Curriculum Derivative Product Manager

The Curriculum Derivative Product Manager reports to the Chief of Product and is responsible for the quality, lifecycle, and supporting systems of OpenSciEd's curriculum derivatives and companion products. This role works across matrixed internal teams and external partners to ensure derivative products are intentionally selected, well designed, and sustainably supported, strengthening the overall OpenSciEd curriculum and support ecosystem.

This role balances strategic decision-making with hands-on product leadership, ensuring that curriculum derivatives connect market desires with OpenSciEd’s instructional vision, quality standards, and equity commitments.

This role will also advance OpenSciEd’s AI-related work aimed at making curriculum and derivative development more efficient, consistent, and cost-effective, and working with partners to create Companion tools and resources that support implementation.

What You’ll Do

• The Derivative Product Manager leads the work to ensure that OpenSciEd’s derivative and companion products uphold the quality that is expected of the OpenSciEd brand and that these materials extend OpenSciEd’s reach to more classrooms. Initially, the Derivatives Product Manager will focus on bringing existing derivatives into OpenSciEd’s authoring and distribution systems as processes are established or refined. This will include setting the criteria for quality that derivatives must meet, coordinating reviews of derivatives against the criteria, and determining how much support OpenSciEd gives each product. It also includes building the processes and tools that bring derivatives in as well as distribute and maintain them over their life cycle. As this work moves forward, this role will also own the strategy for pursuing curriculum derivatives, from opportunity identification through development, release, ongoing market support, and owning the ROI for each derivative investment.
• Finally, this role leads connected technology efforts that draw on the power of machine learning to support the creation and rollout of OpenSciEd Companions and make product development and distribution processes more effective and efficient. This work will include collaborating with Learning Commons to refine an OpenSciEd-specific knowledge graph, supporting build partners to use the knowledge graph to create great products, and writing and maintaining AI agent skills for internal and external use.

Key Responsibilities

• Derivative Quality and Support
• Clarify and own the criteria derivatives and companion products must meet to carry the OpenSciEd brand and the processes for evaluating against these criteria.
• Coordinate in-depth quality reviews of derivatives and companion products, and prepare analysis that partners can act on to meet the criteria.
• Collaborate with technology partners to build and run the system for ingesting, distributing, and maintaining high-quality derivatives to make sure they reach classrooms.
• Apply AI to derivative review, intake, and maintenance to increase efficiency.
• OpenSciEd Companion and AI work
• Support the build and maintenance of the Learning Commons OpenSciEd knowledge graph to make it a useful tool for developers, including OpenSciEd.
• Together with the Commercial Partnerships Director, determine which build partners are admitted to use the OpenSciEd knowledge graph for development.
• Use market data and analysis to determine which partners and derivative products will increase market share.
• Manage build partners through their development period, including the quality review process and the guidance they need to build high-quality products.
• Lead collaborative work along with the Chief Product Officer and curriculum product managers to write and revise AI agent skills designed to support internal work and external partnerships (such as the one with Claude for Teachers).
• Derivative Portfolio Strategy and Development
• Develop and maintain a strategic roadmap that prioritizes curriculum derivatives by assessing market demand, educational need, strategic alignment, organizational capacity, partnership potential, and the return on investment.
• Collaborate with the Chief Product Officer and Chief Executive Officer to identify, cultivate, and advance strategic opportunities that expand the development, adoption, and impact of OpenSciEd curriculum derivatives.
• For strategically selected and funded derivative curriculum products, lead the design and development in collaboration with internal teams and external partners, ensuring alignment with organizational priorities, instructional goals, and market desire.
• Represent OpenSciEd in national, state, and partner communities to cultivate strategic relationships and promote the adoption and impact of OpenSciEd instructional materials in collaboration with the Marketing Manager.

Requirements

• Required Skills and Experience
• 5+ years of experience in K–12 education in the areas of curriculum development, product management, instructional materials review, or education system leadership.
• Strong knowledge of NGSS and three-dimensional science teaching and learning.
• Demonstrated ability to review science education products against quality criteria and give clear, constructive, actionable feedback.
• Ability to acquire and decipher market data to determine product development that will lead to potential market share growth.
• Strong knowledge of the barriers that currently exist in the science education market and empathy for the educators navigating these barriers.
• Strong facility with AI tools and the concepts behind them, such as data transfer through APIs, MCP, and building AI agent skills. Coding experience is not required.
• Demonstrated success building processes and managing complex, multi-partner initiatives from concept through implementation.
• Excellent communication and facilitation skills, with the ability to build alignment across diverse stakeholders.
• Strong strategic thinking paired with attention to execution details.
• Demonstrated commitment to educational equity and inclusive design.
• Comfort working in a remote, distributed organization.
• Preferred Skills and Experience
• 5+ years of experience teaching in the classroom, preferably science.
• Deep working knowledge of OpenSciEd's curriculum and instructional model.
• Experience with state standards development, state instructional materials adoption processes, or instructional materials review processes.
• Experience with knowledge graphs, structured data, or ed tech development.
• Experience acquiring and interpreting market data to inform product development that could drive market share growth.