Research Job Opportunities

Position Overview

The Office of Sponsored Programs is responsible for ensuring the responsible stewardship of research funding, and overseeing the submission of proposals through review to ensure compliance with federal, State, University and sponsor regulations and guidelines.

The Associate Contract Review Officer (ACRO) is within the Office of Research and Economic Development (ORED), and works under the direction of the Contract Review Officer. The primary function of the Associate Contract Review Officer is to ensure the University complies with state, federal, and internal regulations and policies in the contracts it executes with external parties. This is done by reviewing, negotiating, and drafting sponsored research contracts, subcontracts, sub-awards, and proposals between the University and the external parties in order to ensure compliance with those regulations and policies. The ACRO must also work with individuals from state agencies, industry, non-profits, foreign entities, and other universities as well as people within the University of Idaho. The position is expected to work independently.

Job Duties

Ensure Compliance with Policies/Procedures/Laws by (Estimated effort: 85%):

• Reviewing, evaluating, and negotiating complex contracts with external sponsors of University research, education, and other sponsored activities
• Researching relevant laws, regulations, policies, and procedures that impact proposed contract language and assess the university’s ability to comply with any constraints; disseminating information to appropriate internal customers
• Consulting with internal (Office of Technology Transfer, VPR, Office for Research Assurances, compliance committees, etc.) and external (COGR, AAU, FDP, etc.) resources regarding contract issues
• Developing, reviewing and negotiating complex subcontracts derived from externally sponsored research contracts
• Coordinating and communicating with OSP staff regarding contract terms, compliance, and post award activities
• Monitoring the Federal Register, agency websites and listservs, and attending applicable conference and training opportunities to stay apprised of regulatory changes and best practices for managing sponsored projects
• Negotiating and providing white papers or other analysis of the issues identified; developing working relationships with General Counsel; contacting funding agencies to resolve problems
• Reviewing Requests for Proposals (RFPs) and other pre-award proposal documentation to ascertain compliance with obligations accepted when the proposal is submitted

Ensure Accountability for UI/ORED by (Estimated effort: 10%):

• Working with the Contract Review Officer to identify and develop administrative procedures to comply with federal and state laws and regulations, the Regents of the University policies, and generally accepted sponsored programs practices
• Providing analyses of issues to the Contract Review Officer and General Counsel; developing a work relationship with the Associate General Counsel
• Contacting funding agencies to resolve issues or concerns

Supports Continued Sponsored Programs and Research Efforts by (Estimated effort: 5%):

• Developing and participating in training programs to educate faculty, investigators, and staff, about state, federal, and university policies for research and research compliance
• Providing guidance and training to grant coordinators, administrators and principal investigators on sponsored research agreements and sub-awards
• Representing the needs of the CRU with respect to development of new processes and procedures

Requirements

Education

• Bachelor’s Degree

Experience

• Negotiating or conflict resolution
• Analyzing issues and recommending solutions
• Providing customer service
• Meeting deadlines or working in high pressure situations
• Working independently or with minimal supervision
• Sponsored funding administration

Other requirements

• None

Preferred Qualifications

• J.D., MBA, or MPA degree
• Previous experience negotiating and/or drafting grants and contracts
• Experience using Adobe Pro to make forms and compile documents
• Strong service orientation
• Working knowledge of 2 CFR 200 and other federal grants regulations
• Working knowledge of the Federal Acquisition Regulations, including the ability to determine which clauses are apply to a situation and when a clause is unacceptable
• Working knowledge of Idaho State Board of Education policies
• Using word processing, spreadsheet and email software
• Basic knowledge of intellectual property law
• Working knowledge of VERAS, TDX, and Banner

Physical Requirements

• None

Additional information

• Apply through the University of Idaho Careers page.
• In your application, please address all the minimum requirements in the Letter of Qualification. Preferential review of applicants to begin on April 16, 2025.

Position Overview

Innovative Agriculture and Marketing Partnership for Idaho (IAMP) is a USDA/NRCS-funded project that is incentivizing producers in Idaho to implement practices to reduce GHG emissions and increase soil carbon storage in seven agricultural commodities on more than 100,000 acres across the state. A project goal is to build supply chains for these commodities that connect producers using the methods with buyers across wholesale, retail and commodity markets. The position will work within the IAMP team and with its partners to bridge the gap between climate-smart farming practices and market demand.

This position is responsible for leading efforts in exploring and establishing innovative market opportunities for specified stakeholder produced commodities aligned with specific programmatic goals. This position identifies or initiates marketing opportunities, builds marketing partnerships, promotes products through branding and other promotional materials, throughout supply chains from producers to consumer. The work is done within a collaborative environment of the program that includes graduate education, research, outreach and education.

