Overview
Work type: Faculty – Pro Tempore
Location: Eugene, OR
Department: The Institute for Resilient Organizations, Communities, and Environments
Rank: Research Assistant
Annual Basis: 6 Month
Review of Applications Begins January 29, 2025
Special Instructions to Applicants
To ensure consideration, please include the following with your online application:
• Current resume/CV.
• Please submit a cover letter providing detailed information on your relevant experience and what your specific interests are in the areas we work in. In the cover letter please identify which type of position you are applying for: Research Assistant, Research Associate or Postdoctoral Scholar.
Department Summary
The Institute for Resilient Organizations, Communities, and Environments (IROCE) is a center for innovative, interdisciplinary research at the nexus of ecological, economic, and social sustainability. The IROCE is a thriving center for collaborative research, technical assistance, and policy education. The Institute produces information to help resolve complex problems and enable people to sustain the economies and environmental systems that support their communities. Faculty in the Institute focus on a wide variety of issues including natural resource management, land use, climate change, rural development, transportation, green building, alternative energy, natural hazards, and environmental education. The IROCE has a number of program areas, including the Ecosystem Workforce Program, Disaster-Resilient Universities network, Location Innovation Lab, and several individual research initiatives.
Position Summary
This position with the Ecosystem Workforce Program supports a wide variety of quantitative and qualitative social science research and outreach related to landscape conservation and management, forest restoration, policy and management of public lands, and enhancing community resilience to wildfire and wildfire smoke events. These activities are designed to inform public policy, national forest management, community-based forestry, and efforts to build residence in rural and urban communities. While most of the projects focus on Oregon, the research has broad relevance across the American West.
Approximately half of the effort for this position will be devoted to supporting a project focused on identifying opportunities for advancing equitable forest and fire workforce pathways. This project is focused on characterizing and reimagining the workforces supporting community and land-based fire resilience in the western US, including highlighting key obstacles and opportunities for change.
This position will work on:
1) Identifying and understanding the multiple pathways that lead to these jobs, and the associated barriers that keep people from pursuing or advancing along those paths.
2) Identifying opportunities to expand, enrich and reimagine these careers across scales, to foster more secure, good-paying, equitable, skilled jobs and multiple workforce sectors.
3) Community and practitioner-guided research, responsive to the expertise of individuals in community and land-based fire resilience.
This project will gather and synthesize information to share results and recommendations that characterize these workforce challenges and opportunities for future investment or policy change. The intended results of this project include research, policy briefs and reports geared toward policy and decisionmakers/land managers/community organizers and facilitated learning opportunities with interested groups. This project also aims to collectively advance understanding and partnership around the intersection of multiple sectors working on fire resilience, including fire, forestry, and home hardening in the western US with an anticipated focus on Oregon and 2-3 other states in the western US.
This position will:
• Involve facilitation and engagement, including co-creating and managing advisory group(s) of fire workforce professionals, community members, and youth mentees, with emphasis on empowering diverse participation.
• Use qualitative methodologies to elicit information, such as conducting focus groups, participant observation, and interviews.
• Potentially use quantitative methodologies to conduct survey-based data collection and analysis, and/or analyze existing workforce data (e.g. contracting data).
• Involve literature and document review, key informant discussions and synthesis to inform project design.
We welcome a broad spectrum of candidates and invite applications from individuals who are underrepresented in the profession. Additionally, candidates who have worked with people from diverse identities and backgrounds and who have a commitment to inclusivity are encouraged to identify their experiences and interests.
This position will be based in Eugene, Oregon with expectation of travel for fieldwork and potential for a hybrid work arrangement.
Minimum Qualifications
• MA/MS (or BA/BS with at least 2 years of relevant professional experience) in applied natural resource social science in fields such as forestry, environmental studies, public policy, geography, political science, rural sociology, history, planning, anthropology or other related fields. Significant professional experience may substitute for a bachelor’s degree for highly qualified individuals.
• Experience with some combination of natural resource policy and management, community-government relations, collaboration, climate change, sustainable rural development, forestry or ecology, land use or transportation policy, green building, health policy, or a related field.
• Demonstrated experience with group convening, focus groups, facilitation and related activities.
• Demonstrated experience with some combination of environmental policy and management; workforce development or training; labor economics; community-government relations; collaboration; sustainable rural development; fire suppression, forestry or home hardening businesses and workforce(s); or a related field.
• Demonstrated experience working with/within underserved, under-resourced or historically marginalized groups and communities, including for example, experience with inclusive and culturally-responsive practices.
Professional Competencies
• Knowledge of a variety of quantitative and qualitative social or natural science research methods, and ability to learn new methods as needs arise.
• Ability and willingness to travel regionally and nationally, including to remote, rural communities.
• Effective communications skills, including ability to write publications and documents and deliver presentations for diverse audiences.
• Ability to solve problems quickly and efficiently and learn new methodological skills.
• Strong organizational skills, attention to detail, and good time management.
• Ability to manage multiple tasks and maintain overall program mission.
• Ability to work cooperatively in a team environment.
• Ability to organize, convene and facilitate diverse groups.
• Ability to solve problems quickly and efficiently and learn new methodological skills.
• Commitment to empowering individuals and communities who have been historically excluded from the fire field and fire policy discussions.
Preferred Qualifications
• MS or PhD in related field.
• Specific knowledge and experience related to community-level social science research and outreach in natural resources conservation, landscape/forest management, and wildfire.
• Demonstrated expertise in ethnographic fieldwork in rural community settings.
• Experience with graphic design and layout, preparation of reports and factsheets, and/or website design.
• Experience and knowledge of ArcPro or other GIS software.
• Experience using Adobe Illustrator/Photoshop/InDesign.
• Experience and knowledge of SPSS, R or other statistical applications.
• Spanish fluency.
• Experience working in and with Tribal/Indigenous communities.
• Experience working with youth (16-30).
• Experience with or knowledge of Indigenous and Decolonizing Research Methodologies and/or Participatory Action Research.
• Experience working in policy venues on related topics.
• Experience working with people from diverse identities and backgrounds, e.g. people with racialized, working class, rural, urban, LGBTQIA2S+, and/or marginalized gendered identities.
• Specific knowledge and experience related to federal, state or local-level workforce development, training and recruitment for fire, forestry and home hardening careers.