Undergraduate Research Assistant

The Quality Talk research team is seeking an hourly employee to work on our federally funded research project housed in the College of Education. This employee will provide support for various research activities, including literature searches, developing materials, and collecting, scoring, and analyzing data.

The project is funded by the National Science Foundation and is aimed at enhancing mathematics teacher educators' capacity to support preservice teachers developing pedagogical knowledge and skills through reasoning-intensive mathematics discussions. The model and professional development approach used in the project, Quality Talk, has been shown in previous studies to increase teachers' discussion-based pedagogical content knowledge and efficacy as well as students' critical-analytic thinking and reasoning.

Responsibilities include coding, scoring, and analyzing video discourse data as well as data management such as scanning, scoring, and ensuring data integrity. Other research tasks may also be assigned. Training for these skills will be provided as needed.

Compensation for this part-time position starts at $15/hr.

Required Applicant Prerequisites:
* Enrollment in a relevant undergraduate program (e.g., Education, Human Development, Psychology)
* Successful completion of CITI Training
* Commitment to working 10 hours/per week
* In-person work on the UP campus of Penn State in a group setting

Preferred Applicant Qualities:
* Knowledge and/or prior experience with elementary and/or high school mathematics, science, and English language arts teaching and learning
* Prior research experience in any of the following: video coding and analysis; curriculum development; instrument and scoring rubric development; and/or qualitative data analysis

Applicants must apply online. Questions regarding this position can be directed to Dr. Murphy (pkm15@psu.edu).

Applicants should express interest by October 1, 2023, but materials will be accepted until the position is filled.

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