Instructional Support Engineer (Indianapolis)

The Instructional Support Engineer works in the Technical Services Group at Purdue Indianapolis and serves as a consultant, providing direct support to faculty, staff, and students in the school’s formal instructional labs for all undergraduate courses in Mechanical and Motorsports Engineering.

Day-to-day responsibilities include maintenance and repair of instructional lab equipment and ensuring the instructional facilities are ready for each lab session. Equipment consists primarily of custom-designed instrumentation that is not commercially available; as such, this position develops documentation related to specification, design, fabrication, testing, and repair of equipment and develops and trains on these elements. Repair and maintenance involve root cause analysis and complex decision-making related to problems that do not have clear solutions and require new, engineered solutions. Through these responsibilities, the Instructional Support Engineer ensures labs are running at optimal functionality in order to enable successful completion of course projects, objectives, assignments, and outcomes for faculty, staff, and students.

This position will work in a team supporting the several instructional laboratories in the Mechanical Engineering and Motorsports engineering program. These labs include Metrology, Universal Testing Machines, CNC Equipment lab, Fluids Lab, Systems Measurement and Control Lab, Heat Transfer Lab, and Motorsports Instructional Labs in the School and will coordinate the usage of the facilities as needed for other college courses. This position is focused more on the metrology, Universal Testing Machines, and CNC equipment and will provide direct supervision and training to users of CNC machining equipment and high accuracy Metrology equipment. This position will be expected to maintain and repair the equipment. This position may be called upon to provide engineering solutions to complex problems to implement the ME curriculum in this space. Through these responsibilities, the Instructional Support Engineer ensures labs are running at optimal functionality in order to enable successful completion of course projects, objectives, assignments, and outcomes for faculty, staff, and students.

This position collaborates frequently with new faculty and teaching assistants each semester to provide safety training, equipment training, lab orientations, and prescribe processes if issues arise in working with the CNC machinery, universal testing machines, metrology equipment, and instrumentation. The training materials and topics are to be developed by this position in response to identified needs and deficiencies of knowledge in course instructional staff. This position will also participate in periodic course meetings to ensure the safe and consistent operation of the labs.

This position will provide strategic guidance in the development of new laboratory experiments and apparatus to further modernize the school’s undergraduate program. In this role, given new concepts in lab apparatus, this position will lead the design efforts to physically implement this concept idea. This position will engage collaborators and resources as needed to develop the proposed solution and bring the proposal through the design review process, fabrication process, and implementation process.

About Purdue University Indianapolis: 

Purdue University in Indianapolis is part of Purdue University West Lafayette, with multiple locations throughout the city of Indianapolis. It bookends America’s Hard Tech Corridor, which extends from West Lafayette through new investments in Lebanon’s LEAP Innovation District to downtown Indianapolis. It positions our students, faculty and staff in close proximity to top businesses and leading industries, providing new and unique executive education and internship opportunities. Its chief academic officer is David Umulis, senior vice provost and professor, who reports to Provost Patrick Wolfe, and its chief operating officer is Daniel Hasler, former Indiana secretary of commerce. 

Purdue University has achieved excellence at scale, ranking among the top four U.S. universities in agriculture, graduate engineering and number of utility patents and, across all leading American universities, as No. 1 in undergraduate STEM enrollment. That level of achievement now extends to all parts of Indianapolis. Responding to the strong need expressed by central Indiana business and community leaders for more highly skilled talents in science, technology, engineering and health care disciplines, we will ambitiously grow enrollment to establish a new pipeline of Boilermaker talent to our capital city. Degrees granted and tuition will exactly mirror those in West Lafayette – and all degrees, programs, departments, schools and colleges will be eligible to be considered for a Purdue University in Indianapolis presence. 

Education and Experience:
Required:

• Bachelor’s degree in science, technology, engineering, or mathematical field 
• 2-3 years of experience in electronics design, fabrication, and troubleshooting, as well as making and mechanical assembly and/or related experience
• Equivalent combinations of education and experience will be considered
• Experience in CNC machines, universal testing machines, metrology, and making 
• Experience with CAM software and G-code

Preferred:

• MasterCAM experience

Skills:
Required:

• Programming skills using microcontrollers 
• Ability to use soldering equipment, hand tools and machine tools
• CAD/CAM software skills
• Good written and verbal communication skills
• Proficiency in process/project management
• Ability to interact with faculty, staff, and students and convey information critical to safety and process

• Purdue University will not sponsor employment authorization for this position  
• A background check will be required for employment in this position
• FLSA: Exempt (Not Eligible for Overtime)
• Retirement Eligibility:  Defined Contribution Waiting Period
• Purdue University is an EOE/AA employer. All individuals, including minorities, women, individuals with disabilities, and veterans are encouraged to apply
• Benefit Statement: Purdue University offers a substantial Benefit Package including medical, dental, and vision insurance as well as a generous paid time off package for sick and vacation days