The Learning Sciences and Technologies PhD Program (LS&T) at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) invites applications for anticipated tenure-track positions at the assistant or associate professor level to begin in the 2015 academic year.
WPI’s LS&T program is small, but intensely successfully, and has raised close to $20 million in funding to support its research.
Applicants must have an earned doctorate, a record of research publications with high impact, external funding, and a strong record of mentoring graduate students or postdoctoral researchers, appropriate to rank. Appointment, as either assistant or associate professor, and tenure home department will depend on the professional background of the successful candidate, but we are looking for a candidate with a psychology or mathematics education background if possible. Teaching and mentoring of students are required. All research areas will be considered, although preference will be given to those that appear to complement and extend the interests of current LS&T learning scientists and affiliated faculty. Of particular interest is a candidate who can propose studies to be run inside WPI’s ASSISTments platform, which is used by 50,000 students a year, mostly in middle school mathematics. Eighteen peer-reviewed publications have already been published using this platform.
LS&T is an interdisciplinary, program at WPI with the mission to conduct research that advances our understanding of how students learn. Visit http://www.wpi.edu/academics/lst.htmlto learn more about the LS&T. While WPI is small, we work with researchers from Harvard, Berkeley, Vanderbilt, Stanford, Carnegie Mellon, UMASS, University of Notre Dame, and University of Illinois. Learn more about how researchers use ASSISTments here: http://www.aboutus.assistments.org/university-researcher.php
We encourage candidates to run a study with ASSISTments and we can provide assistance to make this happen. For more information on running experiments in ASSISTments, we are hosting a webinar July 28, 2014, at noon (Eastern time zone), to describe the process. Sign up here to learn more. Video of the webinar will be available after July 28,2014.
WPI is flexible in the candidate’s background, but being able to teach classes in cognitive psychology, educational psychology, memory, motivation, and other areas relevant to increasing student learning and engagement in K12-16. A candidate would be expected to teach a graduate class in their own area. While the LS&T does not run a teacher preparation program, a background in education research is needed.
Worcester Polytechnic Institute is an equal opportunity / affirmative action employer. Women and minorities are encouraged to apply. The formal system to accept applications is not yet available, but you can ask questions to Neil T. Heffernan [nth@WPI.EDU] Co- Director, Learning Sciences & Technologies, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, MA 01609.