Project Manager, Chicago Urban Heritage Project

Department

College Chicago Studies & Experiential Learning

About the Department

Chicago Studies supports academically rich collaborations between instructors, students, and academic and community partners to leverage Chicago as an illuminating locus for study. In so doing, it extends the University of Chicago's reputation as a premiere space for place-based, interdisciplinary urban studies. As one of the offices that support teaching and research innovation across the undergraduate College, Chicago Studies has historically served as a resourcing platform and networking space for course instructors interested in teaching about and with the city. More recently, Chicago Studies has offered its own curricular, undergraduate research, and para-curricular opportunities in response to growing interest from students and collaborating academic units, including the Chicago Urban Heritage Project.

Job Summary

The part-time Project Manager (PM) provides technical expertise for day-to-day management of the Chicago Urban Heritage Project (CUHP). A collaboration between Chicago Studies and the Center for Digital Scholarship at the University of Chicago Library, this initiative has garnered significant interest from student researchers, instructors, and citywide partners. In addition to overseeing the current project and its publication, the PM will contribute to efforts to secure external funding for its regional expansion.

Responsibilities

• Manages Chicago Urban Heritage Project, overseeing research design and implementation, student RA hours and scheduling, and project exhibition.
• Advances computer vision, machine learning, and GeoAI research to extract geospatial data from scanned historical maps, and remains in conversation with other research leaders in the field.
• Designs and develops web-based, publicly-accessible research tools leveraging UChicago AI resources, such as Claude Enterprise and PhoenixAI, to streamline undergraduate researchers' GIScience workflows to process datasets derived from the open-source CUHP GeoAI pipeline.
• Maintains strict data quality standards to ensure that CUHP produces a cohesive dataset spanning more than one million building entries that is legible to the general public while also useful for geospatial analysis by interdisciplinary researchers.
• Presents project progress at third-party events and conferences, and continues to publish findings in peer-reviewed academic journals.
• Hires, trains, and supervises undergraduate research assistants and on-campus student project manager(s) to implement an educational research cohort that provides students with hands-on GIS and applied data science experiences.
• Serves as liaison to UChicago Library's Center for Digital Scholarship, a key partner in CUHP's design, execution, publication, and expansion.
• Supervises the management, training, and supervision of student researchers associated with the Chicago Urban Heritage Project, including ongoing participation in weekly team meetings and project Slack channel.
• Develops student-, instructor-, and community-facing programming to expand recruitment, participation, and use of datasets.
• When requested, delivers technical demonstrations of project components and findings in support of undergraduate courses and promote broader aims of Chicago Studies and its partners.
• Collaborates with the Center for Digital Scholarship and other project partners to secure external grant funding for extension of this research initiative.
• Helps coordinate events, researches logistics, assists with planning and preparing presentations, event outreach, and post-event write ups.
• May assist with other administrative projects as needed and acquire higher level guidance and skills.
• Performs other related work as needed.

Minimum Qualifications

Education:

Minimum requirements include a college or university degree in related field.

Work Experience:

Minimum requirements include knowledge and skills developed through < 2 years of work experience in a related job discipline.

Certifications:

• --

Preferred Qualifications

Experience:

• Background working with students and academic appointees, including faculty, instructors, and postdocs.
• Project management experience.

Working Conditions

• This is a part-time position of approximately 19 hours per week.

Application Documents

• Resume/CV (required)

The University of Chicago uses AI-assisted tools to streamline and augment some recruitment processes; however, AI is not used to make hiring decisions.

When applying, the document(s) MUST be uploaded via the My Experience page, in the section titled Application Documents of the application.

Job Family

Administration & Management

Role Impact

Individual Contributor

Scheduled Weekly Hours

19.5

Drug Test Required

No

Health Screen Required

No

Motor Vehicle Record Inquiry Required

No

Pay Rate Type

Hourly

FLSA Status

Non-Exempt

Pay Range

$25.00 - $33.00

The included pay rate or range represents the University's good faith estimate of the possible compensation offer for this role at the time of posting.

Benefits Eligible

This position is not eligible for benefits.

Posting Statement

The University of Chicago is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or expression, national or ethnic origin, shared ancestry, age, status as an individual with a disability, military or veteran status, genetic information, or other protected classes under the law. For additional information please see the University's Notice of Nondiscrimination.

Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should call 773-702-5800 or submit a request via Applicant Inquiry Form.

All offers of employment are contingent upon a background check that includes a review of conviction history. A conviction does not automatically preclude University employment. Rather, the University considers conviction information on a case-by-case basis and assesses the nature of the offense, the circumstances surrounding it, the proximity in time of the conviction, and its relevance to the position.

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