Who we are

The Vera Institute of Justice, founded in 1961, is a nonprofit criminal justice organization that strives to build just government institutions and safe communities free from the scourge of racism, white supremacy, profit, and inequity that is pervasive in this country’s legal systems. We are an “inside” lane organization that drives change at scale with ambitious public sector leaders who share our commitment to building anti-racist, reparative systems that deliver justice. We leverage our access to government to transform these systems and work collaboratively with stakeholders across many movements—including advocacy, grassroots, and grassroots organizations. Our role is to pilot solutions that are transformative and achievable, harness the power of evidence to drive effective policy and practice, and use advocacy and communications to change narratives and norms.

Vera has a staff of almost 300 people and offices in New York City, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, and New Orleans. We are an equal opportunity employer with a commitment to diversity in the workplace. We expect our staff to embody respect, independence, collaboration, commitment, anti-racism, and equity—both in our outward-facing work and the internal culture of our workplace. We value a range of experiences in people’s educational backgrounds and encourage people who have been directly impacted by the criminal justice system to apply.

Apply here: https://www.vera.org/careers

Who you are:

Vera is looking for a current student to join the Insights team this summer as a data visualization intern. The intern should be passionate about social and racial justice and, in this role, will primarily be designing and developing visualizations, such as Care First LA and The Waiting Game, in collaboration with other Insights team members.

Schedule

The intern should be available to work up to 35 hours per week during the summer. The dates will be between June 6th and August 12th with some flexibility to accommodate personal and academic schedules.

Compensation

The compensation range for internships is $16.00 – $25.00, per hour. Actual compensation will vary depending on factors including but not limited to experience and performance. Applicants may choose to receive academic credit. For those who need to earn academic credit, Vera will gladly assist in working with the school or program to make arrangements and meet requirements.

How to apply

Please submit cover letter and resume. In your cover letter, please explain why you are passionate about criminal justice reform and what you hope to gain from this internship.

In this role, you will:

Develop interactive data visualizations that make complex data more accessible, understandable, and actionable for advocates.

• Work with internal stakeholders to understand their data visualization needs.
• Develop data visualizations using specifications prepared by the Data Visualization Associate.

Maintain interactive data visualizations and data viz web apps

• Make enhancements to existing visualizations based on a backlog of feature requests

Develop internal enterprise dashboards to create a single point of access for project data for non-technical users.

• Work with Vera researchers and data scientists to inventory the organization’s project data and identify the needs and opportunities for enterprise data visualization.
• Work on internal data viz tools that allow Vera researchers and data scientists to quickly view patterns in their data

What qualifications do you need?

Required:

• A portfolio that demonstrates your ability to create data visualizations (schoolwork, self-published pieces, or professional work)
• Experience with current web standards-based HTML, CSS
• Experience with javascript, preferably with d3.js