at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, United States
Job Description
Job Opening Id: 50081
Department: Education & Social Policy
Salary/Grade: EXS/9
Job Summary:
The NetLogo project seeks a founding executive director to help develop an organizational structure to cultivate the ecosystem of NetLogo users and contributors. The organization exists to maintain and develop the NetLogo software and grow its community of computational modelers. The initial term for this position is through 8/31/2025.
The NetLogo project was founded by Professor Uri Wilensky in the late 1990s and has two core missions: 1) to democratize computational thinking and computational modeling education, and 2) to enable natural and social scientists to use agent-based modeling in their work. Our core product, NetLogo, is a groundbreaking platform that enables learners of all ages to explore complex systems, experiment with simulations, and develop critical problem-solving skills. NetLogo is also the leading platform used by scientists to construct agent-based models. A large number of scientific articles have been based on research using NetLogo (more than 20,000), and the number of such articles published per year continues to grow. The NetLogo project also supports a number of related software products built around NetLogo to facilitate educational and scientific goals. NetLogo and related software are free and opensource.
To date, the development of the NetLogo family of products has been funded primarily by academic research grants (NSF, NIH, etc.) to the Center for Connected Learning and Computer-Based Modeling (CCL) at Northwestern University. The CCL is led by Professor Wilensky and includes other affiliated professors, two full-time software developers, one half-time software developer, PhD students and post-doctoral researchers who contribute to the development of NetLogo in various ways. The development of NetLogo in this academic environment has been highly successful for over 20 years, but a revised organizational structure will help ensure NetLogo’s future sustainability.
Recently the NetLogo Project received an NSF grant from the new POSE program (Pathways to Open-Source Ecosystems) aimed at creating a sustainable organizational structure and ecosystem to ensure the longevity of NetLogo. The founding executive director of the new organization will work closely with the core NetLogo team at the CCL and with partners around the world.
Specific Responsibilities:
- Create the new organizational structure and provide strategic leadership and vision during the shift in governance and beyond.
