Hobby Eberly Telescope Night Staff policies

The following are documents and policies pertaining to night staff. Ongoing efforts are made to keep these as current as possible, but there may be some delay in updating these documents.

• Policies and documents
  • Meeting Attendance Policy
  • Project Time Policy
  • Overlap Policy
  • Night Staff Software Policy
  • Schedule and Timesheet Policy
  • Bad Weather Time-keeping Policy
  • Time Sheet Reporting
  • Sick Time Policy
  • RA research accounts
  • How to get travel approved/reimbursed

Overview of night operations staff policies and expectations

The following summary includes details from (and links to) the above documents and synthesizes/organizes expectations by topic:

Work schedule and time off

• Overall HET Operations calendar is ​here.
• Work schedules for OPS TO/RA and night TO/RA are posted in a Google Calendar (​link)
  • Schedules are made quarterly, four times a year:
    • Nov/Dec/Jan
    • Feb/Mar/Apr
    • May/Jun/Jul
    • Aug/Sep/Oct
  • Calls for time off requests are sent ~35 days before each quarter starts.
  • New work schedules are posted by the 7th of the month before the new quarter starts
  • Approved requests for time off are posted on the HET Operations Google Calendar (​link)
• If you are not scheduled for work and plan to be off-site overnight or longer, let the science operations manager know to add you to the off-duty calendar (this is helpful in cases of emergencies or sick employees requiring replacements)
• When working more than 40h in a week we accumulate “comp” time. All staff members are encouraged to keep their comp time balance low and maintain a healthy work-life balance. The regular use of vacation time is encouraged, and long-range off-duty plans can be accommodated in this scheduling process.

OPS/overlap/night duty expectations

• OPS duty
  • on weekdays starts at 4:30pm during CDT, 4:00pm during CST
  • on weekends/holidays starts 2.5h before sunset
  • OPS TO expected to stay in control room to hand-over to the night TO when they arrive on site at sunset
  • OPS RA expected to send summary email report when tasks have completed; if troubleshooting needs arise, may need to stay until sunset to hand-over to night RA
    • If problems arise after OPS RA has sent the email but before night RA is on duty, it is the responsibility of the OPS RA to monitor and troubleshoot these problems

• Overlap
  • The night before your shift begins, each RA/TO will come to the control room (or join via Zoom in remote mode) to communicate with the on-duty staff member
  • Plan to spent at least 1 hour catching up on updates/changes to operations (may spend up to 4 hours if necessary)
  • If it is your last night on-duty and the next RA/TO does not overlap, please contact them and the science operations manager to make sure they know their night shift starts shortly
  • See here for more details

• TO night duty
  • Night TO should be ready to take over in the control room by sunset
  • Shift may last until sunrise if morning twilight spectra are required
  • TO may "call" the night for safety (e.g., fire, ice, etc) at any time

• RA night duty
  • Night RA should arrive in control room (or remotely) ~10min before sunset
  • Shift may last until sunrise if morning twilight spectra are required; typically the RA OPS shift takes 1 hour from start to finish if all goes well
  • RA may "call" the night once there is no more time for observations given the weather and/or twilight conditions. In particularly poor weather this may be before 18-deg twilight begins.

• Bad weather expectations
  • One perk of this job is the flexible work schedule and relaxed atmosphere. When bad weather keeps the dome closed, and after any necessary calibrations or engineering tests are finished, idle time should be spent working on projects (or research for the RAs) whenever possible. Bad weather time during scheduled duty counts as work hours and should be treated as such.

• Summer time weekday TO OPS
  • On summer weekdays, TOs start OPS at 4:30pm but sunset is 4+ hours later. The time between when OPS activities complete and when the night TO arrives should be used to work on projects. If TOs need additional resources or support in these projects, they should contact the science operations manager for guidance.

