Assistant Director of Research and Programming

at  Cornell University

ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF RESEARCH AND PROGRAMMING

Assistant Director of Research and Programming
Senior Research Associate
Center for Research on Programmable Plant Systems (CROPPS)

WHO WE ARE

Research and Innovation (RI), led by the Vice President for Research and Innovation (VPRI), enables, and advances the University’s research priorities as well as research activities of Cornell colleges, schools, and research centers, institutes, and laboratories.
The Center for Research on Programmable Plant Systems (CROPPS) is an NSF Science and Technology Center (STC) that is administered under the OVPRI. CROPPS has a mission to develop new technologies that can be used to create a two-way communication system with plants and their associated organisms for the benefit of scientific research, industry, and agriculture. Alongside research, CROPPS pursues related and complementary initiatives in education, public communication, and diversity, equity, and inclusion. CROPPS aims to create an inclusive environment for productive collaboration across disciplines, titles (faculty, students, and staff), and personal identities. The Center aims to develop and implement best practices in Team Science for the pursuit of these goals. The Center has a five- year award at $5MM per year, for a total of $25MM, through September 30, 2026; the award is renewable for an additional five years. CROPPS currently involves faculty from three colleges at Cornell (CALS, CIS, and COE) and has five partner institutions (Boyce Thompson Institute (BTI), Colorado State University (CSU), Tuskegee University (TU), University of Arizona (UA), and University of Illinois Urbana Champaign (UIUC). The Center research is organized into five themes and funds approximately ~60 research projects annually, which includes ~32 faculty investigators (CROPPS Project PIs), and ~60 trainees (PhD, postdoc, and small number of undergraduates) associated with funded projects.

WHAT WE NEED

When reviewing your materials and evaluating your candidacy, we will look for evidence of the following:

• PhD (or equivalent doctoral degree) and 5 to 7 years relevant experience, or equivalent combination of training and professional experience.
• Strong track record with planning, organizing and guiding complex scientific projects and/or portfolios with multiple objectives and stakeholders, including managing resources, communication, project deliverables and timelines.
• Proven track record of successfully applying high-level scientific judgment in a variety of complex situations. Can identify multi-disciplinary solutions and recommend courses of action to project teams.
• Experience with collaborations and exchange of information with peers both within and outside of department.
• Experience with assembling and compiling reports from multiple institutions and delivering presentations to show project and portfolio excellence to collaborators and funding entities
• Experience with managing contracts and intellectual property with legal entities
• Experience with data management, for example, large genomic, transcriptomic, phenomic, or social science data sets.
• Ability to cultivate and develop inclusive and equitable working relationships with students, faculty, staff, and community members.

The Assistant Director of Research will be located in Ithaca, NY and will oversee a multi-disciplinary project team of approximately 30 faculty and 60 trainees from the plant sciences, engineering, social sciences, and computer science and across six institutions (Boyce Thompson Institute, Colorado State University, Cornell University, University of Illinois Urbana Champaign, Tuskegee University, and University of Arizona).
CROPPS’ research goal is the development programmable plant systems defined by bioengineered crop species that can exchange information with automated interfaces informed by multi-scale models to improve crop breeding and management with respect to resource use, resilience, and sustainability. The team includes a social science research thrust focused on public engagement on technology in the agri-food system.
The principal areas of responsibility of the Assistant Director of Research include (find additional details under Position Responsibilities, below):
Research Management: Collaborate with the Center Director, leadership, and Managing Director to oversee the management and coordination of the CROPPS research activities and be a significant contributor to the overall scientific success of Center.
Center-wide engagement : Engage and provide direct support to leadership and all Center participants to ensure efficient execution of collective goals, including connections between missions in research, education, public engagement, and broadening participation.
Team Science : Collaborate with CROPPS DEI Specialist and Associate Director of Diversity and Inclusion, and Director to lead the definition and implementation of best practices for the pursuit of collaborative research that balance productivity with personal and professional needs of research personnel, including students.
Data Management : Develop and oversee a Center-wide data management plan that ensures tracking, storage, appropriate internal and external accessibility, execution of inter-lab and inter-institutional sharing agreements, and compatibility with community-defined and legal standards for data management. This data includes that generated by biological, physical, and social science activities in the Center.
Other responsibilities : Participation in other tasks and activities that support the success of the Center.