Careers

General Summary: 

The Senior Data Specialist works in a team environment with one or more data specialists reporting to the Director of Institutional Research. The incumbent will contribute to campus-wide data-informed decision-making, in support of the implementation of the 10-year strategic plan, For The Times. The Senior Data Specialist is responsible for creating and managing large datasets, extracting information from them, and reporting data to a variety of internal and external audiences. The incumbent will be working in a SQL environment and will use Tableau to create data presentations. The incumbent will be responsible for reporting to the federal Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), the State of Massachusetts, the University of Massachusetts Board of Trustees and President, and to guidebooks like the US News. The position requires interaction with many academic and administrative areas of the campus, and colleagues at other campuses, in the University of Massachusetts President’s Office and the Massachusetts Department of Higher Education.

Examples of Duties: 

Under the Director of OIRAP this position is responsible for:

• The design, implementation, documentation, and maintenance of systems that retrieve data for official reporting purposes.
• Creating datasets and reports using database and statistical analysis tools such as SAS, SPSS, SQL and Tableau, in particular in a HelioCampus/AWS Redshift environment.
• Managing overall compliance with external reporting including, but not limited to, IPEDS, state-level reports to the Board of Higher Education (i.e. HEIRS), reports to the UMass President’s office, NCAA athletic graduation reports, reports to professional organizations, and college guides (e.g. US News surveys, College Board Surveys, etc.) This includes both preparing the data from snapshots or census data as necessary, complying with definitional requirements, ensuring accuracy and knowing when issues need to be referred to the Director, and coordinating the relevant campus offices to fulfill the reporting obligations.
• Responding to ad hoc internal data requests. The candidate must have the ability to work with faculty and staff to translate functional requirements into technical solutions, design and execute the solutions, and educate constituencies about data and reporting options.
• Other duties as assigned.
• Prepare compliance reports to external agencies including IPEDS, HEIRS and NCAA.
• Coordinating campus colleagues to provide compliance reports (eg, IPEDS reporting includes Finance, Library, Financial Aid etc. ).
• Serve on the project management teams to develop Tableau dashboard reporting.
• Provide technical expertise and assistance to campus offices in response to ad hoc requests.
• Produce reports at the request of the Director in support of projects undertaken for administrative decision making.

Qualifications: 

• Master’s degree required. Master’s degree in quantitative field or computer science or equivalent experience required.  Doctorate preferred.
• Five (5) to Seven (7) or more years experience working with reporting data, preferably in a higher education setting.
• Must possess a demonstrated attention to detail in order to achieve a high degree of accuracy in all work output.
• Must possess ability to collaborate effectively with colleagues within the division, university and central UMass units.
• Must possess ability to produce high quality and consistent results with assistance of team members and provide support to teammates with tackling complex projects.
• Demonstrated ability to work independently, especially to plan, organize and set priorities.
• Demonstrated ability to work well with multiple tasks and tight deadlines.
• Requires excellent understanding of data creation and maintenance, excellent communication skills, oral and written.
• Excellent and demonstrated programming and systems skills and ability to expand skills as necessary in:
• Extracting data from large operating systems (e.g. Peoplesoft, AWS Redshift)
• Statistical & data management software (e.g. SAS, SPSS, SQL, Tableau)
• All standard office software (e.g. Microsoft Office suite)
• Cross platform data communication

Application Instructions: 

Please apply online with your resume, cover letter and list of three professional references.

Review of candidates will begin following the application closing date. 

Only Internal candidates in the Professional Staff Bargaining Unit will be considered during the first 10 business days of the posting.  All other candidates will be considered after that period. 

Salary Ranges for the appropriate Pay Grade can be found at the following link: 

Grade:  32            

Salary Ranges

This is an exempt union position. 

All official salary offers must be approved by Human Resources.

UMass Boston is committed to the full inclusion of all qualified individuals. As part of this commitment, we will ensure that persons with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodations for the hiring process. If reasonable accommodation is needed, please contact HRDirect@umb.edu or 617-287-5150.