Research Associate – Public Health Specialist

This role’s primary responsibility will be to provide technical assistance (including consultation and coaching) as well as skill-building education via synchronous and asynchronous trainings, webinars, and resource development to communities that have received state funding from the Indiana Division of Mental Health and Addiction, which may include onsite visits as well as utilizing various technologies including email, telephone, zoom, websites, and other online modalities. The candidate will work as part of a technical assistance team but will ultimately be directly responsible for supporting multiple communities as the primary point of contact for technical assistance.

Typically, this technical assistance will take the following forms:

• Offering technical assistance in prevention process for all competencies across the 10 essential public health services and the Strategic Prevention Framework, including assessment and qualitative and quantitative data utilization, organizational and community-level capacity development, comprehensive strategic planning and program selection, use of evidence-based models with assurance of fidelity and population saturation, prevention infrastructure and coalition development, and evaluation framework application and utilization.
• Offering training, work sessions, meetings, consultations, phone calls and webinars to allow for resource sharing, coaching, fiscal compliance, report requirements, and capacity building.
• Providing feedback on data assessments, reviewing reports, and giving guidance for community planning and implementation.
• Creating webinars, resource documents, worksheets, and tailored tools to support the milestones and benchmarks associated with implementation of the Strategic Prevention Framework with fidelity.
• Occasionally offering one-on-one coaching, group instruction, facilitated planning, or resource sharing.

Because Prevention Insights is a grant- and contract-funded organization, employees often operate in multiple work areas at once. While technical assistance will be the primary work area, the candidate will likely be asked to participate in other projects on an ad hoc basis to contribute to center growth. This work may include, but is not limited to:

• Assisting with other technical assistance, evaluation, or training projects.
• Contributing to grant writing.
• Leading or contributing to smaller independent projects.
• Participation in taskforces to accomplish specific goals (e.g., working with an external advisory board).

Required:

• Master’s degree in public health, health education, community psychology, social work, or a related field. Bachelor’s degree in those fields with relevant experience would also be accepted instead of a Master’s degree.
• A minimum of 3 years of experience in community-level substance use primary prevention and public health promotion.
• Working knowledge of the following areas:
  • Prevention science models, frameworks, and methodologies including the Strategic Prevention Framework, the Communities that Care approach, and the CDC’s Engage approach for youth substance use prevention.
  • Knowledge of evidence-based primary prevention strategies for substance use across the lifespan, an understanding of program implementation fidelity, and familiarity with public-health-based social norms and social marketing campaign design, fidelity, and implementation best practices.
  • Assessment and evaluation knowledge including data collection, prioritization, management, analysis, dissemination and utilization.
  • Experience with coalition development and enhancement, and mobilizing community key leaders, stakeholders, and organizations to support local-level coalition efforts related to community wellness initiatives, such as youth substance use prevention and/or mental health promotion.

Encouraged:

• Public health or prevention-specific certification (e.g., IC&RC, CHES).
• Evidence of strong oral and written communication skills.
• Evidence of the ability to present statistical information in academic and non-academic formats.
• A detail-oriented personality with strong project design and management skills, and ability to meet deliverable deadlines without requiring micromanagement of progress.
• Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to work with a team.
• Salary: Baseline starting at $58,000, with a higher starting amount negotiable commensurate with experienceIndiana University is an equal opportunity employer and provider of ADA services and prohibits discrimination in hiring. See Indiana University Notice of Non-Discrimination here which includes contact information.