Democrats for Education Reform is seeking an experienced campaign operative, with a strong commitment to growing the Democratic Party and improving our country's public schools, to help lead our political and research departments.

DFER's political team supports our state chapters' advocacy and electoral work and directs our ambitious national political agenda. The Political Manager's specific responsibilities include:

• Creating recommendations for where and how DFER invests its resources and support in order to elect progressive Democrats who advocate for great public schools. This requires activities such as:

Collecting, managing and analyzing the right electoral and legislative data to inform our approach;

Drafting compelling recommendations using that data and other sources.

• Creating tools and resources that DFER state chapter staff can use to advance electoral and advocacy goals (e.g., turn in-house polling into a one-pager that a state director can use to show support for a bill and then create a template from this for use in other states)
• Performing campaign duties on priority elections as needed (e.g., "plug in" as campaign staff during the final weeks of a critical state campaign)
• At times, representing DFER at conferences and events to develop relationships with other progressive groups
• Leading and supporting other special projects as needed

We are a small but growing political department, and have some flexibility in how we design this position. With that in mind, we think there are two work paths that could lead you to being an ideal candidate:

You've managed campaigns: You may have run large field campaigns, or managed all components of small to mid-level advocacy campaigns. You've drafted campaign plans, organized volunteers, managed field staff, and kept busy campaign offices running.

or

You've worked as a data/research specialist: You've been the data guru on small to mid-level campaigns. You've overseen targeting, designed data flow procedures, and compiled reports that helped direct strategy.

To succeed in this role, you’ll need to be:

● Excited about working in a start-up culture: we’re not exactly a start up (we’ve been around for ten years) but if you’re looking for a super predictable set of projects that have long time horizons or an organization with a set way of doing things that you’ll just have to master...this isn’t the right spot for you; you’ll need to be flexible, fast and excited to help us learn and improve;

● Passionate about electoral work: this should translate into a fairly deep understanding of it (for example, if asked you could identify likely voters for an upcoming special election, you’ll know the answer);

● A strong writer/communicator: a typical week might require you to write a memo describing a new organizational process for our state directors and then pivot to creating a report on last quarter’s political spending for our senior leadership team ...your writing will need to be compelling, succinct and error-free;

● A strong relationship builder and influencer: unlike some research-heavy roles, this one includes quite a bit people-facing work as well, including external networking and in particular supporting our incredible, diverse, and demanding (in the best way!) team of state directors;

● Able to manage multiple projects simultaneously: You’ll be leading several projects at any given time, with each potentially reporting to a different stakeholder. Proactive communication, attention to detail, and ability to set and meet goals is critical. 

● Aligned with our mission: for more about it, read here.

If your background is in managing campaigns: 

● Able to draft and execute robust advocacy campaign plans that involve multiple tactics, including: polling, phone banks, door-to-door canvasses, and paid mail.

If your background is in data management:

● Extremely good at making order of, and drawing sound conclusions from, complex data sets: for example, if we hand you previous election cycle fundraising and election results from a set of legislative districts, you’ll be able to identify potential competitive districts and set challenger fundraising goals.

● Able to compile and manage large sets of data: eg., we’ll give you a list of 100 U.S. House Members, and you will build a database that allows you to efficiently create reports on their fundraising each quarter.

● Working knowledge of a database management program (SQL preferred)

Compensation

$50,000-$60,000 depending on experience. A comprehensive benefits package is included.

Commitment to Diversity

Democrats for Education Reform seeks individuals of all ethnic and racial backgrounds to apply for this position. We are committed to maximizing the diversity of our organization and recruiting a team that reflects the diversity of our nation’s public schools.