Time sheet submissions

• UT requires all employees to submit weekly time sheets accounting for our work hours
• Time sheet entry itself should only be done during scheduled work hours, so it is understood you may be a few days late submitting
  • the science operations manager approves time sheet submissions at least once a week (usually on Monday nights)
• All time sheet submissions must have "comment" entries to describe the work done during that time
  • Examples: "OPS", "night", "RA", "TO", "project: DIMM", "project: PR_timelost", "meeting", etc
• Up to 2 hours of time may be entered for checking e-mail each week, if necessary (but may not exceed 40 hours)
• No week should have more than 75 hours in a row - take breaks
• No day may have more than 15 hours of work (if you anticipate this happening, please get in touch ahead of time)
• Sick time is described in the following subsection: Sick Time
• Guiding principle is accuracy of time sheets, but efficiency matters as well (i.e., don't track tenths of an hour!)
  • OPS TOs are considered on duty the whole time, expected to submit time from the start of OPS until sunset
  • OPS RAs may submit time for as long as their shift requires actions (may be only 1 hour if all goes well, or may be until sunset)
  • Night TOs/RAs may submit time from sunset until sunrise, either using:
    • Annual average night length of 12 hours (sunset-to-sunrise is 11.4h, but work often extends slightly)
    • Monthly average night lengths (given below, also average to 12 hours)
      • Jan: 14h
      • Feb: 13h
      • Mar: 12h
      • Apr: 11h
      • May: 11h
      • Jun: 10h
      • Jul: 10h
      • Aug: 11h
      • Sep: 12h
      • Oct: 13h
      • Nov: 13h
      • Dec: 14h
    • Very rarely if problems arise, the night RA/TO may work past sunrise, and should log that additional time worked.
• See Schedule and Timesheet Policy for more details
• See also Bad Weather Time-keeping Policy

Sick Time

Sick may be used for any of the permitted uses listed below, during a week when your timesheet's total hours are below 40 (i.e., sick time cannot be used to generate comp time; also note that comp time expires after 12 months but sick time never expires).

• Sick time entries on timesheets may include an optional comment (not required)
• Acceptable uses include:
  • Employee medical condition (unable to work because of sickness/injury/pregnancy)
  • Medical appointments including travel time to those appointments
  • Care of immediate family (including travel time to medical care/appointments)
  • Care of family who do not reside in the same household (spouse, child, or parent who needs care as a result of a documented medical condition)
  • Parent-Teacher conferences (up to 8 hours sick leave per year to attend conferences for students in pre-K through 12th grade)
  • see ​UT's policy webpage for full details
• When using more than three sick days (e.g., >24 hours of sick time) in a week, according to UT policy: "employees shall provide a licensed practitioner's certification showing the cause or nature of the condition or another written statement of the facts for the sick leave that is acceptable to the supervisor"
• For other questions or circumstances please contact the science operations manager.

Projects

• TOs and RAs spend some of their time (usually ~10-15%) working on projects to help improve operations
  • Project prioritization and progress are discussed with the Science Operations Manager
  • Expecting regular updates (at least 1 or 2 email updates per month); can use format:
    • Projects worked on this past week or two (brief updates of progress)
    • Projects planned for next week or two (again brief)
    • Future projects not worked on yet
• Project time becomes more significant in the summer with shorter nights
• Project time cannot be used to go beyond 40 hours in a week (and earn comp time) unless you are specifically requested to do so by the science operations manager, facility manager, or director

Communications/meetings/etc

• TOs/RAs are expected to read and reply to relevant emails primarily during their scheduled duty times
  • Occasional email checking while off-duty may be appropriate to stay up-to-date on important information
• TOs and RAs are expected to attend the weekly Thursday Operations Staff Meetings unless
  • They are scheduled to work night duty on that same Thursday night
  • They have been approved to be off-duty and are listed on the off-duty calendar
  • They are sick and unable to attend (and will use sick time on their timesheet)
• See also the Meeting Attendance Policy