Research Specialist I

Texas A&M University; Dallas (TX); On-site; USD 42,000 - 60,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health, dental, vision, life insurance

Paid holidays

Paid time off

Retirement program

Wellness program

Job summary

Texas A&M AgriLife’s Healthy Living program in Dallas seeks a Research Specialist I to support community-engaged health research. You will work with the Healthy Living team on study design, data collection, and dissemination, under supervision from the associate director.

This role emphasizes collaboration with faculty and staff across the program. The position requires a bachelor’s degree and four years of related experience, with strong communication, organizational, and data-handling skills.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in related field or equivalent experience.
• Four years of related experience.
• Ability to handle confidential information with discretion.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills.
• Strong planning and organizational skills.
• Proficiency with Word processing, spreadsheets, databases and presentation tools.

Responsibilities

• Support study design, operations, and reporting with faculty and research team.
• Coordinate IRB human subjects protocols and research procedures.
• Assist with recruitment, data collection, field work, and logistics.
• Develop and refine curricula and materials for chronic disease prevention.
• Assist in grants, reports, manuscripts, and presentations.

Skills

Communication skills

Organizational skills

Initiative

Education

Bachelor's degree

Master's degree (preferred)

Tools

Qualtrics

REDCap

Job description

Research Specialist I

Texas A&M AgriLife is comprised of the following Texas A&M University System members: Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service, Texas A&M AgriLife Research, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Texas A&M University, Texas A&M Forest Service, Texas A&M Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Laboratory. As the nation’s largest most comprehensive agriculture program, Texas A&M AgriLife brings together a college and four state agencies focused on agriculture and life sciences within The Texas A&M University System. With over 5,000 employees and a presence in every county across the state, Texas A&M AgriLife is uniquely positioned to improve lives, environments and the Texas economy through education, research, extension and service.

Click here to learn more about how you can be a part of AgriLife and make a difference in the world!

Position Information

Texas A&M AgriLife’s Institute for Advancing Health Through Agriculture (IHA) Healthy Living program, based at the AgriLife Center at Dallas, seeks an experienced Research Specialist I to work in close collaboration and coordination with the Healthy Living team, led by IHA Associate director, Dr. Rebecca Seguin-Fowler, whose work focuses on community-engaged research to address and ameliorate health disparities. The Research Specialist I, under general supervision, works collaboratively with the Healthy Living team to plan, develop, and implement projects, providing technical and operational program and research support.

Why Work at Texas A&M AgriLife?

When you choose to work for Texas A&M AgriLife, you become part of an organization that is an established leader in agriculture and life sciences with a wide range of capabilities to meet the needs of our statewide, national, and international constituents. In addition, Texas A&M AgriLife offers a comprehensive benefit package including the following:

• Health, dental, vision, life and long-term disability insurance with Texas A&M AgriLife contributing to employee health and basic life premiums
• 12-15 days of annual paid holidays
• Up to eight hours of paid sick leaveand at leasteight hours of paid vacation each month
• Automatic enrollment in theTeacher Retirement System of Texas
• Employee Wellness Initiative for Texas A&M AgriLife

Responsibilities

• Work closely with faculty and the research team to support the implementation of ongoing studies and the development of new ancillary research, including study design, operations, and reporting.
• Design and assist with managing research project operational procedures, including preparing and coordinating IRB human subjects research protocols.
• Assist with study participant recruitment, data collection, field work, and management of project-related logistics.
• Contribute to the development and refinement of curricula and program materials for chronic disease prevention and health promotion, ensuring accuracy and consistency.
• Assist with preparing grant applications and proposals to funding agencies; develop and edit reports, manuscripts, scientific presentations, manuals, and other dissemination products for various audiences.
• Conduct literature reviews to inform the design, implementation, and evaluation of community-engaged health interventions and/or scientific publications.
• Assist with data cleaning, management, and preliminary statistical analyses across various data types; maintain thorough documentation and prepare reports, tables, and figures for manuscripts, presentations, and grant proposals.
• Assist with data management, data cleaning, documentation, acquisition, and merging, and statistical analyses (qualitative and quantitative) across various data types.
• Provide technical and administrative support to research teams, including facilitating data sharing and ensuring compliance with data integrity and reporting requirements under the direction of senior staff.
• Assist in the development and management of online research tools (e.g., Qualtrics, REDCap, etc.) to support data collection, analysis, and evaluation.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in related field (e.g., public health, nutrition, exercise science, health communication, health administration, epidemiology, biostatistics, etc.) or equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Four years of related experience.
• Professional demeanor and demonstrated ability to manage and safeguard confidential information with the utmost discretion and professionalism, ensuring sensitive data is handled securely and in compliance with privacy policies.
• Ability to take initiative, work independently, multitask, work cooperatively with others, and manage priorities and tasks as assigned.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills.
• Outstanding planning and organizational skills.
• Knowledge of word processing, spreadsheet, database, and presentation applications, including Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Teams, etc.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master’s degree in related field (e.g., public health, nutrition, exercise science, health communication, health administration, etc.).
• Fluent in Spanish and English, verbal and written.
• Research background, including experience with community-engaged research and evaluation projects, specifically research management, data collection and/or experience with implementation of clinical research studies.
• Experience coordinating research projects in the following areas: maternal and early childhood nutrition; underserved populations; minority and urban health; food systems; food and nutrition security; community-based health behavior interventions.
• Experience conducting human subjects research and managing Institutional Review Board (IRB) applications.
• Experience with scientific writing, including proposal preparation and writing, developing written reports, and editing manuscripts and documents.
• Experience with statistical modeling and management of research datasets; statistical programming languages (e.g., R, SPSS, Stata, SAS), data visualization tools (e.g., Tableau, Power BI), and database applications.
• Knowledge and understanding of the mission and role of the Land Grant University System, including community-campus partnership and the Extension system.

Salary

Salary: Compensation for this position is commensurate based on the selected candidate’s qualifications.

Job Location

Dallas, Texas

Job Type

Staff

Equal Opportunity & Diversity

Equal Opportunity/Veterans/Disability Employer. The Texas A&M University System is one of the largest systems of higher education in the nation, with a statewide network of twelve universities, eight state agencies, a comprehensive health science center, Texas A&M-Fort Worth and Texas A&M-RELLIS. The A&M System is committed to providing an educational and work environment that is conducive to the personal and professional development of each employee. Each member institution provides equal opportunity and access to all students, employees and prospective employees. External Applicants - Applicants not currently employed by a Texas A&M System member may Search Postings and apply for positions within one or more A&M System members by selecting the job posting. Internal Applicants - This site lists job postings throughout The Texas A&M University System. It is intended for applicants not currently employed by a member of the system. Current employees should apply for jobs on the Internal Career site. The Texas A&M System is an Equal Opportunity/ Veterans/ Disability Employer.