Job Details

Scientific Computing Specialist

Position Number: 6551093
Location: Claremont, CA
Position Type: Computing - Other

Scientific Computing Specialist
Harvey Mudd College

Full Time
REQ-7527

NOTE TO APPLICANT: Some positions require a resume, cover letter and/or other documents to be submitted with your application. Please submit these as one attachment in the My Experience section of the application under the "resume/CV" upload section. Once you submit your application, you will not be able to attach additional documents.

Job Posting Title:
Scientific Computing Specialist

Job Description:

Job Title: Research Computing Specialist

POSITION SUMMARY:

Reporting to the Senior Director, Academic and Research Computing Services (ARCS) in the Computing and Information Services Department (CIS), the Research Computing Specialist supports the teaching and research mission of Harvey Mudd College. The specialist will work in close relationship with faculty, students and academic technology staff to facilitate access to High Performance Computing (HPC) resources of various kinds and support the work of faculty and students using HPC resources.

The specialist will be an integral part of the ARCS team, which collaborates to support the wide range of instructional and research activities undertaken by the HMC faculty and students. The team members each have a core area of responsibility but they are accustomed to working together and drawing on one another's areas of expertise to support faculty and students.

The Research Computing Specialist's core area of responsibility is high performance computing, which encompasses support for some on premise clusters as well as supporting work done on shared resources (regional and national). The specialist engages with faculty and students to understand their computational requirements and facilitates access to appropriate resources and tools. S/he must have sufficient knowledge of the tools commonly used in HPC environments in order to train users and troubleshoot issues. S/he must also have sufficient knowledge of Linux to perform system administrator tasks or to supervise someone doing those tasks.

The Research Computing Specialist will have or acquire broad knowledge of software used by the science disciplines, ability to understand and support research in their own and adjacent scientific fields and strong interest in technology used in the Humanities, Social Sciences and the Arts. They will have experience in higher education technology in general and a willingness to learn new applications and train others in their use.

Given the diverse and evolving nature of research needs and the spectrum of responsibilities, the ideal candidate must possess strong analytical and problem-solving skills, coupled with a willingness to continuously learn and adapt to new technologies and research domains.

DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

High-Performance Computing

Manage or assist in the management of on-premise high-performance computing clusters and workstations owned by faculty, with help from other staff members and/or outside consultants.
For local resources, perform system maintenance tasks or supervise others doing so. Work closely with other staff from Computing and Information Services, Computer Science, Math and Engineering to ensure that faculty and students have access to these resources for their teaching and research.
For local resources, install needed application software. Examples include Jupyterhub and WebMO. See HPC at Harvey Mudd College.
Carry out the role of Campus Champion for HMC, ensuring that the community is aware of and can access national cyberinfrastructure resources such as ACCESS and Open Science Pool.
Work closely with counterparts at the Claremont Colleges (TCC) and in southern California to match HMC faculty and students' computing needs with the appropriate high-performance computing resources located at TCC and in the region. These would include HPC resources at Pomona College, at Claremont McKenna College and at USC, for example. Participate in the development of an HPC alliance between the colleges.
Assess and analyze needs and make recommendations to CIS management regarding high-performance computing resources.

Faculty and Student support and engagement

Working with other ARCS team members, the specialist will engage with students and faculty to help them meet their instructional/learning and research goals. This work can vary enormously, which means that the specialist must bring an open mind and a problem solving attitude to subject matter that s/he might not have encountered before. Examples of recent activities include:
Assist faculty members with onboarding to a regional cluster. Install AMPL with Gurobi solver and test the installation with multiple accounts. Add students to the faculty member's allocation.
Work with an Engineering faculty member to convert assignments for a course from Matlab to Python. Setup and test Google Colab and Github as platforms to host the assignments.
Collect descriptions of science use cases from faculty; collate the material and draft summaries for inclusion in NSF grant applications for a science DMZ and regional computing cluster.
Meet with a student team to advise them on effective machine learning algorithms for their capstone project. Assist other clinic teams in getting access to appropriate HPC resources for their project.
Research licensing for RStudio Cloud for faculty teaching a Biology course. Provided technical setup, onboarding guides, and direct support to faculty and TAs. Advise on role management, monitor usage, and facilitate integration with Sakai and Gradescope. Work with other CIS staff to implement single sign on with Google Workspace for Education.
Proactively research, analyze and evaluate software tools and toolkits. Recommend new software and other tools to faculty and students.
In close collaboration with other ARCS team members, ensure that the CIS service catalog is complete and accurate.
Work with the ARCS team to arrange for the delivery of workshops and lectures by experts on computational methods of interest to the HMC community.
Write documentation in the form of tutorials, web pages, FAQs, etc.
Collaborate with faculty to produce instructional materials, such as homework assignments.
Keep abreast of developments in higher education technology with an emphasis on scientific and engineering disciplines; report back to the HMC community about developments as appropriate.

