Data Scientist I

About the role

At Tavern Research, we’re building models to understand and influence how people form opinions online. That means taking on problems like tracing how narratives spread through social platforms, or analyzing how different messages land with different audiences. The data is messy, the questions are ambiguous, and the stakes are high.

Responsibilities

• Work hands-on with real-world, unstructured data: cleaning, debugging, and engineering features that support effective models.
• Support the design and execution of numerical experiments by handling data prep, fitting models, and running standard analyses.
• Contribute to feature engineering and model building, taking ownership of clearly defined components of modeling projects.
• Write clean, well-documented Python code using standard data science libraries.
• Assist with model evaluation, diagnostics, and performance monitoring.
• Collaborate with researchers and engineers to scope and execute tightly defined tasks.
• Learn and apply best practices and emerging tools in machine learning, AI, and causal inference.

Qualifications

• This role is designed for early-career candidates with 0–3 years of experience or equivalent hands-on project work who are eager to grow into more advanced modeling responsibilities.
• Strong academic or applied background in data science and software engineering or closely related fields.
• Experience building statistical models (beyond differential equations or simulations).
• Demonstrated experience working with messy, real-world datasets.
• Proficiency in Python and standard data science libraries.
• Familiarity with AI and machine learning concepts like embeddings, supervised and unsupervised ML methods, and agentic systems
• Clear understanding of the data science concepts behind work you’ve done (not just “I ran the code”).
• Strong communication skills and a collaborative mindset
• Humility, patience, and attention to detail.
• We especially value candidates who have independently built data or modeling projects outside of coursework, including internships, research, or production data work.
• Bonus: exposure to model deployment, large language models, or causal inference.

Benefits

• Premium health insurance
• Unlimited PTO
• Office closed for all federal holidays
• 401k match
• Equity

Company Information

Tavern Research is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.