Postdoctoral Research Associate – AI Learning Technologies

Job Title: Postdoctoral Research Associate – AI Learning Technologies

Job Number: 65476

Location: Los Angeles, US

Job Description

The Learning Sciences group at the University of Southern California, Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT) is seeking a Postdoctoral Scholar – Research Associate to join our team.

The ICT Learning Sciences team researches AI and Machine Learning (ML) for education, with an emphasis on bringing AI for education out of the lab to learners who need it most. Our work is dedicated to establishing new genres of AI tools that can empower educators, underserved groups, and public/government organizations to make the greatest impact on education and training. ICT has a history of over 20 years producing impactful, award-winning, use-directed research in AI, computer graphics, AR/VR, and the learning sciences.

This is a one year fixed-term appointment and renewable on the recommendation of the faculty mentor, with an ideal term of 2 years.

Research Effort: You will be joining a new multi-year USC research effort between ICT, the Rossier School of Education, and the Information Sciences Institute (ISI). Depending on your skills and research goals, you will join and help lead one or more tracks of this large-scale effort:

1) AI Upskilling (AI-UP): Developing, sharing, and evaluating the benefits of adaptive learning and intelligent tutoring systems that use AI to train AI. This research includes adaptive learning recommendations, conversational intelligent tutoring systems, and tutoring built into Python notebooks.

2) Intelligent Self-Regulated Learning: Analyzing and revising an intelligent learning coach agent designed to train self-regulated learning skills while presenting other educational materials.

3) Automated Content Revision: Research on ML pipelines to detect where changes in core curricula text imply that parts of other learning materials must be updated (e.g., quiz items, text in a slide deck). This track involves close collaboration with ISI researchers.

4) Automated Writing Enhancement: Developing and studying the impact of AI tools to train skills for domain-specific writing projects (i.e., not just the standard college essay). This track engages with initiatives from the USC Generative AI Center.

You will also have opportunities to build familiarity with other ICT research projects, such as collaborations with the Mixed Reality group (augmented reality projects), the Natural Language group (reinforcement learning and dialog systems), and Cognitive Architectures group (generative AI for training simulations).

Ideal Candidate: Our ideal postdoctoral candidate aims to someday lead their own research lab as a PI for advanced, interdisciplinary AI projects. We intend to mentor both technical skills and research leadership skills needed to create, evaluate, and publish results for AI education technologies. Researchers will engage in the following activities:

* AI Systems Design: Lead software development for AI in web-based and/or mobile applications.
* Outreach & Evaluation: Supporting human subjects studies on how AI tools impact real learners
* Data Analytics: Engage in educational data mining, interpretation, and presentation of results.
* Publications: Write and publish research results to competitive, peer-reviewed venues.
* Leadership: Provide leadership and mentoring to students and junior personnel on projects.
* Emerging Topics: Contribute to proposals for funding and suggest novel aspects for research.

Competitive candidates will have strong expertise in multiple areas, and will be motivated to master areas where they do not yet have substantial experience. This position will also involve participating in leadership planning for new research directions and candidate technologies (e.g., generative AI for intelligent tutoring systems, semi-supervised ML, novel reinforcement learning techniques, ensemble models). We will encourage developing proposal concepts with established researchers that can lead to new research directions and applications.

Application Deadline: 2024-01-31