Senior Research Associate: Statistics

2 days ago


Lancaster, United Kingdom Lancaster University Full time

Overview of the project

Lancaster University/Lancaster University’s School of Mathematical Sciences is seeking to appoint a Senior Research Associate for the **_Responsible AI in Modern Online Educational Testing_** project. This is a full-time post with funding for 12 months. We would like someone that can start as early as possible.

You will help build a change‑point detection framework that can distinguish between genuine changes, like evolving question difficulty or new cohorts of test‑takers, and the anomalous spikes that signal potential compromise. You will have access to anonymized item‑response data and Duolingo’s adaptive‑testing platform, ensuring that our methods are both sound and scalable.

Lancaster University will provide dedicated high‑performance computing resources and expert supervision from faculty with strengths in statistics, machine learning and psychometrics. Your findings are expected be published in top-tier journals and presented at international conferences.

Role responsibilities

As part of this funded project, you will be responsible for:

- Developing change-point detection methodology for computerised adaptive testing data
- Developing code that implements the methods developed in a way which supports reproducible research practice.
- Writing up the research findings for journal publication and international conference presentations

About you
- a PhD in statistics or a closely related field
- experience of latent variable modelling, categorical data analysis, streaming data, log-file data analysis, change-point detection
- demonstrable ability to publish, including the ability to produce high-quality academic writing
- strong computing skills, including programming in python/R/C or equivalent languages.
- motivation, passion and resilience to ensure the robustness of the project’s results.

Why work with us

Lancaster is a friendly, affordable city in North-West England. We're within two hours’ travel of most major UK cities and surrounded by scenic mountains and coastline.

Contract and contact

This post is offered on a full-time, 12-month contract. We are happy to talk about flexible working.



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