Senior manager of education content

If you’re a tech-savvy person with instructional design experience, a strong understanding of internet culture and a passionate belief in the power and importance of quality journalism, we want to meet you.

The News Literacy Project (NLP) is seeking a senior manager of education to work on our content development team. There is intense public interest in NLP’s work, and we are experiencing tremendous growth. This is a unique opportunity to add your voice, talents and creativity to a team that builds world-class e-learning experiences, provides influential training for teachers and helps to shape the global field of news/media/information literacy.

Candidates for this position must have:

• Instructional design experience, such as creating innovative, engaging learning activities and instructional resources as a classroom teacher.
• An understanding of the unique challenges of instructional design for asynchronous, blended online learning.
• A strong understanding of the opportunities and challenges in today’s information landscape.
• Exceptional writing skills, especially the ability to produce explanatory pieces that make complex topics understandable for a variety of audiences and are nuanced, clean and concise.

The ideal candidate will also have several of the following:

• Experience using or designing content for education technology tools or platforms.
• Journalism experience, preferably as a writer for a reputable, standards-based news organization.
• A strong understanding of trends in misinformation and its spread, especially on social media.
• Strong digital skills, especially simple graphic design, a basic understanding of user experience principles and/or some familiarity with HTML.
• Engaging, responsive public speaking skills.

Note: Candidates with experience in both education and journalism are strongly encouraged to apply.

We’re looking for someone who is energized by our mission and is full of exciting, creative ideas for teaching news literacy skills and concepts. This person should also be unafraid to experiment, have a collegial nature, a sense of fun and the ability to work both independently and collaboratively.

This position reports to NLP’s director of education content.

About NLP

Founded in 2008, the News Literacy Project is a national nonpartisan education nonprofit that empowers educators to teach middle school and high school students how to sort fact from fiction in today’s challenging and complex information environment. Our central offering is the Checkology^® virtual classroom, an online e-learning hub. Since the platform was introduced in 2016, almost 25,000 teachers have registered to use it in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, four U.S. territories and 112 other countries.

About the position

As the senior manager of education content, you will join our four-member education team to help design and build resources that support educators across the United States and around the world, and to help promote news literacy to the general public. In this role, you will primarily be working on four types of content:

• E-learning (primarily lessons, challenges, tutorials and other materials for the Checkology^® virtual classroom).
• Traditional classroom (print-based lesson plans, classroom activities, graphic organizers, infographics, etc.).
• The Sift^® (NLP’s weekly newsletter for both educators and the general public).
• Website (quizzes, explainers, tips, etc. — mainly for the general public).

You will be responsible for managing NLP’s roster of journalist volunteers, who connect with teachers and students through our Newsroom to Classroom program. You’ll help them through the orientation process, answer their questions and maintain the journalist directory on Checkology.

In this job, you will also:

• Work closely with NLP’s senior vice president of education.
• Contribute items to The Sift on a weekly basis during the school year and assist with other aspects of its production, including proofreading, fact-checking, link-testing and addressing minor layout issues.
• Monitor and approve journalist volunteer applications; send key communications to journalist volunteers.
• Work with NLP education team members and NLP’s head of network to help align the development of new resources with teachers’ needs.
• Lead occasional teacher professional development workshops.

About you

In addition to the qualifications noted at the beginning of this job description, the successful candidate will have all or most of the following:

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience.
• A minimum of 6 years of relevant experience in education, instructional design and/or journalism.
• A talent for making complex topics come alive through innovative learning experiences.
• Experience producing high-quality written work on tight deadlines.
• A genuine passion for NLP’s mission and a desire to enhance our impact.
• General familiarity with common elements of successful lesson planning and curriculum design (learning objectives, essential questions, effective assessments, learning standards, etc.).
• Sharp digital skills, including a high level of proficiency in Microsoft Office.
• A command of today’s information landscape, including a deep familiarity with a variety of social media platforms, misinformation trends and verification tools.
• Experience and comfort with working in a virtual work environment (in terms of both technology tools and personal skills).

Compensation and benefits

The salary band for this position is $60,000 to $70,000 and is based on experience and qualifications. NLP offers outstanding benefits, including health and dental insurance, a 401(k) plan, generous paid time off and an annual bonus structure.

While most of the education team live in Chicago, this position is about 80% virtual and is open to candidates anywhere in the United States.

To apply, send a cover letter and a résumé to jobs@newslit.org with “Senior manager of education content” in the subject line. If you have a portfolio of relevant work (innovative and engaging classroom resources, published pieces of journalism or other writing), we encourage you to include up to three samples with your materials.

The application deadline is 5 p.m. ET on Thursday, June 11. We hope to hire as quickly as possible for a start date in mid- to late August.

The News Literacy Project welcomes applicants from diverse backgrounds. We offer equal opportunity in employment for all qualified persons and prohibit discrimination in employment on the basis of race, color, religion, creed, sex (including sexual orientation and gender identity), national origin, ancestry, age, veteran status, disability unrelated to job requirements, genetic information, military service or other protected status.