Systems Administrator/ DevOps- Junior (C)/Senior(D) (Hybrid Eligible)

at University of Pennsylvania
Published May 31, 2023
Location Philadelphia, PA
Category Default  
Job Type Full-time  

Description

University Overview

The University of Pennsylvania, the largest private employer in Philadelphia, is a world-renowned leader in education, research, and innovation. This historic, Ivy League school consistently ranks among the top 10 universities in the annual U.S. News & World Report survey. Penn has 12 highly-regarded schools that provide opportunities for undergraduate, graduate and continuing education, all influenced by Penn’s distinctive interdisciplinary approach to scholarship and learning. As an employer Penn has been ranked nationally on many occasions with the most recent award from Forbes who named Penn one of America’s Best Large Employers in 2023.

Penn offers a unique working environment within the city of Philadelphia. The University is situated on a beautiful urban campus, with easy access to a range of educational, cultural, and recreational activities. With its historical significance and landmarks, lively cultural offerings, and wide variety of atmospheres, Philadelphia is the perfect place to call home for work and play.

The University offers a competitive benefits package that includes excellent healthcare and tuition benefits for employees and their families, generous retirement benefits, a wide variety of professional development opportunities, supportive work and family benefits, a wealth of health and wellness programs and resources, and much more.

COVID-19 vaccination or a University authorized exemption is a requirement for all positions at the University of Pennsylvania. For more information about Penn’s vaccine requirements, visit the Penn COVID-19 Response website (https://coronavirus.upenn.edu/) for the latest information.

Posted Job Title

Systems Administrator/ DevOps- Junior (C)/Senior(D) (Hybrid Eligible)

Job Profile Title

Systems Administrator C

Job Description Summary

The Eukaryotic Pathogen, Host & Vector Bioinformatics Resource Center project (VEuPathDB.org) is seeking a new staff member to join its Systems Administration Team, including expertise in DevOps. This open-source project supplies the global scientific community with data-mining websites that are used on a daily basis by tens of thousands of investigators for discovery research in infectious disease biology and public health.

Job Description

VEuPathDB staff include ~60 scientific & IT professionals based at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn), the University of Georgia (UGA), the University of Notre Dame (UND), and institutions in the UK and elsewhere, organized into multi-site performance teams dedicated to Systems Administration, Software Infrastructure, Data Loading, Scientific Outreach, etc.. The SysAdmin team is responsible for ensuring the security, integrity, and availability of IT resources, through the maintenance of existing infrastructure and the selection, deployment, and management of new hardware & software technologies. Operations include deployment automa­tion, monitoring & alerting, and instrumentation dashboards for applications and services support­ing terabyte-scale, compute-intensive IT. Our activities are increasingly focused on infrastructure as code, site reliability engineering, and DevOps collaborations with project developers. The successful applicant will work closely with all members of the SysAdmin team, as well as database administrat­ors, software developers, data scientists, data center managers, and the University of Pennsylvania InfoSec team (and their equivalents at the University of Georgia). They may also liaise with project leadership, and other staff across all performance sites as noted above.

We seek experienced, forward-looking SysAdmin/DevOps personnel eager to work with a dynamic, professional IT staff to facilitate access to – and exploration of – integrated scientific data, helping to ameliorate disease worldwide. This position provides excellent benefits, including educational opportunities.

DUTIES:

  • Monitor system health and maintain a highly-available, fault-tolerant production environment at scale. Plan, develop, debug and support system automation infrastructure, using industry standard tools and custom software.

  • Manage and maintain internal systems. Work with the SysAdmin team to manage and main­tain internal systems, including Puppet, LDAP, Jenkins, GrayLog, Prometheus, Docker, Traefik, Nagios, etc.

  • Remain current on new & emerging technologies, providing technical guidance for application infrastructure development, and advice regarding the possible adoption of new technologies (expected for senior post and a plus for junior post).

  • Contribute new functionality, monitoring, and automation to meet project needs. Develop and implement tools and workflows for the configuration, monitoring and management of servers, services, websites and databases; plan for future development, reflecting the shifting balance between institutional data centers & cloud-based resources.

  • Participate in collaborative meetings and other communications with project teams to coordin­ate and prioritize efforts, in accord with overall project needs.

  • Provide technical user support for other project teams.

  • Contribute to project documentation, describing standard operating procedures and methods for developed or utilized tools, scripts and automations.

  • Perform other duties as required, including interactions with software engineering teams.

Senior (D) Level:

DevOps responsibilities:

  • Responsible for design and implementation of tools and workflows for the configuration, monitoring and management of servers, services, websites and databases

  • Work closely with the software engineering teams to develop and implement required tools and technologies.

QUALIFICATIONS:

C and D Levels:

  • BA/BS (In Computer Science, Information Systems, Statistics, Mathematics, Biology, or similar field), with at least 2 to 3 years of relevant experience, or an equivalent combination of education and experience required.

  • Experience with:

  • Unix / Linux administration (RHEL preferred)

  • standard open-source tooling (LDAP, Git, named, iptables, NFS, Systemd, etc)

  • open-source web servers and deployments (Apache, NGINX, Tomcat)

  • systems automation (Puppet preferred)

  • Jenkins continuous integration

  • system scripting in at least one language (Shell, Python, PERL, etc)

  • containers (Docker, Singularity, Traefik)

  • MinIO/S3

  • monitoring (Prometheus, Grafana, Nagios, Graylog/Fluentd, AWStats)

  • standard security policies and procedures

  • Ability to work independently, learning new skills, meeting deadlines, and soliciting feedback for project improvement over the long term.

  • Strong interpersonal skills, enabling effective communication with a collaborative team.

