Research Fellow – Evaluation Specialist

Post date: 16-Feb-2016 09:50:20

The Australian Prevention Partnership Centre

Sydney School of Public Health

Reference No. 101/0116

Join a collaborative team working in chronic disease prevention

Further develop your research profile and national and international networks

Full-time fixed term, remuneration package: $114K-$135K p.a. which includes base salary $96K-$114K, leave loading and up to 17% superannuation

The University of Sydney is Australia's first university and has an outstanding global reputation for academic and research excellence. It employs over 7300 permanent staff, supporting over 50,000 students.

The Australian Prevention Partnership Centre (TAPPC) is a collaboration involving state, territory and Commonwealth government agencies and eight universities and research centres.

TAPPC is jointly funded by the Australian Government through the National Health and Medical Research Council and the Australian National Preventive Health Agency, the NSW Ministry of Health, the ACT Health, and the HCF Health and Medical Research Foundations.

It is administered by the Sax Institute (Sydney) and co-hosted as a partnership between the Sax Institute and the Centre for Excellence in Intervention and Prevention Science (Melbourne).

The aim of the centre is to be a world leader in prevention science applied to chronic disease. It will do this through strengthening the research base for prevention, synthesising evidence and making readily available what is known and helping to activate an effective and efficient prevention system.

We are seeking to appoint a Research Fellow to take responsibility for the day-to-day running of projects and analysis of data in the Rapid Response Evaluation Capacity (RREC) node of TAPPC. The role is based at University of Sydney.

The RREC is one of the four capacity areas in TAPPC, with a focus on contributions to population-level evaluation design, implementation, analysis and reporting on the effects of population level prevention programs, especially with those relevant to the TAPPC funding partners. A key expectation will be the publication and dissemination of the outcomes.

The RREC will carry out innovative and large-scale program evaluations, in concert with stakeholders; a component of this work will be to design rapid response evaluations to natural experiments or proposed policy initiatives, and to use an appropriate suite of evaluation skills and methods to deliver high quality evaluation advice and support.

The RREC will also support the other capacities in the Centre (systems approaches, evidence synthesis and communications) - and will provide technical research, evaluation and methodological support and advice.

The RREC will also host short courses and provide training in research methods and evaluation of population level interventions. An additional function of the RREC will be to build new methods and approaches to population level evaluation and to the evaluation method for assessing ‘opportunistic’ interventions and natural experiments.

Working with the RREC leaders and with Centre, you will:

• manage the planning and design of evaluations for the RREC, especially in evaluating scaled-up population level interventions
• assist at all levels of evaluation, including formative evaluation, planning process evaluation methods and indicators, and planning impact evaluation, including research design, ethical approval and measures
• provide acute responses and advice to stakeholders regarding the opportunistic evaluation of prevention policies and programs
• work with stakeholders to refine evaluation designs and plans at the start, and during the program evaluation process
• work with other disciplines in the Centre, including health economics, to support complex program evaluations
• analyse data using appropriate methods contribute to analysis of project data and prepare of reports and publications on this evaluation research
• manage other research staff associated with a specific project
• contribute to teaching and training in program evaluation.

To succeed in securing this role you will have:

• a PhD or equivalent work experience in public health and in program evaluation / or related areas
• extensive experience in the methods of program evaluations, from formative evaluation and logic model use in planning, through to program design and delivery
• an understanding of qualitative and quantitative methods, and demonstrated analytic skills
• an understanding of public health and current prevention programs and policies in Australia
• demonstrated capacity to project manage evaluation projects and supervise junior staff
• demonstrated ability to work in collaborative environment including with practitioners, policymakers and Government departments
• track record of academic research publication appropriate to early-mid career researcher
• evidence of work in prevention-related research and evaluation relevant to policymakers and organisations in Australia.

To be considered for this position it is essential that you address the online selection criteria. For guidance on how to apply visit: How to apply for an advertised position.

More information can be found in the position description via the link below this advertisement. Specific enquiries regarding the role may be directed to Professor Adrian Bauman on +61 2 9036 3247 or via email adrian.bauman@sydney.edu.au. General enquiries regarding the recruitment process may be directed to Julie Small on +61 2 8627 1223.

CLOSING DATE: 11pm 8 March 2016