HEDx Graduate Assistant, Data Management & Analysis (Student Wage)

The University of Virginia’s Karsh Institute of Democracy, in partnership with Campus Compact, the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U), and More Perfect, is seeking a Graduate Resourcing Assistant to support the creation of the Higher Education Democracy Exchange (HEDx) platform. The HEDx platform will be a dynamic, multi-functional, standalone platform that empowers higher education institutions, individually and collectively, to promote democratic engagement and advance civic and community learning.  
 
One of the four functionalities of the HEDx platform will be Civic Indicator Dashboards. Dashboards will display aggregated data to illustrate higher education’s contributions to supporting and advancing democracy, including contributions and opportunities for alignment with More Perfect’s Five Democracy Goals. The Graduate Assistant will support data collection, cleaning, analysis, and aggregation from numerous sources and formats to support the Civic Indicator Dashboard within the HEDx platform. Civic indicator Dashboards will include state and local level data, as well as information from sources such as AAC&U’s VALUE Scoring Collaborative, NSLVE, Civic Health Index - National Coalition For Dialogue & Deliberation, and Carnegie Classification elective classification for community engagement metrics. The dashboard will prototype these indicators and eventually include campus-level data aggregation (e.g., Democracy Inventory, a campus-level tool led by Campus Compact but still in development). Data may originate from CSV, Excel, or API files, or from direct database connections.   
 
The Graduate Assistant will also contribute to the final list of indicators to be used for the Minimum Viable Product (MVP) of the Dashboard, the definition of parameters and appropriate formatting for inclusion, and the methodology for analyzing new data that will be uploaded once the platform is live.  
 
Key Responsibilities:  

• Collect and aggregate data from numerous sources  
• Identify new possible sources of data (with support and input from HEDx Advisors) 
• Data collection, cleaning, analysis, and aggregation 
• Brainstorm and explore varied approaches to displaying and aggregating available data  
• Attend and participate in working sessions during UVA Karsh Institute of Democracy’s Democracy360 in Charlottesville, VA October 15-17, 2025 
• Additional tasks related to resourcing, as agreed upon in consultation with relevant HEDx Advisors, the Graduate Assistant and their direct supervisor  

  
Anticipated Assignment Dates: August 2025 – April 2026 
 
Position Type: Part-time, hourly wage, approximately 5-10 hours per week. The bulk of the work will take place between August 2025 and January 2026. 
 
Position Compensation: $25/hour 
 
Minimum Qualifications: 

• Education: Current graduate student enrolled full-time at UVA 
• Capable of accurately following oral and written instructions, completing tasks promptly and reliably, an exhibiting exceptional attention to detail 
• Excellent organizational and analytical skills 
• Experience using spreadsheets to capture large quantities of information 

 
Application Requirements: 

• CV or resume 
• Cover letter 

 
The graduate assistant will be hired by the Karsh Institute of Democracy and will report to  Nikki Kain, assistant director of programming at the Karsh Institute of Democracy. They will work directly with Alisa Jimenez, HEDx Project Manager, and should expect to work closely with HEDx Advisors.  Applications and questions should be directed to Nikki Kain at nikki@virginia.edu, using the subject line “HEDx Graduate Assistantship, Data Analysis.”  
 
About HEDx: 
The Higher Education Democracy Exchange (HEDx) platform. will be a dynamic, multi-functional, standalone platform. HEDx is an initiative of Campus Compact, in partnership with the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) alongside University of Virginia’s Karsh Institute of Democracy, and More Perfect. 
 
The primary audiences will be higher education-based faculty, students, administrators, and civic leaders. Secondary audiences include funders who work in the civic engagement space, state and national policy leaders, and employers in the space—both for-profit and nonprofit. The platform is intended to enable access to data, validate civic skills, share and acquire resources and best practices, crowdsource ideas to scale initiatives across institutions, and access a diverse network of civic experts to support campus and community engagement and advance civic efforts. The HEDx platform will empower higher education institutions, individually and collectively, to promote democratic engagement and advance civic and community learning. Currently, campuses across the country engage in a wide variety of civic engagement efforts, but they are often siloed and limited in scope. HEDx aims to bridge these disparate efforts through four core functions: (1) civic indicator dashboards that aggregate data from national and campus-level sources to illustrate higher education’s contributions to supporting and advancing democracy, (2) a civic credential clearinghouse that connect students, faculty, and staff to professional development opportunities that enhance their civic knowledge and marketable skills, (3) hubs for scaling civic innovation that house curated tools and resources designed to scale impactful civic and community-based practices, and (4) a civic experts network that facilitates connections, coaching, and strategy building by providing access to a diverse pool of civic leaders and experts.  
 
For more information, please see: 

• Campus Compact and AAC&U announce Higher Education Democracy Exchange (HEDx) 
• Request for Proposals: HEDx Platform.pdf  

The University of Virginia is an equal opportunity employer. All interested persons are encouraged to apply, including veterans and individuals with disabilities. Click here to read more about UVA’s commitment to non-discrimination and equal opportunity employment.