Senior Research Computing Systems Engineer

Uvmjobs; Burlington (VT); Hybrid; USD 80,000 - 113,000; Full time

Job summary

The University of Vermont is seeking a Senior Research Computing Systems Engineer to support the Vermont Advanced Computing Center’s HPC infrastructure and software stack. You will manage multi-cluster environments, assist researchers with Slurm and Open OnDemand, and help scale resources for classroom and research use.

Ideal candidates will have Linux administration, scripting, and strong collaboration skills, with experience in HPC technologies and IaC practices.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in a STEM field.
• 5 years of Linux Systems Admin/Engineer experience.
• Thorough knowledge of Linux OS, networking, and shell scripting.
• Expertise with system and network debugging.
• Excellent customer service ethic and collaborative communication.
• Ability to learn and evaluate new technologies for adoption.
• Infrastructure as code mindset.
• Ability to work on teams and independently.
• Expertise in at least one systems language (C, C++, Python, Perl, Rust).

Responsibilities

• Provide expert support for HPC resources and related software.
• Install, maintain, and support research software and tools (Slurm, Open OnDemand).
• Collaborate with faculty and researchers to tailor compute resources.
• Develop scripts for cluster administration and user support.
• Assist in expanding HPC use in classroom settings.

Skills

Linux Admin

Scripting

Communication

Teamwork

Infrastructure as Code

Systems programming

Education

Bachelor’s degree in STEM

Tools

Slurm

Lmod

Spack

CUDA

Ansible

VMware

Proxmox

KVM

Podman

Apptainer

MongoDB

InfiniBand

Job description

Senior Research Computing Systems Engineer

The University of Vermont is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, protected veteran status, or any other category legally protected by federal or state law.

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Advertising/Posting Title Senior Research Computing Systems Engineer

Posting Summary

This Research Computing Systems Engineer position provides expert support for the Vermont Advanced Computing Center’s ( VACC ) research computing systems and helps build and maintain state-of-the-art high performance computing ( HPC ) solutions for our researchers. This position joins a team that supports the HPC hardware, large-scale storage systems, cluster software, and researcher software in the VACC .
The VACC has four research clusters, including multi-thousand core “big compute” resources and GPU -focused resources, and a massive in-memory database cluster. This position will support the VACC computing and storage hardware infrastructure, as well as research computing software such as Slurm, OpenOnDemand and related technologies. This position directly supports UVM’s goal of enhancing IT resources and infrastructure available to the UVM research community.
The position will work with other VACC IT staff to install, maintain, and support research software and tools used by the UVM research community. In collaboration with Research Computing Facilitators, this position will respond to a wide range of requests submitted by researchers, providing guidance and expertise in software installation and troubleshooting.
This position will assess the needs of our faculty, helping adjust the VACC compute resources to better meet their needs for research and academic purposes. The position will actively support academic use of VACC resources, working with faculty to expand HPC into the classroom.
Scripting is an important skill for this position, both for cluster administration, and for helping users take advantage of the VACC cluster. A change to any part of the VACC resources is likely to affect hundreds of users, working on millions of dollars of research, so systematic attention to detail, careful planning and judgement are critical.

Minimum Qualifications (or equivalent combination of education and experience)

• Bachelor’s degree in STEM related field.
• 5 years of experience as a Linux Systems Administrator/Engineer.
• A thorough knowledge of Linux operating systems, network architecture and Linux shell scripting.
• Expertise with system and network debugging.
• Excellent customer service ethic, effective communication skills and collaborative approach to teamwork.
• Skilled at learning and evaluating new technologies and ability to determine if appropriate for adoption.
• An appreciation for infrastructure as code.
• Ability to work effectively on team and independent projects, with ability to self-direct and adjust to shifts in priorities.
• Expertise with at least one systems programming language (C, C++, Python, Perl, Rust, etc…).

Desirable Qualifications

• Significant prior experience with high performance computing systems and scientific software.
• Expertise with HPC technologies, such as job schedulers like Slurm, module systems like Lmod, package managers like Spack, CUDA .
• Experience with Ansible as a deployment and orchestration framework.
• Experience with virtualization and/or container technologies (VMware, Proxmox, KVM , Podman, Apptainer).
• Experience with MongoDB in a sharded architecture.
• Low latency networking experience (e.g., InfiniBand, DOCA - OFED
• Experience compiling, installing, and running open-source software, including software using MPI libraries
• Experience in debugging and tuning of software applications on HPC clusters, experience with common scientific libraries and applications.
• Experience deploying open-weight AI models.
• Experience deploying Open OnDemand, Jupyter Notebook and supporting technologies.
• Clustered filesystem expertise (e.g., GPFS ).

Anticipated Pay Range

Anticipated Pay Range $80,000-$113,000

Other Information

Special Conditions

Special Conditions A probationary period may be required, Occasional evening and/or weekends required (if non-exempt position, may result in overtime), This position is eligible for a hybrid schedule with an option to split time between campus and elsewhere, in accordance with the university telecommuting policy, This position is eligible for full-time telework in accordance with the university telecommuting policy, Background Check required for this position

FLSA

FLSA Exempt

Union Position

Union Position Yes, UVMSU

Position Information

Job Open Date

Job Open Date 09/29/2026

Job Close Date (Jobs close at 11:59 PM EST.)

The University of Vermont is a welcoming, educationally purposeful community committed to creating an inclusive environment that embraces intellectual diversity and global perspectives. We seek to prepare students to be accountable leaders who will bring to their work a grasp of complexity, effective problem-solving and communication skills, and an enduring commitment to learning and ethical conduct. Members of the University of Vermont community embrace and advance the values of Our Common Ground: Respect, Integrity, Innovation, Openness, Justice, and Responsibility. Staff play a critical role in this effort and the successful candidate will demonstrate a strong commitment to UVM’s mission and advancing Our Common Ground values through the execution of their job duties.

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