Duties may include:

• Manage, write and edit marketing material production across various mediums
• Facilitate partnerships between producers and buyers to promote climate-smart commodities
• Support farmers and commodity groups in meeting market requirements and opportunities, including certifications, traceability and sustainability metrics
• Design and implement strategies to increase market access for producers
• Participate in or organize promotional events in support of marketing
• Work with the IAMP internal team, implementing partners and administrating partners to promote the benefits of climate-smart agriculture to buyers and consumers
• Develop marketing plans, creative briefs and executive briefs for campaigns
• Other duties as assigned

Job Duties

Contribute to the overall success of the IAMP project by (Estimated effort: 100%):

• Lead efforts in exploring and establishing innovative market opportunities for climate-smart agricultural commodities produced through incentives from the Innovative Agriculture and Marketing Partnership project (IAMP)
• Develop and maintain relationships with producers, buyers (wholesale and retail) and commodity groups and other for-profit, nonprofit and governmental organizations involved in marketing sustainable, climate-smart or regenerative commodities
• Identify and pursue opportunities to market IAMP’s focal commodities, produced using climate-smart practices, through existing and emerging supply chains
• Connect IAMP-enrolled producers with buyers interested in climate-smart commodities
• Conduct market analyses to identify trends and demand for climate-smart commodities
• Support IAMP-enrolled producers in meeting market requirements such as certifications, traceability and sustainability metrics
• Plan annual food and beverage events that feature and celebrate sustainable production and the commodities produced through IAMP incentives
• Collaborate with partners to plan or participate in food and beverage events that highlight and celebrate commodities produced using sustainable, climate-smart or regenerative farming practices
• Work with IAMP agricultural economists to plan for and respond to results of willingness-to-pay studies and focus groups
• In coordination with IAMP project leadership
  • Solicit, select and manage contracts with service providers supporting IAMP’s marketing objectives
  • Solicit, select and manage subawards to partners delivering programmatic support for marketing climate-smart commodities produced by IAMP-contracted producers
• Work with regional partners including ISDA and its Idaho Preferred program, Salmon-Safe, major commodity groups and others to identify unique marketing opportunities for each IAMP commodity.
• Build strategy for long term sustainability of markets for climate smart commodities

Requirements

Education

• Master’s Degree in Marketing, Communications or Public Relations; a Bachelor’s Degree and two additional years of experience (for a total of five years) may substitute for a Master’s Degree

Experience

• Three years working in the marketing/brand development/social media space to include at least three of the following:
  • Developing and managing marketing plans
  • Experience in agriculture, food systems, supply chain coordination or sustainability initiatives
  • Analyzing marketing data to inform marketing direction
  • Experience with agricultural production, marketing or both
  • Experience establishing and coordinating contractor relationships and project implementation agreements
  • Content marketing story identification, development and versioning specific to published platforms
  • Social media management across multiple platforms
• Supervising and directing the work of individuals or leading project teams

Other requirements

• Must be able to work nonstandard business hours as needed
• Must be able to travel regionally on occasion

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with agricultural production, marketing or both
• Experience using a content management system for publishing web content
• Experience producing and editing informational and marketing collateral
• Knowledge of management and supervisory techniques
• Experience with project management applications
• Understanding of digital marketing best practices
• Event planning experience, especially in food and beverage or agricultural contexts
• Strong understanding of agricultural production and sustainability practices in Idaho, especially the target commodities of IAMP: wheat, barley, chickpea, hops, beef, potato, sugar beets
• Strong understanding of agricultural production and sustainability practices
• Proven ability to build and maintain relationships with stakeholders
• Excellent communication, negotiation and problem-solving skills
• Ability to manage multiple projects and meet deadlines

Physical Requirements

• None

Additional information

• Apply through the University of Idaho Careers page.
• In your application, please address all the minimum requirements in the Letter of Qualification. Preferential review of applicants to begin on April 24, 2025.

Position Overview

University of Idaho is seeking two Data Scientists to participate in an innovative National Science Foundation-funded project: “Crossing the Innovation Valley of Death: Democratizing Data and Artificial Intelligence for Research Administration.” The project offers the opportunity to pioneer the development of open-source AI solutions that will reshape how universities manage operations, while leading the democratization of data access and analysis across the research administration landscape. The goal is to drive institutional change by bridging the gap between cutting-edge technology and administrative efficiency. The candidates will help architect and implement AI-powered solutions to streamline workflows, design data integration strategies across multiple university systems and departments and create scalable, open-source tools that can be adopted by research administration units nationwide. One position will have a focus on technical development and implementation, while the other will combine technical expertise with training and knowledge dissemination responsibilities.

This posting will hire two applicants to meet the needs of this project.

