Career Center

Apply via email with a resume and cover letter to: hello@sparkshop.org before May 31st, 2022.

This Role’s Mission:

To develop world-class and equitable curriculum packages that introduce elementary school students to engineering.

This Role’s Outcomes:

1. Create original educational STEM content for 4th and 5th graders

   • Collaborate with Program Lead to design learning outcomes and activities 

   • Write culturally responsive engineering and humanities lesson plans (5 units per school year)

   • Build beautiful and informative student-facing slides

   • Film and edit 2 educational videos per month (typically 5-10 per year)

   • Align lessons to NGSS, SEL, and Common Core standards

2. Increase accessibility and equity of SparkShop curriculum

   • Translate 100% of SparkShop curriculum and family-facing communications from English to Spanish

   • Create alternate lessons for students with IEP accommodations as needed

   • Build supplemental activities for heritage months that highlight STEM professionals with underrepresented identities

3. Manage teacher professional development program

   • Run teacher professional development sessions

   • Coordinate partnership with Northwestern University to manage accreditation

   • Evaluate and report on program impact

Competencies: 

• Creativity - Imagines new and valuable educational content and delivery formats

• Curiosity - Has a strong desire to learn and understand the world around them

• Communication - Speaks and writes clearly and succinctly, is able to tell stories that resonate with children

• Attention to detail - Thoroughly and accurately completes tasks while catching mistakes

Cultural Competencies:

• Flexibility - Is able and willing to adapt behavior to new constraints and opportunities

• Proactivity - Identifies projects and opportunities for improvement without waiting for work to be assigned

• Design thinking - Solves problems with a user-centered, iterative, team-based approach that challenges assumptions and generates innovative solutions

• Teamwork - Prefers working in a collaborative group of people to achieve common goals

• Resourcefulness - Pursues quick and clever solutions to problems using the resources available to SparkShop

• Intersectional Thinking - Understands the dynamics of race, socioeconomic class, and gender in the world, recognizes bias in themselves, and actively chooses to dismantle systems of oppression

Compensation and Benefits: 

• Full-time exempt position with flexible working hours

• Salary: $60k-$65k/year depending on experience

• Health and dental insurance provided (90% employer, 10% employee)

• 401K (no matching)

• Unlimited PTO (2 week minimum in addition to holidays)

• $2k budget for continued education or professional development

Work Environment:

• Role is based in the Chicago-area

• Office in the West Town neighborhood of Chicago

• Hours are flexible, typically 80% remote. We value work-life balance and encourage employees to adjust their schedule to their liking and needs. Due to occasional events, flexibility in working hours is sometimes required

• SparkShop is a small team with lots of collaboration and room to grow

Address: 965 W Chicago Ave, Chicago, IL 60642

Start Date: June or July 2022

Apply via email with a resume and cover letter to: hello@sparkshop.org before May 31st, 2022

Interview Process: Phone screening, virtual interviews, and final round in-person masked interview

SparkShop is an equal opportunity employer. Our full anti-discrimination policy is available upon request. 

Requirements:

• Must have earned an Associate (2-year) or Bachelor’s (4-year) degree from an accredited academic institution

• Must have at least two years of experience as a classroom teacher

• Priority will be given to those fluent in spoken and written Spanish

• This position includes moving and stacking boxes weighing up to 25 lbs within our storage space

• All SparkShop employees must be fully vaccinated against COVID-19