Other Duties

In collaboration with the ARCS team, work on goal-specific, time-bound projects proposed by faculty and/or students.
Work with User Support team to install, analyze, test, and maintain software on departmental lab and research systems.
As appropriate or necessary, supervise, mentor, and evaluate the performance of assigned staff or contractors
Participate in cross-functional teams that work on computing-related projects. Coordinate teamwork when assigned to the position of team leader.

APPLICANTS WITH AT LEAST SOME OF THE FOLLOWING ARE ENCOURAGED TO APPLY.

Education and Experience:

Master's degree in computer science, engineering, mathematics, or the natural sciences.
Three years of professional experience in research computing support, instructional technology, or other related fields.
Experience with High Performance Computing clusters.
Demonstrated familiarity with the Linux operating system.
Demonstrated strong analytical skills.
Exemplary communication and interpersonal skills.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:

Sufficient knowledge of Linux to manage High Performance Computing clusters and high powered workstations or sufficient knowledge of Linux to supervise a staff member performing system administration tasks.
Working knowledge of Linux system administration, shell scripting, and the use of job schedulers such as SLURM.
Working knowledge of Project Jupyter ecosystem including setting up JupyterHub servers on on-premise and cloud services with kernels for various programming languages such as Python, Julia, R, etc
Knowledge of parallel processing in cluster environments as well as multi-core, multi-CPU, and GPU systems in order to provide advice and support to faculty and students.
Knowledge of and interest in tools in the Python ecosystem such as NumPy for numerical computation, SciPy for scientific algorithms, and Pandas for data manipulation and analysis. Familiarity with Matplotlib and Seaborn for data visualization.
Ability to support computing environments such as Jupyter Notebook, R Studio, Google Colab.
Knowledge of, or willingness to learn, mathematical and statistical packages, such as Matlab, Mathematica, LaTeX, and R, as well as modeling, simulation and data visualization software such as Gaussian, Materials Studio, COMSOL, and GROMACS, in order to support others in their use, troubleshoot issues and evaluate other applications within the genre.
General knowledge of generative AI technology, such as Gemini, Vertex AI or Microsoft Copilot, especially for coding and research.

Ability to

Research, analyze and recommend new software and hardware.
Communicate technical issues to users in a clear and effective manner.
Learn new software applications quickly.
Establish and maintain cooperative and effective working relationships with others, using tact, patience and courtesy.
Analyze situations accurately and adopt an effective course of action.
Define realistic, specific goals and objectives and to prioritize them.
Work independently with little direction in a dynamic and goal-oriented work environment.
Supervise and evaluate the performance of assigned staff.
Work at a high level of independence and exercise good judgment in making decisions.

Physical Requirements:
While performing the duties of this job, the staff member is regularly required to sit; stand, use hands and fingers and talk or hear. The employee is occasionally required to reach with hands and arms. The individual must regularly lift and/or carry up to 10 pounds and occasionally lift and/or move up to 25 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, and the ability to adjust focus. The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Hours:
Regular office hours are 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. However, days and hours may vary due to the needs of the department or the College.

Remote Work Eligibility:

All staff positions, regardless of remote work eligibility, require an initial 30-calendar-day on-campus work period. Based on an evaluation by the supervisor and area Vice President, this position falls under Remote Work Category C as defined in the College's Remote Work Policy. During the academic year, the position is eligible for up to 2 remote workdays per week, and up to 3 days per week during the non-academic year (e.g., summer). All remote work arrangements must be approved by the direct supervisor, area Cabinet member, and Human Resources, and are subject to periodic review based on institutional needs. These arrangements are neither guaranteed nor considered entitlements and may change due to factors such as employee performance, evolving business needs, or changes to the position.

Classification:
This is an exempt, full-time, regular, benefits eligible position.

Salary:
$95,000-$110,000 per year

Reports To:
This position reports to the Senior Director of Academic and Research Computing Services.

Additional Information:
This job description defines the essential job duties of the position. Harvey Mudd College expects that employees hired for this position can perform the essential functions of the job without imposing risk of substantial harm to the health or safety of themselves or others. It may also include marginal functions, generally defined within Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Regular employment at the College is for no specified period; conditions and status of employment (hours, pay, title, duties, etc.) are subject to change at any time. Employment is at-will and employees, and likewise the College, are free to end the employment relationship at any time, for any reason, with or without notice or cause, unless otherwise prohibited by law.

Harvey Mudd College is an Equal Opportunity Employer. Qualified applicants will be given consideration for employment without regard to age, race, gender, national origin, sexual orientation, protected veteran's status, disability, or any other characteristics protected by applicable law.

Please note that in order to be considered an applicant for any staff position at Harvey Mudd College you must apply for each position for which you believe you are qualified.

To apply, visit https://theclaremontcolleges.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/HMC_Careers/job/Sprague-Center/Scientific-Computing-Specialist_REQ-7527