About the Company

Civis Analytics helps businesses use data to gain a bold advantage in how they identify, attract, and engage loyal customers and employees. With a powerful combination of elite proprietary data, cutting-edge software solutions, and an interdisciplinary team of data scientists, developers, and survey science experts, Civis works with Fortune 500 companies and the country’s largest nonprofits to make data-driven decision-making essential to how the world’s best companies do business.

Civis embraces the individuality of our employees and we celebrate each other's differences. Our products, services, and culture benefit from and thrive on the unique perspectives brought by each person in our Civis community. We're proud to be an equal opportunity workplace, and we are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, age, sex, color, ancestry, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, citizenship, marital status, disability, or Veteran status. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know.

About the Role

The Data Science Research and Development team is responsible for developing the fundamental data science methods, techniques, and best practices that power the mission of our company. Our diverse work includes predictive analytics, algorithm development, experimental design, natural language processing, visualization, and survey research.

As an intern on our Chicago-based Research and Development team, you will learn modeling strategy, research design, and software engineering from data scientists on the cutting edge of the field. You will work on collaborative projects through which you will make real contributions to the best practices that back our products and our consulting. To help you learn and succeed, you will be paired with a data scientist mentor from our team: we strive to grow the skills of our interns. Past interns have worked on a variety of projects including:

• Applications of neural network autoencoders on large, sparse datasets from social media, television viewership, and medical diagnostics
• MCMC code development and Bayesian statistical modeling of time series data from surveys
• Development of production code for resource optimization
• Graph-based clustering for record linkage and deduplication
• Using a large-scale proprietary survey dataset, along with methodology from observational causal inference and survival analysis, to measure the effectiveness of political ads

We are looking for individuals from a diversity of backgrounds with demonstrated quantitative and problem-solving skills. We value creativity, hard work, and on-the-job-excellence and offer competitive compensation. In compliance with federal law, all persons hired will be required to verify identity and eligibility to work in the United States. Juniors and graduate students only. Our paid summer internships are a full-time, 10-12 week commitment.

Minimum Qualifications

• Junior standing in undergraduate degree program in statistics, computer science, economics, physics or other quantitative field
• Experience using applied statistics, optimization, or machine learning
• Proficiency with Python or R
• Experience working with imperfect data
• Passion and eagerness to constantly learn and teach others

Preferred Qualifications

• Masters or PhD student in statistics, computer science, economics, applied mathematics, physics or other quantitative field
• Specialization in a particular area of statistics or machine learning, e.g. neural networks, Markov Chain Monte Carlo, network analysis, data engineering, natural language processing, optimization, etc.
• Experience or interest in software development and engineering, especially building or maintaining application software that is used by others