum three years of experience with relevant quantitative research required; OR:
- Master’s degree in the one of the above fields (preferred).
- Proven ability in statistical analysis and technical expertise in data mining.
- Proven proficiency with SQL queries and analysis is required; knowledge of relational databases and data warehousing architecture also required; hands-on ETL development experience is a plus.
- Proven proficiency with at least one statistical programming languages (R, Python) is required.
- Experience with reporting and visualizing complex research products; hands-on experience with Tableau is a plus.
- Experience with cloud environments (AWS, Azure) is a plus.
- Excellent oral and written communication skills.
- A demonstrated interest in criminal justice. Prior work in criminal justice or related social justice is a plus, as is familiarity with New York City-specific criminal justice issues, data, and research (though these latter qualifications are not absolute prerequisites).
- Experience with using administrative data sets to explore complex policy questions.
- Ability to balance competing priorities, complex situations and tight deadlines.
- Ability to work independently in a fast-paced environment.
- Ability to work comfortably with a wide variety of people at different levels of technical and research proficiency and with different backgrounds.
Work Model: Hybrid in-person and remote.
Salary: Likely range of $80,000 to $115,000. Final salary will be based on the skills and experience of the successful applicant.
Benefits: Competitive health insurance plan with vision and dental; generous annual leave time and holiday schedule; 403b and Group Retirement Annuity; Life & disability insurance, and additional benefits from the RF-CUNY system available immediately or after a period of service.
To Apply:
Please submit a cover letter, resume, and list of three references.
For More Information:
Data Collaborative for Justice: https://datacollaborativeforjustice.org/
Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice: https://criminaljustice.cityofnewyork.us/
RFCUNY Benefits
RFCUNY Employee Benefits and AccrualsAbout the Research Foundation
The Research Foundation of The City University of New York (RFCUNY) was established as a not-for-profit educational corporation chartered by the State of New York in 1963. RFCUNY supports CUNY faculty and staff in identifying and obtaining external support (pre-award) from government and private sponsors and is responsible for the administration of all such funded programs (post-award).
RFCUNY stands between CUNY’s principal investigators (PIs) and the sponsors who support them and strives to fulfill its essential responsibilities to both groups. Working closely with individual PIs and Grants Officers on the campuses, RFCUNY oversees employment, accounting, audit, reporting, purchasing, and special responsibilities that include management of a planned giving program; liaison with governmental agencies and foundations; negotiation of agreements; facility construction and renovation; protection and commercialization of intellectual property; and compliance with applicable standards in research involving human subjects, animal care, environmental and radiological safety, and conflicts of interest.
Equal Employment Opportunity Statement
Key Features
Data Collaborative for Justice
Full Time
$80,000.00 - $115,000.00
Jul 10, 2023 (Or Until Filled)