Jobs

Purpose

The Science Operations Manager for the Hobby-Eberly Telescope (HET) at the McDonald Observatory will provide leadership, high-quality science, and technical support in the science operations of the HET, including managing the HET science and engineering support operations, supervising night-time operations, monitoring and reporting on HET optical and instrumentation performance, data acquisition and reduction.

Responsibilities

• Manage HET science and engineering support operations. Coordinate with engineering and special program leads to facilitate HET Board discussions of these allocations and produce Telescope Allocation Committee (TAC) allocations. Manage the HET observing queue and resolve time conflicts. Work closely with science and engineering staff to specify and conduct night-time engineering tests and analyze/reduce data/results as needed.
• Conduct personal research. Become an active user of the Observatory instruments to contribute to the scientific life at the Observatory. Participate in outreach activities such as giving public talks, tours of the facility, and attending colloquia. Submit research proposals to outside funding agencies as principal investigator (PI) or on research grants/contracts.
• Monitor and report on science operations. Lead operations meetings. Oversee HET Observing Metrics and report to the HET Board, Time Allocation Committees, and Users Committee on HET science operations performance and time usage.
• Conduct night operations. Serve as a resident astronomer approximately two nights per month, or as needed, in the night operations team to conduct science observations on behalf of HET users, using facility instruments and based upon queue priorities, weather conditions, and facility constraints. In addition, also maintains a working understanding of the essential duties of the Telescope Operator position, including stacking and acquiring targets.
• Supervise HET night-time operations staff. Manage projects to improve operations. Monitor and evaluate work performance. Supervise training.
• Conduct projects to improve HET operations and/or add new capabilities or features. Projects may include theoretical work, documentation, hardware, and software projects, depending on the candidate's skill set.
• Conduct daytime operations. Support daytime engineering testing, including instrument commissioning tests as needed and daily telescope functional tests on a rotation basis.
• Observatory operations. Participate in observatory-wide duties and serve as deputy facility manager.
• Perform other duties as assigned to meet business needs. Keep accurate and updated time sheets and complete required training and paperwork. Staff living on-site in the residential community are considered essential employees as determined by the HET Facility Manager and the Observatory Superintendent. They will be required to serve on the Observatory Emergency Response team “ERT" and perform tasks to help respond to emergencies, such as fire, medical, hazardous material, or other emergencies threatening or interfering with the facility's normal operations.

For additional information and to apply: HET Science Operations Manager

Purpose

This position performs electrical engineering tasks on the Hobby-Eberly Telescope's (HET) equipment and facility infrastructure, with a wide latitude for independent action and decision-making. This hands-on position maintains, designs, and improves the functionality of electrical, electronic, electromechanical, and electro-optical subsystems on the Hobby-Eberly Telescope (HET) to achieve McDonald Observatory's scientific goals. The position reports to the HET Electrical Engineer Manager at McDonald Observatory.

Responsibilities

• Engineering. Conducts electrical engineering duties that modify, repair, or reconfigure the HET electrical, electro-optical, and electro-mechanical subsystems.
• Team Collaboration and Backup. Works cooperatively and constructively with the HET and Austin electrical and mechanical teams on design, improvements, and preventative maintenance on HET electrical, electro-mechanical, and electro-optical subsystems. Periodically performs operations engineering and cross-functional duties.
• Planning Meetings. Attends and constructively participates in morning planning meetings, weekly HET staff meetings, weekly electrical team meetings, periodic technical and/or design review meetings, and other meetings as needed for an efficient and productive operation.
• Project Management. Provides input into long-term planning and technical direction for HET engineering tasks. Provides daily reporting of activities.
• Respond to Problems. Responds as necessary to night-time repair and maintenance calls from telescope operations staff.
• Other Duties. Performs other related duties as assigned to meet business needs. Serves as an essential employee, and acts as a member of the McDonald Observatory’s Emergency Response Team (ERT), responds to fire, medical, hazardous material, or other emergencies that threaten or interfere with the facility’s normal operations

For additional information and to apply: HET Electrical Engineer 

Purpose

To program, install, maintain, and support the computers and network of the Hobby-Eberly Telescope (HET) at the McDonald Observatory with emphasis on designing and authoring new code, and maintaining existing code for the control of the telescope sub-systems. These efforts are part of continuing telescope development projects to operate and upgrade the HET as needed.

Responsibilities

• Serves as a programmer in the development of new software products directly related to the design and operation of telescope and instrument control systems. Also includes the upgrade of existing software in support of existing telescope hardware.
• Maintains existing software already in production, providing for the rapid resolution of software bugs identified by operators and site staff, continuously develops familiarity with all code bases.
• Serves in a broad-spectrum backup role in the event that another team member is unavailable; includes maintaining an active interest in other systems related to those directly involved in assigned projects.
• Linux system administration.
• Act as HET Operations Engineer as required in the schedule rotation.
• Respond as necessary to nighttime repair and maintenance calls from the telescope operations staff.
• Attends meetings and delivers status reports as necessary. Works directly with project scientists, engineers, and computing staff. Maintains consistent pre and post-incident communication with team members to ensure full problem resolution and project completion. Updates the content of both internal and external documentation archives, notifies users and staff to software changes in production packages, retains backup copies and version archives of software products.

For additional information and to apply: HET Software Engineer