Hiring
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Community + collaboration:
Summer teaching jobs and more at EXPLO
Learning should be fun. Seems obvious, right? After all, we know that this is when it’s the most engaging and effective. Though many summer enrichment programs put learning and fun side by side, no one combines them in quite the way EXPLO does. If you want to put this educational ideal into action, we have a dream job for you this summer as a teacher or advisor.
2027 Employment Dates
June 21 - July 25, 2027
*Instructors: June 22 - July 23, 2027 (weekdays only)
Open Positions
We need people who are as curious and creative as we are. Passion for working with kids and fostering their emotional and academic growth through hands-on experience is essential. We value people who can build community and relationships with their peers as well as with teens and tweens.
Assistant Dean
As an Advisor, you’ll be a mentor, role model, and community builder. All Advisors live on residence hall floors with students, support instructors, and help plan engaging activities and events. Days are busy and collaborative, and Advisors are essential to making the program run smoothly and successfully.
Assistant to the Head
The Assistant to the Head reports directly to the Head of Program and helps keep the entire program running smoothly. This is a wide-ranging role for someone who thrives on variety: no two days look the same, and much of the work cannot be predicted in advance.
Instructional Coach
Instructional Coaches are members of the Office of Teaching and Learning, the team charged with ensuring that students have a safe, engaging, and joyful classroom experience while at the program. Instructional Coaches regularly observe courses and provide Instructors with direct feedback and guidance on their classes and teaching performance.
Instructor
As an Instructor, you will engage with a dynamic, project-based curriculum crafted by EXPLO’s professional curriculum development team, yet retain the flexibility to infuse your teaching with your unique expertise, interests, and passions. You will guide bright and curious students through an experience that emphasizes collaboration, critical thinking, and real-world problem solving.
Main Office Manager
The Main Office is the center of communication for the program. Reporting to the Main Office Director, the Manager helps lead the office and keep it running smoothly. This role helps oversee the completion of daily administrative tasks to maintain smooth communication at the program.
Medical Rotations Instructor
As the Medical Rotations Instructor, you will engage with a dynamic, project-based curriculum crafted by EXPLO’s professional curriculum development team, yet retain the flexibility to infuse your teaching with your unique expertise, interests, and passion for the field. You will have the opportunity to inspire students to explore both new areas of study and potential future career paths.
Photojournalist
The Photojournalist is responsible for telling the story of EXPLO through our online photo platform for students, staff, and families, as well as capturing content for social media, blog posts, and other marketing pieces. Always looking to capture the next great moment on campus, the Photojournalist compiles photos of the dozens of classes, activities, events, and trips that happen each day.
Programming Office Manager
The Programming Office is the center of all student activities outside of the classroom. Reporting to the Director of Programming, the Manager helps lead the office and keep it running smoothly. As a direct supervisor of staff assigned to the office, the Manager provides regular coaching and feedback to help each staff member grow in the role and deliver engaging, well-run activities and events.
Residence or Day Director
Residence Directors and Day Directors are members of the Office of Student Life, the summer team charged with creating community on campus and ensuring that students have both a safe and joyful experience while at the program. Residence and Day Directors work with the Dean and Assistant Dean to oversee all aspects of dorm and student life, including student conduct, discipline, health, safety, and sense of community.
Veterinary Science Instructor
As the Veterinary Science Instructor, you will engage with a dynamic, project-based curriculum crafted by EXPLO’s professional curriculum development team, yet retain the flexibility to infuse your teaching with your unique expertise, interests, and passion for the field. You will have the opportunity to inspire students to explore both new areas of study and potential future career paths.
What we’re like
We’ve been working to inspire 12-14 year-olds (grades 6-8) since 1984. We understand that middle schoolers are figuring out who they want to be—and experimenting with becoming. This can feel chaotic at times, but it's an exhilarating journey of discovery. That’s exactly why we love it.
Since our founding in 1977 as a nonprofit startup at MIT, EXPLO has created transformational learning environments of intellectual inquiry and spirited adventure. As we celebrate our 50th year, we’ve brought together over 90,000 students and educators from 101 countries for summer enrichment programs.
What you can expect working at EXPLO
Professional Development
EXPLO has a long and strong reputation for excellent professional development. You will be doing real and important work. No pushing papers, grabbing coffee for someone, or observing from afar. You will be doing it from day one.
Our organizational model is designed for you to receive regular feedback so that you can quickly grow your skills. Whether you are still in school and exploring where your own interests lie, in the early stages of your career trying to figure out if education is your field, or a seasoned instructor or industry practitioner who wants to improve their teaching practice, EXPLO will help you make progress. Many of our former managers and administrators are now school, university, and non-profit leaders, but also leaders in medicine, law, engineering, marketing, business, and numerous other fields. Many have told us years later that EXPLO is the place where they got their best professional development.