Job Duties

Facilitate data engineering and integration efforts by (Estimated effort: 55%):

• Proactively identify, evaluate, organize and access existing data sources relevant to the GRANTED project mission and goals.
• Develop and nurture strong relationships with project partners internal and external to U of I.
• Work with Office of Sponsored Programs, IIDS, ORED, OIT, Institutional Research and others to periodically assess technical requirements of integrating project software into institutional workflows.
• Liaise with U of I offices, faculty, staff and leadership to acquire, document and ingest data into secure and approved repositories for archival, analysis and dissemination.
• Develop workflows compliant with relevant information security standards such as FERPA, NIST 800 171 and CMMC. Minimize use of sensitive personal information (SPI) where possible and participate in training and certification on handling sensitive data.
• Ensure interoperability with existing internal data repositories (e.g. VERAS, Banner, etc.) and external data networks (Web of Science, ORCID, PubMed, DataCite, Google Scholar, SciENcv, etc.)
• Deploy enterprise and open-source large language models to improve interoperability and process efficiency for research administration workflows.
• Benchmark and evaluate large language models for tasks related to process efficiency, automation and strategic analysis of institutional and external data.
• Fine tune, train and/or otherwise apply enterprise and open-source large language models for research administration use cases.
• Contribute to the design, maintenance, documentation and monitoring of processes and workflows related to research administration. These include data acquisition, preprocessing and maintenance, data integrity, data documentation (metadata) and data processing to enable automation, reproducibility and scalability.
• Design, implement and maintain databases in collaboration with technical staff within OSP, IIDS, OIT, ORED and other constituencies.
• Manage data through acquisition (database queries, web scraping), organization, cleaning and normalization and documenting data and processing steps with metadata.
• Develop and maintain modular software systems and related technologies to support interactive data management, visualization and dissemination.
• Build, customize and adapt AI applications, software and databases as needed to meet evolving partner and user-community requirements.

Lead development of innovative research data management and artificial intelligence solutions by (Estimated effort: 25%):

• Design and implement creative technical and logistical solutions to complex data management problems that pertain to U of I sponsored funding activity and impact.
• Leverage artificial intelligence, including large language models and multimodal LLMs to improve data quality and efficiency of data intensive workflows.
• Collaborate with GRANTED team, U of I staff and faculty and leadership to identify needs, customize solutions and train users and consumers.
• Train U of I staff on best practices for research data acquisition and data sharing, including how to use available AI applications, data sharing platforms and data management tools (e.g., searchable data catalog, data visualization and online collaboration systems and tools) and the importance of data security, data privacy and compliance with state and federal regulations.
• Develop and implement training materials necessary for the success of planned GRANTED tools and modules.
• Regularly engage with OSP and IIDS leadership to continually assess needs for additional training and communication.
• Participate in meetings, summits, conferences and other related events pertaining to the project objectives and activities.

Participate in partnership activities and events to build and maintain a community of practice by (Estimated effort: 15%):

• Travel to and host GRANTED partners at U of I to develop a robust community of practice for the GRANTED program.
• Attend relevant Research Administration meetings and conferences, such as NCURA Region VII annual meeting, NCURA National meeting, IMURA, etc.) to engage with partners, generate interest and partnerships for GRANTED and learn more about research administration needs.
• Present materials, tools and training at Research Administration events.

Continue professional development (Estimated effort: 5%):

• Travel to and host GRANTED partners at the U of I to develop a robust community of practice for the GRANTED program.
• Attend relevant Research Administration meetings and conferences, such as NCURA Region VII annual meeting, NCURA National meeting, IMURA, etc.) to engage with partners, generate interest and partnerships for GRANTED and learn more about research administration needs.
• Present materials, tools and training at Research Administration events.

Requirements

Education

• Bachelor’s Degree

Experience

• Two years in a data scientist or data engineering type position
• Programming in one or more computer languages commonly used in data science (e.g., Python, R, Julia, MATLAB)
• Designing and using relational databases, including demonstrated experience with writing SQL queries
• Collecting, organizing and managing large data sets
• Using APIs and web scraping tools to develop and connect large interoperable databases
• Implementing best practices for rigorous data security
• Working both independently and within a team managing multiple projects with competing deadlines

Preferred Qualifications

• A Masters or PhD in data science, data engineering, data analytics, computer science, business analytics, management information systems (MIS), statistics, mathematics, software engineering, informatics or related field
• Experience in a Research Administration setting, preferably at an Institution of Higher Education
• Developing and presenting data visualizations in static and interactive formats to communicate analyses, methods and results
• Experience providing training and giving presentations to groups of people
• Experience with retrieval augmented generation using large language models
• Proven ability to effectively communicate with peers and coworkers on complex research and technology issues in both group and individual settings
• Understanding of and experience with institutional research data
• Experience with the following technologies:
  • Web Development with HTML, CSS, Javascript as well as PHP or Python
  • Understanding of common metadata standards and practices
  • Web service Application Programming Interfaces (APIs)
  • JSON, XML, XSLT and related tools
  • Linux operating systems
  • Software configuration and versioning tools such as: Git/GitHub, Subversion, etc
  • AI integration using Langchain or other pipelines
• Experience with the use, training and fine-tuning of artificial intelligence and large language models
• Knowledge and understanding of computer security and compliance frameworks such as CMMC and NIST
• Experience writing IT programming specifications
• Experience in handling confidential information
• Experience with using high performance computing environments
• Excellent written and verbal communication and interpersonal skills as demonstrated in application materials
• Self-motivated, team-oriented attitude as demonstrated in application materials

Additional information

• Apply through the University of Idaho Careers page.
• In your application, please address all the minimum requirements in the Letter of Qualification. Preferential review of applicants to begin Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025.