Job Description

Student employees will be working with the Philadelphia Water Department's Scientific and Regulatory Affairs Unit (SRA) at the Bureau of Laboratory Services. Student employees will work under the direction of supervising civil and chemical engineers who are responsible for monitoring, investigating, and assisting in the operational decisions of the City's drinking water distribution system. The distribution system consists of a large network of mains, storage tanks, reservoirs, and pumping stations, and delivers 275 million gallons of water to 1.6 million people every day. SRA monitors the distribution system by analyzing both daily grab samples and real-time online water quality data transmitted from water quality sensors installed throughout the city.

ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS

The responsibilities include:

• Analyzing and summarizing grab sample and online water quality instrument data for a variety of purposes monitoring and classifying the outputs of event detection systems as part of the Contamination Warning System
• Assisting engineers during field work. Field work consists of visiting and investigating customer complaints, grab and online sampling locations, and other projects as needed.

COMPETENCIES, KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS AND ABILITIES

Knowledge of (or the desire to learn) advanced Excel skills is useful in this position because it often requires processing and display a large amount of data from several different sources. This position also requires the ability to learn and master several types of computer software programs, such as time series data management systems and geographic information systems (GIS), which may be used extensively depending on current projects.

Qualifications

Candidates must be active students.

Appropriate Majors include:

• Chemical Engineering
• Civil Engineering
• Environmental Engineering
• Environmental Sciences
• Biological Sciences

Additional Information

Hourly rate: $17.66/HR 

The City of Philadelphia is an Equal Opportunity employer and does not permit discrimination based on race, ethnicity, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, national origin, ancestry, age, disability, marital status, source of income, familial status, genetic information or domestic or sexual violence victim status. If you believe you were discriminated against, call the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations at 215-686-4670 or send an email to faqpchr@phila.gov.

For more information, go to: Human Relations Website: http://www.phila.gov/humanrelations/Pages/default.aspx