Director of Scientific Education & University Partnerships

About the Role

We're on a mission to advance education in science and technology, and this role is central to that mission. We're looking for someone who is passionate about education, technically grounded, and ready to lead the adoption of AI-powered simulation workflows across universities and research institutions.

You'll be the bridge between our platform and the academic world, designing strategy, building partnerships with faculty, running workshops, and showing the next generation of engineers and researchers how agentic AI is transforming photonic and multi-physics design.

You'll start by driving adoption in photonics, but this is a growth role. As we expand into broader multi-physics simulation products, you'll have the opportunity to shape and lead education strategy across new domains, growing the scope and impact of your work over time.

This is a remote position open to candidates based in the US or Canada. Frequent travel to universities, research institutions, and conferences is expected. We also have an office in the Boston area if you prefer in-person or hybrid work.

Strategic

• Define and execute a university adoption strategy targeting electrical engineering, photonics, physics, and applied optics departments across the US and Canada.
• Build and maintain partnerships with professors, lab directors, and department heads. Understand their curriculum needs and research challenges, then map our tools to them.
• Set measurable goals for university engagement, user growth, and long-term institutional adoption.
• Serve as the voice of the academic user back to our product and engineering teams. Surface what s working, what s confusing, and what s missing.
• As we expand into multi-physics products, lead the strategy for bringing new simulation capabilities into academic environments.

Hands-On

• Design and deliver workshops and demos showing students and researchers how to use our GUI, Python client, and agentic AI tools to accelerate photonic/RF/EM design workflows.
• Create tutorials, example projects, and course-ready materials with a focus on high-impact application areas like AI datacenter optical interconnects, silicon photonics, and RF/EM system design.
• Grow a community of student users, university champions, and academic advocates who organically spread adoption.

• Genuinely passionate about education. You believe that getting powerful tools into the hands of students and researchers early changes the trajectory of their careers and their fields. This isn t a stepping stone for you; education is the mission.
• Technical foundation in photonics, RF, or EM. You have a degree (BS required; MS/PhD preferred) in electrical engineering, physics, optics, or a related field, and you can speak credibly about waveguide design, optical simulation, electromagnetic theory, or similar topics.
• Comfortable with code. You re fluent enough in Python to walk someone through a scripting workflow and debug on the fly. Familiarity with simulation tools (Lumerical, COMSOL, Ansys, RSoft, or similar) is a strong plus.
• AI-curious (or AI-obsessed). You re excited about what agentic AI means for engineering workflows. You don t need to be an ML researcher, but you should understand how LLM-driven tools work and why they matter.
• A natural communicator. You light up when explaining complex ideas. You re the person in the lab who everyone asks for help, not because you know everything, but because you make things make sense.
• Both strategic and hands-on. You can set a quarterly adoption plan and also jump into a live workshop and troubleshoot a simulation on the spot. You re comfortable moving between the big picture and the details.
• Self-directed and energetic. This is a role where you ll define the playbook as you go. You thrive with autonomy and aren t waiting to be told what to do next.
• Willing and able to travel. You re comfortable with frequent trips to campuses, conferences, and research labs. You see face-to-face engagement as a feature, not a burden.

• Experience in technical evangelism, developer relations, or academic outreach
• Existing relationships within university photonics/EE departments
• Background in AI datacenter architecture, optical interconnects, or silicon photonics
• Experience creating video tutorials, technical blog posts, or course materials
• Familiarity with agentic AI frameworks or LLM-based automation tools
• Experience with multi-physics simulation beyond photonics (thermal, structural, RF)

• A leadership role at the intersection of AI and photonics, two of the fastest-moving fields in tech
• A clear growth path as we expand into multi-physics products and new academic markets
• The chance to shape how an entire generation of engineers learns to work with AI-driven simulation
• A team that is serious about its mission to advance science and technology education
• A collaborative, technically deep culture that values curiosity and initiative

If you read this and thought "this is exactly what I want to do," we want to…