Science & Research Jobs in Somerville, MA (Now Hiring) — 99 open — Page 2

Statement of Duties

SomerStat, Somerville’s Division of Innovation and Analytics, provides timely analysis and reporting to help City staff and residents measure progress toward community goals and understand local challenges. By combining analytics, performance tracking, and open data, SomerStat empowers decision-making, improves city services, and keeps the community informed.

SomerStat analysts contribute to the core areas of SomerStat’s work: performance measurement, program evaluation, and analysis support for City staff and constituents. This includes contributing to individual efforts as well as to the development of frameworks that guide our work in these areas.

Analysts work in a multitude of topic areas with varied audiences and time horizons, and are expected to “own” projects from start to finish. Examples of work include developing internal and public-facing dashboards tracking progress toward the City’s goals; conducting and analyzing results from the biennial Happiness Survey and other survey efforts; and informing social service delivery supporting community welfare.

Below are the types of work an analyst could be expected to perform on a project. Almost no projects contain all these elements, and expertise across the board is not assumed nor required. However, interest in learning how to conduct all the work types below is a must:

• Conceptual clarification: Working with City staff and other stakeholders on defining a research question, developing conceptual metrics
• Creating data collection instruments: Usually surveys, occasionally other data collection protocols
• Cleaning data: Scripting in R for categorization/transformation
• Detail review & quality assurance: Data QA, reviewing surveys, memos, and visualizations
• Conducting analysis: Using R, GIS, Tableau, or Excel
• Creating visualizations: Using Tableau, GIS, or Excel/PowerPoint
• Creating documentation & communication: Usually materials for presentation (slide decks) or narrative (written reports)
• Setting up data pipelines: Scripting in R for optimization, automating processes to batch steps
• Advising: On data collection and analysis strategy for other teams across the City, taking into account different needs and areas of expertise of our diverse workforce

Essential Functions

The essential functions or duties listed below are intended only as illustrations of the various types of work that may be performed. The omission of specific statements of duties does not exclude them from the position if the work is similar, related, or a logical assignment to the position.

• Advances the core areas of SomerStat’s work by supporting the development and application of our frameworks in performance measurement, program evaluation, and analysis support efforts throughout the City.
• Conducts analysis projects from start to finish, including conceptualization, metric development, data selection or collection, analysis, presentation of findings and recommendations.
• Develops systemic access to appropriate data sources (including collecting new data as needed); creates and maintains automated data extraction and reporting workflows that clean and integrate relevant data to monitor performance and develop recommendations.
• Works independently with various interdisciplinary teams to determine how data analysis can best support municipal operational goals.
• Develops and delivers insightful reports, interactive dashboards, and presentations using visualization tools (e.g., Tableau, ArcGIS) to enable data-informed decision-making in the organization.
• Provides technical support, cross-training, and documentation to SomerStat and other municipal staff in use of SomerStat’s dashboards and other tools to ensure continued independent use of the developed solutions.
• Supports the City’s commitment to transparency by identifying new sources of data to make available to the public, preparing datasets for public use, and increasing public awareness and understanding of city systems and data.
• Supports the City’s commitment to equity by ensuring that data collected and/or selected for evaluation represent all the communities of Somerville, particularly those who are generally underrepresented in public engagement.
• Prioritizes accessibility and clarity in communication of data and results, to ensure that all constituents are informed about city goals and priorities, and our progress on their achievement.
• Participates in strategic communication and civic engagement efforts with staff, elected leadership, and the public.
• Ensures compliance with legal requirements and best practices to maintain the privacy and confidentiality of sensitive information; uses discretion and good judgement when calibrating access to data and reporting results.
• Assists other SomerStat staff in the performance of their duties as necessary.

Recommended Minimum Qualifications

Education and Experience: Bachelor’s Degree in public policy, public administration, business, economics, urban planning, finance, statistics, computer science, political science or a similar field, and three (3) years of experience; or any equivalent combination of education, training and experience which provides the required knowledge, skills and abilities to perform the essential functions of the job.

Knowledge, Abilities and Skill

Knowledge: Municipal operations; public policy; data analysis practices and techniques; budgeting and finance.