  • Interest and/or experience in bioinformatics and/or genomics is a plus.

  • Interest in DevOps a plus

Senior (D) Level:

BA/BS (In Computer Science, Information Systems, Statistics, Mathematics, Biology, or similar field), with at least 3 to 4 years of relevant experience, or an equivalent combination of education and experience required.The senior applicant is expected to have significant DevOps experience and in-depth experience with:

  • Unix / Linux administration (RHEL preferred)

  • Standard open-source tooling (LDAP, Git, named, iptables, NFS, Systemd, etc)

  • open-source web servers and deployments (Apache, NGINX, Tomcat)

  • systems automation (Puppet preferred)

  • Jenkins continuous integration

  • system scripting in at least one language (Shell, Python, PERL, etc)

  • containers (Docker, Singularity, Traefik)

  • MinIO/S3

  • monitoring (Prometheus, Grafana, Nagios, Graylog/Fluentd, AWStats)

  • standard security policies and procedures

Targeted Pay Range:

Systems Administrator C Level: $60,000- $100,000

Senior Systems Administrator D Level: $80,000 -$120,000

This Targeted Pay Range is only applicable to this job posting. All salary offers are made based on the candidate’s qualifications, experience, skills, and education as they directly relate to the requirements of the position, as well as internal and market factors and grade profile.

Job Location - City, State

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Hybrid Eligible - This position is eligible for a hybrid work schedule with a work week divided between working onsite and working remotely.

Department / School

School of Arts and Sciences

Pay Range

$61,046.00 - $132,906.66

Salary offers are made based on the candidate’s qualifications, experience, skills, and education as they directly relate to the requirements of the position, as well as internal and market factors and grade profile.

Affirmative Action Statement Penn adheres to a policy that prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, creed, national or ethnic origin, citizenship status, age, disability, veteran status, or any other legally protected class.

Special Requirements Background check required after a conditional job offer is made. Consideration of the background check will be tailored to the requirements of the job.

University Benefits

  • Health, Life, and Flexible Spending Accounts : Penn offers comprehensive medical, prescription, behavioral health, dental, vision, and life insurance benefits to protect you and your family’s health and welfare. You can also use flexible spending accounts to pay for eligible health care and dependent care expenses with pre-tax dollars.

  • Tuition : Take advantage of Penn's exceptional tuition benefits . You, your spouse, and your dependent children can get tuition assistance here at Penn. Your dependent children are also eligible for tuition assistance at other institutions.

  • Retirement: Penn offers generous retirement plans to help you save for your future. Penn’s Basic, Matching, and Supplemental retirement plans allow you to save for retirement on a pre-tax or Roth basis. Choose from a wide variety of investment options through TIAA and Vanguard.

  • Time Away from Work: Penn provides you with a substantial amount of time away from work during the course of the year. This allows you to relax, take vacations, attend to personal affairs, recover from illness or injury, spend time with family—whatever your personal needs may be.

  • Long-Term Care Insurance: In partnership with Genworth Financial, Penn offers faculty and staff (and your eligible family members) long-term care insurance to help you cover some of the costs of long-term care services received at home, in the community or in a nursing facility. If you apply when you’re newly hired, you won’t have to provide proof of good health or be subject to underwriting requirements. Eligible family members must always provide proof of good health and are subject to underwriting.

  • Wellness and Work-life Resources : Penn is committed to supporting our faculty and staff as they balance the competing demands of work and personal life. That’s why we offer a wide variety of programs and resources to help you care for your health, your family, and your work-life balance.

  • Professional and Personal Development: Penn provides an array of resources to help you advance yourself personally and professionally.

  • University Resources: As a member of the Penn community, you have access to a wide range of University resources as well as cultural and recreational activities. Take advantage of the University’s libraries and athletic facilities, or visit our arboretum and art galleries. There’s always something going on at Penn, whether it’s a new exhibit at the Penn Museum, the latest music or theater presentation at the Annenberg Center, or the Penn Relays at Franklin Field to name just a few examples. As a member of the Penn community, you’re right in the middle of the excitement—and you and your family can enjoy many of these activities for free.

  • Discounts and Special Services : From arts and entertainment to transportation and mortgages, you'll find great deals for University faculty and staff. Not only do Penn arts and cultural centers and museums offer free and discounted admission and memberships to faculty and staff. You can also enjoy substantial savings on other goods and services such as new cars from Ford and General Motors, cellular phone service plans, movie tickets, and admission to theme parks.

  • Flexible Work Hours: Flexible work options offer creative approaches for completing work while promoting balance between work and personal commitments. These approaches involve use of non-traditional work hours, locations, and/or job structures.

  • Penn Home Ownership Services: Penn offers a forgivable loan for eligible employees interested in buying a home or currently residing in West Philadelphia, which can be used for closing costs or home improvements.

  • Adoption Assistance: Penn will reimburse eligible employees on qualified expenses in connection with the legal adoption of an eligible child, such as travel or court fees, for up to two adoptions in your household.

To learn more, please visit: www.hr.upenn.edu/PennHR/benefits-pay

The University of Pennsylvania's special character is reflected in the diversity of the Penn community. We seek talented faculty and staff who will constitute a vibrant community that draws on the strength that comes with a substantive institutional commitment to diversity along dimensions of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, age, religion, disability, veteran status, interests, perspectives, and socioeconomic status. Grounded in equal opportunity, nondiscrimination, and affirmative action, Penn's robust commitment to diversity is fundamental to the University's mission of advancing knowledge, educating leaders for all sectors of society, and public service. The University of Pennsylvania prohibits unlawful discrimination based on race, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, creed, national or ethnic origin, citizenship status, age, disability, veteran status, or any other legally protected class.