{"id":2434406,"url":"https://alion.io/job/polco-data-scientist","title":"Data Scientist","company":{"id":1924618,"name":"Polco","domain":"polco.us","url":"https://alion.io/company/polco","size_band":"5000+","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Breezy","truth_index":null},"role":"Data Science","role_family":"Data Science","seniority":"junior","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"hybrid","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Madison, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":null,"salary_estimate":{"min_usd":75000,"max_usd":160000,"period":"year","method":"role_seniority_country_remote_cell","sample_n":298},"experience_years_min":2,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"Machine Learning","optional":false},{"name":"Python","optional":false},{"name":"SQL","optional":false},{"name":"AI Agents","optional":true},{"name":"Claude","optional":true},{"name":"Snowflake","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-09-23T14:41:52Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-09-23","last_verified_at":"2026-10-13T19:33:45Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":20,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":20},"description":"Polco is hiring a Data Scientist! Polco runs some of the most important local government performance databases in the country, including GPAL, which is a 'Bloomberg Terminal of local government performance.' As a Data Scientist at Polco, you'll help synthesize advanced insights for our roughly 400 premier US local governments across 50 states. With an average population of over 90,000, you'll be positively impacting more than 36 million Americans.\nThis role spans descriptive analytics (characterizing community trends and benchmarks), predictive analytics (cloud-based machine learning models that show communities where their key metrics are headed), and causal analytics (contributing to the causal econometric work Polco is known for, with mentorship from our PhD economist).\nIf you're a mission-driven Data Scientist with a solid statistics foundation and are comfortable working in Python and SQL (R is a plus) on large, cloud-based datasets (Snowflake), this is the role for you.\nWhile remote candidates across the US will be considered, our preferred candidate will be located in the Madison, WI area and work a hybrid schedule based out of Polco’s headquarters office.\nKey Responsibilities\nMaintain and run Polco’s recurring data processes, including GPAL and other analytic databases (data ingests, cleaning, dataset refreshes), survey weighting and benchmarking, and periodic model updates.\nBuild and improve statistical and predictive models using GPAL and our other databases (for example, our customer renewal model), and adapt existing models as our needs change.\nWith mentorship from Polco leadership, take on advanced client analytics projects-including impact and causal-inference studies-and communicate results clearly to internal and external stakeholders through written, in-person, and virtual presentations.\nPartner with our Engineering Team to automate data workflows (ingest, cleaning, analytics, dashboards) and make statistical and AI tooling more accessible across the company.\nCollaborate with our Marketing, Sales, Customer Success, and Survey Research Teams on internal analytics like renewal models.\nKeep clear, organized, and professional documentation so your work is reproducible and transferable across the team, and contribute to Polco’s online reporting tools and internal data apps.\nSkills & Requirements\nBachelor's degree or equivalent experience in a quantitative field grounded in statistics (data science, statistics, economics, or similar). A graduate degree will be helpful, but not required.\n2+ years of applied, non-academic industry experience in data science or quantitative analysis. A strong applied-project or capstone portfolio can offset part of this.\nProficiency in Python and SQL (required).\nWorking knowledge of R, or willingness to read and learn it as some of our existing tools and internal apps are written in R.\nA solid statistics foundation and genuine interest in causal inference and model building. Deep causal-inference expertise is not required (we'll mentor it), but the aptitude and curiosity to learn it are mandatory.\nExperience building with agentic AI tools (e.g., Claude, Codex)-not just using them, but orchestrating them to run analyses, develop reusable workflows and skills, and extend what you can do statistically beyond what you could hand-code alone.\nStrong written and verbal communication skills, including explaining technical work to non-technical stakeholders.\nExperience working in ambiguity and excitement about moving at startup pace-you like bringing structure to messy, open-ended problems and adapt well when priorities shift.\nHighly organized, detail-oriented, and able to manage multiple projects with minimal oversight.\nNice-to-have Experience\nSurvey research, public-sector, or civic-data experience.\nStrong data-visualization skills and a 'storytelling with data' sensibility.\nExperience automating or scaling data workflows in the cloud (Snowflake, etc.).\nPerks & Benefits:\nExceptional benefits package including dental, medical, and vision coverage.\nHybrid work environment if located in the Madison, WI area; 100% remote if elsewhere.\nFlexible work hours, 15 company holidays, and generous paid time off.\nTo Apply:\nApply for the Data Scientist position by submitting a resume, cover letter, and your personal information to the listing on Polco's careers page (both a cover letter and resume are required for full consideration). Please upload your application materials as PDFs. This position was opened on September 2, 2026 and will remain open until filled.","description_format":"text","description_chars":4567,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":2,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":{"level":"phd","optional":false},"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":["Flexible schedule","Hybrid work"],"hiring_locations":[{"name":"United States","iso":"US","kind":"country"}],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Artificial Intelligence","Data & Analytics","Government","Public Administration & Local Government"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-10-13T10:17:11Z"}],"visa":[],"liveness":{"score":28,"band":"fade","label":"Fading","p_open":1,"p_active":0.632,"p_room":0.45,"age_days":20,"expected_fill_days":13,"reasons":["conf:2","win:tail","comp:junior"],"computed_at":"2026-10-13T22:24:54Z"},"pay":null,"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/polco-data-scientist","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/polco-data-scientist.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-10-13T22:24:54Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":34241,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-10-14T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":1924618},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=1924618"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fpolco-data-scientist"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fpolco-data-scientist"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fpolco-data-scientist"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/polco-data-scientist\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fpolco-data-scientist"}]}