Department Information







The Office of Early Childhood seeks to ensure all Colorado children develop within safe, stable and nurturing environments, cultivate resilience in early age, and arrive at kindergarten ready to succeed (school ready). The Office achieves this by providing leadership, guidance, and support to develop high quality environments for young children; promoting equitable access to inclusive programs and services for all children from birth through age eight; facilitating state and community partnerships that address the needs of young children and their families; and, providing professional development, technical assistance and resources for personnel in early childhood care and education settings.



The OEC Strategic Operations Unit supports the Office in all its strategic research, evaluation, data, process improvement and change management needs. This includes developing logic models, evaluation plans and performance metrics to explicitly identify the desired outcomes, and outputs associate with each Office program, as well as how Office activities are related to achieving them. The unit also collects, manages, analyzes and reports on the data accompanying these measures. Additionally, the unit conducts data analysis to inform management in decision making around public policy and program practice. Further, the unit is responsible for responding to external data requests from other agencies, partner organizations, the media, the public and the legislature. Finally, the unit works with program staff and external stakeholders to re-engineer processes to more effectively and efficiently achieve our desired outcomes.





Description of Job

What You'll be Doing

This position works as a professional data analyst for the Division of Early Care and Learning, and in this capacity supports the data needs of (A) the Colorado Child Care Assistance Program (subsidized child care), (B) child care licensing and (C) Colorado Shines (the State's Quality Rating and Improvement System for qualified licensed child care providers).



With the guidance of the Director of Strategic Operations, this position has the discretion to determine the processes used to research, collect, compile and synthesize a wide variety of data into reports that will be used by the unit leads within the Division of Early Care and Learning, the Division Director, the Director of the Office of Early Childhood, the Deputy Executive Directors of the Department, and the Executive Director of the Department. The position is responsible for anticipating difficulties the Office may face and effectively communicating this information to the senior management team.



Analyses conducted by this position support management decision making, influence daily programmatic practice, assist with grant evaluation, and are used as part of monthly C-Stat effort's (the Department's performance management system). Additionally, this position responds to internal and external data requests to answer policy questions and to improve programmatic practice.

Minimum Qualifications, Substitutions, Conditions of Employment & Appeal Rights

Minimum Qualifications:

Bachelor's degree from an accredited institution, with a major in Psychology, Sociology, Political Science, Economics, Human Services, Child Development, Social Work, Behavioral Science, Social Science or other related field. AND Three years professional experience conducting research and data analysis related to a social or behavioral science field. This experience must have involved long term research projects, long standing program evaluations, or ongoing quality improvement/performance management efforts (i.e. semester class projects would not count as long term). Experience must have included SOME of the following: (1) experience conducting program evaluation, (2) experience cleaning large datasets, (3) experience managing large datasets, (4) the use of statistical analysis software programs (e.g., SPSS, SAS, Stata or R), (5) experience with data visualization/Business Intelligence software (e.g., Tableau, Qlik etc.), (6) experience with administering Customer Relationship Management (CRM) databases (e.g., SalesForce, SAP AG, Microsoft Dynamics CRM etc.), (7) experience with GIS systems (e.g., ArcGIS etc.), (8) experience manipulating large relational databases and/or, (9) experience with SQL queries.



The successful candidate need not be an expert in each of these areas, but should be well versed in a few and be familiar with the basic principles involved for most.

Substitutions:

Professional experience in the above areas noted which provided the same kind, amount, and level of knowledge acquired in the required education, may be substituted on a year-for-year basis for the bachelor's degree. Additional appropriate education will substitute for the required experience on a year for year basis.



Definition of Professional Experience - Work that involves exercising discretion, analytical skills and judgment, and personal accountability and responsibility for creating developing, integrating, applying, and sharing an organized body of knowledge that characteristically is uniquely acquired through an intense education or training regimen at a recognized college or university; equivalent to the curriculum requirements for a bachelor's degree with major study in or pertinent to the specialized field; and continuously studied to explore, extend, and use additional discoveries, interpretations, and application and to improve outcomes.



Applicants using education as a substitution MUST supply unofficial transcripts before the application deadline to the Human Resources office; applications requesting this substitution without transcripts will NOT be considered.



Preferred Qualifications:

The preferred candidate will exhibit SOME of the following. The successful candidate need not be an expert in each of these areas, but should be well versed in a few and be familiar with the basic principals involved for each: Advanced degree in in the social sciences, behavioral sciences, or other related field;

Experience with program evaluation;

Experience with SalesForce or other CRM software;

Experience conducting research and data analysis for purposes of performance management;

Experience with SPSS, SAS, Stata, or R statistical analysis software;

Experience with SQL;

Experience with Microsoft Office, including Word, Excel, Power Point and Access;

Demonstrated working knowledge and expertise with research and evaluation methodologies;

Excellent communication skills both written and oral;

Highly developed interpersonal skills and abilities;

Demonstrated abilities in previous positions building relationships with internal and external stakeholders;

Experience in human services, especially early childhood;

Additional depth and breadth of job-related experience.





Conditions of Employment



The successful candidate in this position must be willing and available to submit to the following conditions: The successful candidate in this position will be willing to submit to and able to successfully pass a criminal background check.

The successful candidate in this position will also possess and maintain a valid Colorado driver's license and be able to independently travel throughout Colorado using personal transportation or a state vehicle to conduct customer visits.

APPEAL RIGHTS:

If you receive notice that you have been eliminated from consideration for the position, you may protest the action by filing an appeal with the State Personnel Board/State Personnel Director within 10 days from the date you receive notice of the elimination.



Also, if you wish to challenge the selection and comparative analysis process, you may file an appeal with the State Personnel Board/State Personnel Director within 10 days from the receipt of notice or knowledge of the action you are challenging.



Refer to Chapters 4 and 8 of the State Personnel Board Rules and Personnel Director's Administrative Procedures, 4 CCR 801, for more information about the appeals process. The State Personnel Board Rules and Personnel Director's Administrative Procedures are available at www.colorado.gov/spb.



A standard appeal form is available at: www.colorado.gov/spb. If you appeal, your appeal must be submitted in writing on the official appeal form, signed by you or your representative, and received at the following address within 10 days of your receipt of notice or knowledge of the action: Colorado State Personnel Board/State Personnel Director, Attn: Appeals Processing, 1525 Sherman Street, 4th Floor, Denver, CO 80203. Fax: 303-866-5038. Phone: 303-866-3300. The ten-day deadline and these appeal procedures also apply to all charges of discrimination.





Supplemental Information