Abilities: Establish and maintain effective and harmonious working relationships with diverse stakeholders regarding strategy, policy, and operations; work independently; manage multiple tasks efficiently, prioritize, and balance short- and long-term responsibilities; carry out assignments to completion in an efficient and accurate manner; communicate and collaborate with executive-level individuals; interact with the public effectively and appropriately; problem solve and think strategically, analytically, and creatively; learn new concepts quickly; collaborate, build consensus, and lead; be self-motivated and organized; handle problems and emergencies; apply effective judgment and discretion to maintain a high level of confidentiality when handling sensitive information; and maintain, manage, and organize records.

Skills: Proficient in operating personal computers and applicable word processing, spreadsheet, and statistical analysis applications, specifically MS Excel or other data analysis and visualization tools, such as R, Python, or Tableau; excellent written and oral communication, facilitation, and public speaking skills; excellent data analysis, database development and management, strategic thinking, problem solving, leadership and project management skills. GIS, front end/web development, and/or programming language skills preferred but not required.

Work Environment

The work environment involves everyday discomforts typical of offices, with occasional exposure to outside elements. Noise or physical surroundings may be distracting, but conditions are generally not unpleasant. Employee may be required to work beyond normal business hours to attend evening meetings or complete work assignments.

Physical and Mental Requirements

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the position’s essential functions.

Physical Skills

Minimal physical demands are required to perform the work. Work effort principally involves sitting to perform work tasks, with intermittent periods of stooping, walking, and standing. There may also be some occasional lifting of objects such as office equipment or photocopy paper (up to 30lbs.).

Motor Skills

Duties are largely mental rather than physical, but the job may occasionally require minimal motor skills for activities such as moving objects, operating a telephone, personal computer and/or most other office equipment including word processing, filing and sorting of papers.

Visual Skills

Visual demands require constantly reading documents for general understanding and analytical purposes.

Role and application details

This role allows for up to two remote days per week (on a set schedule to be decided with the SomerStat Director); the other three are on-site at City Hall (93 Highland Ave, Somerville MA). On remote days, candidates should still expect to be able to get to City Hall as needed with reasonable advance warning. Exceptions can be made for medical accommodations.

The interview process for this role may include an offline technical assessment component. No “live” technical interviews will be conducted beyond discussion of the technical assessment. Initial interviews may be conducted virtually; finalist interviews will be conducted in person.

In lieu of a cover letter, please provide a work sample from previous work, school, or personal experience that demonstrates your ability to clean, analyze or visualize data to solve a complex problem. This can be a link to a GitHub repository, a PDF of a write up or report, or a screenshot of or link to an active dashboard. Please also provide a brief description of what problem you were trying to solve, the broad approach you took, one issue you uncovered in the process, and the outcome of your work (i.e. the answer to the problem).

Preference will be given to applications received by August 4, 2026. 

Hours: Full-Time
FLSA Status: Exempt
Salary $85,000 - $88,400 annualized + benefits
Date Posted: July 20, 2026 

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The City of Somerville is an affirmative action/equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, sex, religion, age, national origin, disability or any other protected category. Women, minorities, veterans, and persons with disabilities are encouraged to apply.

Auxiliary aids and services, written materials in alternative formats, and reasonable modifications in policies and procedures will be provided to qualified individuals with disabilities free of charge, upon request. Persons with disabilities who need auxiliary aids and services for effective communication (i.e., CART, ASL), written materials in alternative formats, or reasonable modifications in policies and procedures in order to access the programs, activities, and meetings of the City of Somerville should please contact the ADA Coordinator at 617-625-6600 x 2059 or ADA@somervillema.gov.

Pre-Employment Requirements for All Employees:

• MA Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) clearance
• Completion of Conflict-of-Interest Law Education training for municipal employees

Overview of Total Rewards:

• 4 weeks annual vacation for non-union positions. Union positions vary by contract. Please note, police officers are members of the SPEA union. Public Health Nurses are part of Union A (SMEA).
• Medical insurance through the Group Insurance Commission (GIC) - 80% of premium costs paid by City
• Dental coverage low and high plans through Cigna
• Vision care through Vision Service Plan (VSP)
• Long term disability through Sun Life
• Group and voluntary life insurance through Boston Mutual
• Health Care and Dependent Care flexible spending through Benefit Strategies
• Deferred compensation plans through a choice of three vendors
• Free, confidential services through the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) provided by E4Health
• Annual cancer screening & wellness release
• Somerville Retirement Pension System
• Tuition reimbursement
• MBTA pass program
• FREE Blue Bikes membership
• Eligible employer for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program (PSLF)

Benefits listed are for benefits-eligible positions and the above information is meant to be a general overview of the benefit programs offered by the City of Somerville and not a binding contract.