Sports, Technology, and Learning Postdoctoral Position

Sports, Technology, and Learning Postdoctoral Position

Job Summary

The TIILT lab (tiilt.northwestern.edu) at Northwestern University invites applications for a
postdoctoral researcher to join our Sports Analytics team to work on NSF Award #2031467.
This project is a research practice partnership that bridges computer science and physical
education. The project team will work with K-5 physical education and coding teachers to create
learning activities that highlight the bi-directional opportunities for computing to improve
performance in athletics and for athletics to support CS learning. Integration of physical
computing and physical education will be realized through activities that involve testing,
critiquing, and designing custom sports wearables.

This project positions interest and participation in sports as an asset. It advances an authentic
and generative context for developing computing competencies, skills, and dispositions. This
may help disrupt existing negative perceptions of technology (and learning) and athletics as
being in opposition to one another. Additionally, this project develops CT among non-STEM
teachers. Across students and teachers, the goal is to contribute to shifting perceptions of valid
CS experiences and who can engage in CS. The research plan includes curriculum design,
professional development, and in-school implementation. The program will reach more than 650
students across three schools and 29 educators across the greater Chicago area.
Methodologically, this project uses a design based implementation research approach to study
the following questions: 1) What are the components of an authentic and generative in-school
learning experience that connects computing and athletics? 2) In what ways do these
experiences impact short-term and long-term student and teacher perceptions, interest,
knowledge and confidence with computing? 3) How do we appropriately re-envision
assessments of student learning within these expansive learning environments? These
questions will be addressed using a combination of data sources and analytic approaches.
This is a two year position.

Who We Are

The Technological Innovations for Inclusive Learning and Teaching (tiilt) Lab aims to improve
learning opportunities for students from under-served communities. Our work with technological
innovations includes:
1) co-designing activities with teachers and learners
2) creating interfaces that broaden participation in meaningful learning experience tools
3) developing analytic techniques for studying and supporting complex learning
environments
We position our work as inclusive, in that we endeavor to address historic and contemporary
disparities in inclusivity and social, racial and economic inequity. Furthermore, we work with
teachers, students, community members and parents, in hope of supporting the development of
positive learning ecosystems.

Key Responsibilities

● Mentoring and closely working with PhD students in the lab
● Leading project meetings related to Sports Analytics
● Coordinating programming with teachers and youth
● Writing and publishing papers
● Analyzing multimodal data and working with custom and commercial wearables

Qualifications

● PhD in Learning Sciences, Computer Science, CS Education, Information or related
field.
● Experience using quantitative (machine learning and statistics), qualitative (ethnography)
methodologies, and/or design of learning environments.
● Experience working with youth, teachers, families, and/or community members.
● Experience in any of the following areas (a) teaching computational thinking or
computer science, (b) responsible, ethical and equitable use of technology in teaching
and learning, (c) critical and equity based theoretical framings
● Additional experience in one of the following areas (a) physical computing,(b) teacher
professional development, (c) youth program development, (d) studying embodied
movement or athletics (e) artificial intelligence, (f) data science.
● Strong writing and communication skills as evidenced by publications and the ability to
conduct research in an interdisciplinary team.

To apply, please submit the following materials:

● Resume/CV
● Cover Letter responding to the post doc call
● List of References
● Professional Publications: one or two representative publications
Please email your application material to Marcelo Worsley (marcelo.worsley@northwestern.edu)
with the subject line “Sports Technology Postdoc Application.” Position is primarily remote until
pandemic is over; generally in-person afterward, with remote as a potential option.

Under-represented students are encouraged to apply.