Summary: 

We are seeking a Human-Computer-Interface (HCI) design intern to develop cutting-edge solutions to America’s most challenging problems. This is an exciting opportunity to perform state of the art research, propose novel solutions to challenging problems across a broad set of domains, and see those solutions implemented into actual systems.

In this role, you will with small teams of research scientists and software engineers to design innovative interfaces to empower users as part of a user-centered design process. You will employ principled and creative approaches to move from research concepts to design prototypes, and ultimately oversee development into functional software systems. You will work with our scientists and software engineers to determine requirements, design creative approaches, and assist in implementing these designs in elegant decision support systems. You will support evaluation and application of research ideas throughout the systems engineering process and create documentation of your results for technical and scientific presentations.

You will need to be able to quickly read and understand scientific papers in new domains, and apply previous research to create new designs, while staying on top of current design trends, scientific advances, and development practices. In addition to research and designing quality user interfaces, the candidate must be able to clearly communicate his or her rationale and underlying analysis through written and verbal means.

Major Responsibilities/Activities:  

• Ability to define and translate user needs and system features into actionable requirements software engineering teams to define the direction of technical solutions
• Research, design, and support development of novel decision support systems
• Willing and self-motivated to quickly learn by searching and reading, by example, and by trial and error
• Contribute to proposals, reports and papers, and present work at briefings and conferences as appropriate
• Analyze and design visual representations to support solving complex problems
• Work with the Principal Investigator to identify cutting edge HCI design methodologies and points of intersection across multiple, similar, domains
• Work with software engineers to develop envisioned technology solutions
• Interact with users, and subject matter experts to analyze and understand domain challenges and needs

Minimum Requirements:  

• U.S. Citizenship
• Working towards or completed a degree in Human-Computer Interaction, Human Factors, Interaction Design, Cognitive Systems Engineering or a related field (e.g., Computer Science with HCI or Interaction Design focus) or a strong track record conducting research and development in these areas
• Strong aesthetic design sense and functional reasoning skills with superior attention to detail
• Strong portfolio of interface design and writing that shows high quality of work
• Knowledge of design and prototyping tools (e.g., Adobe Creative Suite)
• Interest in and ability to researching and applying leading design trends and data science techniques
• Proven experience designing user-focused interfaces and systems with a strong aesthetic design sense and superior attention to detail
• Demonstrated ability generate clear and grammatical written materials
• Strong portfolio of interface design and writing that shows high quality of work

Desired, but not Required:

• 2 or more years of relevant experience
• Proven ability to generate proposals, publications, or similar written materials
• Experience directly interacting with customers and/or users
• Experience performing literature reviews and using the results to recommend system improvements and/or enhancements
• Experience with Agile/Scrum development processes
• Experience with the SBIR/STTR process
• Military Service or DoD work experience
• Experience in multimodal interfaces, autonomous systems, augmented reality (AR) interfaces, human-robot interaction, or interactive data visualization
• Technical or peer-reviewed publications in any of the above fields