The University of Texas at Austin is hiring: Telescope Operator, Hobby-Eberly Te

Overview

Job Posting Title: Telescope Operator, Hobby-Eberly Telescope, McDonald Observatory

Hiring Department: McDonald Observatory

Position Open To: All Applicants

Weekly Scheduled Hours: 40

FLSA Status: Exempt

Earliest Start Date: Immediately

Position Duration: Expected to Continue

Location: McDonald Observatory

Job Details: General Notes

The Hobby-Eberly Telescope (HET) is one of the world’s largest optical telescopes, featuring a 10-meter primary mirror. It is primarily designed for spectroscopy, which involves decoding the light from stars and galaxies to understand their properties. This makes it ideal for searching for planets around other stars, studying distant galaxies, exploding stars, black holes, and other celestial phenomena. The HET is a collaborative project between The University of Texas at Austin, The Pennsylvania State University, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, and Georg-August-Universität Göttingen. See https://mcdonald.utexas.edu/research-facilities/HET.

The HET operates 24/7/365 and is located at McDonald Observatory, 16 miles from Ft Davis, Texas, which is 440 miles west of the UT Austin campus. Frequent night, weekend, and holiday duties are required, along with occasional on-call duties. Residence within the Observatory's residential community is available and may be required. This position may require "call-back" as an essential employee for emergencies or critical responses.

Candidates must be authorized to work in the United States on a full-time, permanent basis without requiring employer sponsorship.

UT Austin, recognized by Forbes as one of America’s Best Large Employers, provides outstanding employee benefits and total rewards packages that include: