Parks Research Fellow

Trust for Public Land (TPL) is seeking a Parks Research Fellow who is passionate about elevating the role of local parks and open space in addressing some of the most critical health, climate, and equity challenges facing communities today. The Research Fellow will manage one of TPL’s primary annual data collection efforts (the City Park Facts survey) and will assist with projects related to park equity and policy, including research and education tasks as necessary. This role will work directly with local government and non-governmental park organizations across the country, collecting key data and information and helping synthesize that information into actionable insights. 

Working with staff from both TPL’s Land and People Lab and 10-Minute Walk team, this position will help advance TPL’s work to support city partners’ commitment to advancing 10-minute walk park access and equitable park systems. Research topics that the Fellow may support include best practices for parks and urban planning and the economic and public health benefits that parks provide people.

This position is a 12-month fellowship with potential for extending the term, based on funding availability.

A core goal of this program is to provide opportunities for early career professional development for those interested in entering the world of urban parks. Key skills you will gain from this fellowship include:

• Opportunities to meet, network, and collaborate with park and recreation staff in a wide range of cities across the country.
• Training and experience in data science, including GIS, SQL, and survey methodologies.
• Coaching and individualized professional development.
• Strong understanding of the key strategies to elevate the importance of city parks.

About the Organization:

At TPL, we don't just save land—we save land for people to enjoy, from neighborhood parks to national parks. Our mission is to create parks and protect land for people, ensuring healthy, livable communities for generations to come. Every park, playground, and public space we create is an open invitation to explore, wonder, discover, and play. We're proud to say that we've been connecting communities to the outdoors—and to each other—since 1972. Today, millions of Americans live within a 10-minute walk of a park or natural area we helped create, and countless more visit every year. The Land and People Lab at TPL applies rigorous evidence and state-of-the-art analysis to accelerate the national movement for parks and public land. The team created and manages the largest database on U.S. parks, and from this built ParkServe, a publicly available mapping platform that is used to close the park equity gap. The team also releases the annual ParkScore index, the national gold-standard comparison of park systems across the 100 most populated U.S. cities.

Responsibilities:  

• Conduct data collection and research, potentially including review of literature, interviews, analyzing case studies, and survey work
• Management of the annual City Park Facts survey of the 100 largest cities, including communicating directly with each city organization (governmental and non-governmental) to secure and confirm data inputs.
• Collaborate with other TPL staff to prepare ParkScore and City Park Facts for release, including preparing supporting documentation and media outreach documentation.
• Participate in regular team and organizational meetings.
• Analyze qualitative data and information to identify key insights and recommendations.
• Collaborate with the Lab’s geospatial team to help verify spatial parks data updates to ParkServe, such as syncing park acreages in Microsoft Excel and GIS for cities.
• Identify and communicate trends and changes in the data to technical and non-technical audiences through both written and visual mediums (e.g. reports, Tableau, Microsoft PowerPoint).
• Develop and maintain cooperative working relationships with colleagues, municipalities, partner organizations and others.
• Support and engage with other relevant projects as opportunities arise.

Essential Qualifications:

• Passion for parks, people, and working together
• Positive attitude, with interest and ability to develop client and partner relationships, being sensitive to balancing research aims with clients’ and partners’ needs
• Ability to work independently and collaboratively on a geographically distributed team and with staff in other departments
• Detail oriented and organized
• Willingness to adapt and remain flexible as projects and priorities change
• Comfort with problem-solving data
• Experience with data analysis software programs (e.g. Microsoft Excel functions)
• Excellent oral and written communication skills
• Commitment to the full fellowship term (12 months)
• Minimum of a 2-year AA degree from an accredited college or university

 
Desired Experiences:

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in urban planning, parks and recreation, geography, community development or related fields
• Experience working with any of the following types of software:
  • GIS data using Esri software (ArcCatalog, ArcPro, etc.)
  • Advanced data analysis software (e.g. SQL, R, advanced Microsoft Excel functions, Tableau, SurveyMonkey)
  • Relationship Management software (MailChimp, Salesforce, etc.)
• Experience performing background research, preparing narrative reports, tables, charts and presentation graphics
• Experience structuring large datasets for quantitative analyses
• Experience communicating research findings to specific audiences
• Experience with local government policies and structures
• Experience as a community advocate and/or  community service

As a full-time exempt employee, the candidate will be eligible for Trust for Public Land’s comprehensive benefits program which includes medical, dental, and vision insurance, vacation and sick pay, plus holidays, and a 403(b)-retirement plan, currently with an up to 7% company match. We offer competitive salaries commensurate with experience; the anticipated hiring range for this position is $55,000-65,000.

Trust for Public Land’s active goal is to be an inclusive and equitable place to work and build community. As the organization actively works to eliminate racial and other disparities it welcomes candidates with diverse backgrounds and/or multicultural skillsets. We are open to the possibility that a great candidate for this job may not precisely meet all the above criteria; if you believe you are the right person for this job and can persuasively make that case, we encourage you to apply.