Instructional Designer

Meet Circuit Stream

Why You’ll Love This Role

What You'll Be Doing

• Own the instructional design and development of new Pre-University courses for learners ages 13–18.
• Translate course concepts and subject-matter expertise into clear learning objectives, lesson plans, activities, assessments, projects, and instructor guides.
• Design hands-on, highly interactive learning experiences rather than lecture-heavy curriculum.
• Build courses around measurable learning outcomes and ensure activities and assessments clearly support those outcomes.
• Work closely with internal and external subject matter experts to turn specialist knowledge into content that is accessible and engaging for teenagers.
• Scope course content appropriately so it is ambitious enough to be meaningful but realistic for the learner age, course length, and delivery format.
• Develop and improve curriculum for in-person, live online, and blended delivery.
• Build meaningful projects and capstone experiences that allow students to apply what they have learned.
• Create clear instructor-facing materials that make the curriculum easy to understand, prepare, and teach consistently.
• Support instructor onboarding and training, including curriculum walkthroughs, teaching expectations, instructor guides, and learning-management-system tools.
• Conduct classroom audits and quality-assurance reviews to evaluate how effectively curriculum is being delivered.
• Gather feedback from instructors, students, and the Education team and use it to continuously improve course content.
• Maintain curriculum materials in our learning systems and ensure content is accurate, organized, current, and ready for delivery.
• Manage multiple course-development projects simultaneously and keep work moving against clear timelines and launch dates.

What We're Looking For

• 3+ years of professional experience in instructional design, curriculum development, learning experience design, or a closely related field.
• Demonstrated experience developing courses or structured learning programs for youth or teen learners.
• Strong understanding of learning theory, instructional design, pedagogy, assessment, and age-appropriate learning principles.
• Experience translating subject-matter expertise into structured, learner-friendly curriculum.
• Strong ability to write measurable learning objectives and design activities and assessments that align with them.
• Experience designing project-based, experiential, or hands-on learning.
• Strong written communication and the ability to create clear lesson plans, instructor guides, student materials, and assessment tools.
• Experience working collaboratively with subject matter experts who may not have a background in teaching or instructional design.
• Comfort working in learning-management systems such as D2L Brightspace, Canvas, Moodle, Blackboard, or similar platforms.
• Strong project-management and organizational skills, including the ability to manage several course-development workstreams at once.
• High attention to detail and a willingness to test, review, revise, and improve curriculum based on classroom feedback.
• A degree or formal training in Education, Instructional Design, Curriculum Development, Learning Sciences, or a related discipline is preferred.
• A portfolio containing examples of courses, learning experiences, curriculum materials, or youth programs you have developed is strongly preferred.

Who This is For:

• An instructional designer who gets excited about building real courses that students will actually take, not just creating learning documentation.
• Someone who understands that teaching teenagers requires participation, variety, practical application, and a strong reason to care about the material.
• A strong curriculum architect who can look at a broad topic and determine what students realistically need to learn, in what order, and through what activities.
• Someone who can take an SME’s deep expertise and turn it into something a 15-year-old can understand without watering down the substance.
• A practical builder who is comfortable creating lesson plans, projects, assessments, instructor guides, rubrics, and LMS content—not simply recommending what someone else should create.
• Someone who believes a strong course should culminate in students doing or creating something, not simply remembering information.
• A collaborative partner who can ask good questions, challenge assumptions respectfully, and help SMEs focus on what learners actually need.
• Someone who welcomes classroom feedback and sees curriculum as something to test, learn from, and improve.
• A highly organized person who can manage several courses at different stages of development without losing track of details or deadlines.
• Someone who takes ownership of the final learner experience and asks, “Will this actually work in the classroom?”

Who This Is Not For

• If most of your instructional-design experience is focused on corporate compliance training, passive e-learning modules, or information-heavy courses with limited learner interaction.
• If you prefer designing curriculum in isolation rather than collaborating closely with subject matter experts and instructors.
• If you tend to take everything an SME gives you and simply turn it into slides instead of challenging what students actually need to learn.
• If your default approach to course design is lecture first, activity second.
• If you have little interest in how teenagers learn, what keeps them engaged, or how their needs differ from adult corporate learners.
• If you are uncomfortable making decisions about scope and need the SME to tell you exactly what should go into every lesson.
• If you prefer perfecting curriculum indefinitely rather than getting a strong version into the classroom, gathering feedback, and improving it.
• If managing several courses, stakeholders, deadlines, and revisions at once feels overwhelming.

What’s In It For You

• Hourly rate of $35-$45 depending on experience and alignment to the role.
• Part-time contract for up to 100 hours spread over 3 months (ending December 18th).
• Opportunity to renew in 2027 for an additional 3-4 months to work on additional projects.
• The opportunity to have a direct impact on Circuit Stream's educational goals and products.
• Ownership over development of 4-5 new Pre-University courses that will launch in summer 2027.
• A collaborative, driven team environment focused on strong execution and measurable results.
• Hybrid working model with 1 day per week (for 4-6 hours) at our Calgary office in Beltline, with the remainder of the work completed remotely

Ready to Apply?

• Tell us about a course or learning program for kids or teenagers that you developed. What was the subject, who were the learners, how was it delivered, and what did you personally own?
• Walk us through your process for developing a new course with a subject matter expert. How do you move from a broad topic to learning objectives, lessons, activities, assessments, and a final deliverable?
• Share an example of curriculum you changed after seeing it delivered. What wasn’t working, what feedback or evidence did you use, and what did you change?

Compensation

$35.00 - $45.00 per hour