William & Mary

Position Title/Short Description

Full Text of JOE Listing:

The Global Research Institute (GRI) at William & Mary invites applications for a post-doctoral scholar position with a focus on geospatial and/or economic analysis of development projects financed by China. This position is designed to strengthen GRI’s research capacity in this area, increase the diversity of our scholarly community, provide a mentored learning experience to the postdoctoral fellow, and support and provide additional research opportunities for undergraduate students. GRI seeks to attract promising researchers and educators from different backgrounds, races, ethnic groups, and other diverse populations whose life experiences and research experiences will contribute significantly to the academic mission of William & Mary and GRI.

The postdoctoral scholar will support ongoing research on Chinese development finance at AidData and fully integrate into GRI’s thriving multidisciplinary international development research community. Additionally, s/he will teach one course and direct a team of undergraduate researchers for each year of the award. Throughout this period, s/he will receive mentoring from faculty members and/or senior researchers affiliated with GRI in various academic development areas including: his/her ongoing research interests, pursuing funded research, organizing an undergraduate research lab, and how to improve his/her classroom teaching.

This is a 12-month position, renewable for a second year contingent on performance. To apply, please visit the position listing at https://jobs.wm.edu/postings/44724.

Required Qualifications
• Have a PhD by the time appointment begins (June 2022) in economics, political science, public policy, geography/GIS, data science, computer science, or another relevant field;
• Have a strong interest in building and pursuing a policy research agenda that makes use of AidData’s Global Chinese Development Finance Dataset, Version 2.0 -- in particular, its geospatial features (see https://www.aiddata.org/data/aiddatas-global-chinese-development-finance-dataset-version-2-0 and https://github.com/aiddata/china-osm-geodata);
• Possess advanced quantitative methods training and expertise in: GIS and geospatial analysis, machine learning, distributed/parallel computing, data analytics;
• Demonstrate experience working with one or more of the following software and tools: Python and relevant GIS/ML packages (e.g., Rasterio, GeoPandas, Tensorflow, PyTorch), QGISmachine;
• Have strong organizational and communication skills

Preferred Qualifications
• Experience conducting externally-sponsored international development research;
• Engaged in applied/policy research that is directly relevant to China's Belt and Road Initiative;
• Experience working collaboratively on applied/policy research projects with large, multi-disciplinary teams;
• Track record of published in peer-reviewed academic journals and/or presenting research at major academic conferences;
• Experience preparing grant proposals and securing external research funds;
• Experience teaching and/or mentoring undergraduate students;
• Willingness/ability to travel overseas