The Exhilaration of Hard Fun
The EXPLO faculty is a group that will inspire you to do more and better work than you ever thought possible. Our culture combines optimism, inclusion, entrepreneurial thinking, creativity, a can-do problem solving spirit, and collaboration. And when you’re working with a team that’s willing to do the small things as well as tackle the big things (even when they’re challenging), you’ll experience what it means to engage in the exhilaration of hard fun.
Competitive Compensation + Room and Board
Our salaries are very competitive. Room and board is covered for Advisor positions, and lunch is available for Instructors. And then there are the extras. Advisors could find themselves supervising trips to theatrical performances, food tours of Boston, museums, or even Red Sox games.
Academics, Activities, and Events
At EXPLO, each day is packed with activity—for students and staff. Most weekdays consist of hands-on highly engaging academics where students are digging into projects, connecting with experts, conducting experiments, debating, creating, and discovering.
When not in workshops or electives, there is a full roster of activities, led by our residential staff, from sports to cooking, current events to nature walks, jam sessions to improv groups. EXPLO leads the industry in the breadth of its organized student programming.
Evening events often include staff-organized themed events, and we encourage staff to bring their own interests to our community, showcasing their talents and helping our students discover a new passion. On weekends staff lead off-campus trips to various locations—you might spend the day whale watching, see a Red Sox game, lead a foodie tour, or check out the newest museum exhibit.
Professional guidelines
To make EXPLO the experience we want to provide for our students, faculty need to adhere to these guidelines.
The health and safety of all our students and faculty are our highest priorities. No matter what your role is, it will be your responsibility to help make EXPLO an environment in which students can learn and grow in a way appropriate for their age. Classes, activities, residential floors, and trips all need to make students feel physically, emotionally, and intellectually safe, even when being challenged. Enforcement of program guidelines concerning student conduct is essential to this objective.
The use of drugs, alcohol, or tobacco at EXPLO is strictly prohibited. Because each faculty member is responsible for the safety and well-being of our students, we must mandate a high standard for faculty concerning the use of these substances. At no time should any faculty member on- or off-duty be under the influence of illegal or other non-medicinal drugs, or possess them on-campus. At no time should any faculty member be under the influence of alcohol on-duty or return to campus while under the influence after being off-duty. Consumption of alcohol by off-duty faculty over the age of 21 is restricted to off-campus locations only. Smoking and the use of other tobacco products (including e-cigarettes or vaping devices) are likewise strictly prohibited on campus and whenever you may be within view of students of the Program.
We take the commitment you’re making when you apply for a position seriously. Once you’ve accepted a position, EXPLO will incur obligations and make commitments to participants based on your being available at the program. Any sudden cancellation of your involvement could severely damage the program’s quality and cause irreparable economic loss to EXPLO.
Please only apply for a position if you are prepared to make a commitment to work for EXPLO for the entire duration of the summer program. If you plan to look for full-time employment after the summer is over, it is possible that a potential employer may wish you to start during the summer. If this would prevent you from fulfilling the entirety of your responsibilities to EXPLO, you should not consider applying for a position at EXPLO at this time.
Frequently Asked Questions
You've got questions—we've got answers.
All correspondence regarding your application is sent via email. Emails may come from our program database, called Campsite, as well as from individuals within EXPLO (all with explo.org email addresses). It is important that you regularly check your inbox (and spam folder) for important updates, and that you reply to all communications in a timely fashion.
We ask that you submit professional references—such as teachers, professors, job or volunteer supervisors—who can speak to your potential to thrive as an EXPLO staff member and work with middle schoolers. Examples of references we would not accept include personal references such as parents, friends, or peers.
While EXPLO does not directly sponsor visas, college students seeking employment be able to obtain CPT authorization through their college/university. Applicants are encouraged to inquire with their institution’s international student office to confirm eligibility before applying. Instructor candidates must be authorized to work in the United States.
We make our best effort to move applications along as quickly as possible, and to keep candidates informed throughout the process. In some cases when we are considering multiple candidates for a role, the process may take several weeks or more. As a general rule, you can expect to hear from us regarding the status of your application within a few weeks of applying. Initial communications will be via email.
In the spring, all EXPLO Instructors are assigned a curriculum coach, who advises them on EXPLO’s teaching style, and on the lesson plans specific to their workshop and/or elective. This provides a wonderful chance to prepare class logistics, become familiar with course content, reflect on teaching style and strategy, and build excitement for a great summer of teaching!
The curriculum for all of our workshops and electives is written by EXPLO’s professional curriculum development team. If you are hired to teach a workshop and/or elective, we will provide you with a complete set of lesson plans outlining the activities for the workshop/elective, materials needed for each activity, etc. In consultation with a curriculum coach, you will have the chance to familiarize yourself with the lesson plans to include input based on your own skills, expertise, and experience.
Staff members are contracted for the full five weeks of the program at Wellesley College. You’ll spend the first week on campus for staff orientation, and students will join us for the four weeks that follow.
