Our Mission

Quill.org's mission is to help low-income students become strong writers. In 2018, Fast Company recognized Quill.org as one of the Top 10 Most Innovative Education Companies of 2018 alongside Duolingo, Sesame Workshop, and Coursera. As an open-source organization, we work with a large community of developers and educators to build free online literacy tools to advance our mission of helping low-income K-12 students become strong writers and critical thinkers. Building on a strong pedagogical foundation and an innovative use of machine learning and natural language processing, we aim to serve 10 million students in the next five years. Quill currently offers six free online learning tools that bring the power of cutting-edge AI technology into the classroom: Quill Connect, Quill Lessons, Quill Diagnostic, Quill Proofreader, Quill Grammar, and Quill Reading for Evidence.

With our newest tool, Quill Reading for Evidence, we have expanded our offering to support writing and reading comprehension. Quill Reading for Evidence provides students with nonfiction texts paired with AI-powered writing prompts, instead of multiple-choice questions, to enable deeper thinking. Our tool challenges students to write responses that are precise, logical, and based on textual evidence, coaching students through revisions with custom, targeted feedback Quill is currently developing activities for ELA, social studies, and science classrooms, with a particular focus on texts that examine 21st-century issues.

The Social Studies Curriculum Developer

As a member of the curriculum team, you will work with the social studies lead to build Reading for Evidence activities that would fit within a high school American history or world history course. To develop these activities, you will research topics, write articles, and create prompts for students to engage with. You will work alongside the curriculum team to use AI to provide feedback on student writing by analyzing large sets of responses, identifying patterns, categorizing responses, and writing feedback to support students in the revision process.

Since you will be creating new activities to help students develop their writing skills, it is essential that you can adapt your writing for various levels of reading fluency and English language development while still considering tone, cultural responsiveness, and student engagement. You should have both broad and deep social studies content knowledge, with a knack for recognizing and clearly communicating compelling stories from the past—especially those that center diverse voices and experiences. Ideally, you will bring experience/familiarity with disciplinary literacy instruction as well. In addition, you should be well-versed in technical grammar and able to quickly identify the areas of a student's sentence that need revision or require feedback. This role is best suited for an individual who is highly analytical—someone who has an aptitude for recognizing patterns and likes to solve complex puzzles.

Responsibilities

• Create activities for our recently-launched Reading for Evidence tool, which includes writing texts on a variety of social studies topics, creating prompts, and writing feedback that students will use to revise their writing.
• Evaluate and label large amounts of student data.
• Develop original content for students grades 7-12 that is clear, accessible, and mirrors the tone and approach of a skilled teacher.
• Give, receive, and implement feedback on writing/activities as part of a collaborative development cycle.
• Collaborate on determining style guidelines, revising existing content, creating curriculum standards alignments, and other curriculum-based projects as needed.

Competencies

• The social studies curriculum developer will demonstrate the following competencies:
• You are a strong creative and non-fiction writer.
• You have an understanding of pedagogical best practices in 7-12 grade social studies education.
• You have strong research skills and are able to find and evaluate the credibility of useful sources.
• You have an understanding of DEIA best practices and effectively apply them to your work.
• You have a solid understanding of technical grammar and make few errors in your writing.
• You can recognize patterns in student responses and effectively categorize them based on those patterns.
• You can write feedback for students that is clear, accessible, and mirrors the tone and approach of a skilled teacher.
• You have strong spreadsheet skills or an aptitude for building data analysis skills quickly.

Skills and Experience

This role may be a good fit for you if…

• you love to write and research
• you care deeply about education and serving students
• you love data analysis and are excited by the idea of spending a lot of time in a spreadsheet
• you enjoy building and improving digital products
• you like to collaborate but also enjoy long periods of independent work
• you are methodical and strategic
• you have a growth mindset and value giving and receiving feedback
• you thrive in an environment with many unknowns, sudden shifts in priorities, and ambiguity

Successful candidates will have the following qualifications:

• 2+ years as a high school American or world history teacher or as a social studies content creator
• Experience with data analysis using large datasets
• Experience in or familiarity with the non-profit sector and/or a start-up environment
• Located in or near NYC and be willing to travel to NYC one per week or every two weeks for in-person meetings
• Comfortable working remotely and utilizing Google Suite, Zoom, and Slack

Join Us!

At Quill, we offer a flexible schedule, pretty spectacular benefits, and an amazing team of brilliant, supportive colleagues. We believe in a growth mindset, one of our organizational values, learning from our mistakes, and celebrating each other’s success as we work toward our collective impact!

Salary: The salary range for this position is $70,000 - $80,000.
In the interest of equity, Quill does not negotiate outside of this range; all of Quill’s salary ranges are developed through market research and a commitment to fairness and equity internally. Final salary offers will be a combination of a candidate’s skills, experience, and in consideration of current internal salaries.

Benefits: Health, Dental, Vision Insurance (Aetna), 4% 401k Matching, 33 Days Paid Holidays & Paid Days Off (with Unlimited Sick Leave and one week of office closure during the winter holidays), $1,500 professional development stipend annually.

Location: This is a remote/hybrid role; we are searching for someone based in or near the NYC area, who will be willing to travel once a week or once every two weeks for in-person meetings.

Typical office hours: Quill maintains a 40 hour work week with typical hours from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Quill also utilizes a flexible work schedule around those hours with the idea that the work gets done.
Start date: Early August. Applications received by June 15th will be prioritized.

To apply: Please email your resume to [email hidden] with the subject line “Social Studies Curriculum Developer” In lieu of a cover letter, please attach your thoughtful answers to the following questions:

What is one of the biggest challenges in teaching history today? (150-200 words)
What is one high-quality social studies curriculum or resource that you've used? Explain why you consider this resource to be high quality. (150-200 words)
What is one social studies curriculum or classroom resource that you've used that could be improved? Explain what you would change to strengthen this resource and why. (150-200 words)