Senior Specialist, Laboratory Support, Nutrition

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Under the authority of the Director of the School of Nutrition Sciences the incumbent is responsible to coordinate all undergraduate food and nutrition sciences laboratories to supervise the testing and the adaptation of experiments to the curriculum requirements of the School to ensure that the demonstrations and tutorials are current and scientifically and pedagogically sound. Instructs teaching assistants facilitators and students in safe working practices in the laboratory and coordinates all laboratory activities within the School of Food and Nutrition Sciences ensuring efficient operation and compliance with occupational Health and Safety and WHMIS legislation by demonstrators and academic standards. Supervises and coordinates the planning and execution of specialized activities and programs including mini-courses and summer camps. Works closely with faculty students and external partners to support educational initiatives and objectives. Maintains laboratory resources guides personnel and implements best practices for a productive learning environment.

In this role your responsibilities will include:

• Laboratory instruction activities: Teaches a maximum of 6 credits courses and collaborates with other nutrition and food science professors in the creation and development of food science and nutrition courses. Instructs students and TAs in a variety of laboratories (food preparation food analytics and food processing) to help them acquire necessary technical knowledge in the discipline. Responds to student/professor inquiries and concerns.

• Laboratory and operations management: Plans and coordinates the day-to-day operation of all course laboratories in both English and French. This includes instructing training and supervising teaching assistants and part-time technicians in planning demonstrations throughout the academic year as well as offering remedial instruction to teaching assistants and professors where needed. Coordinates the use of labs for other activities such as practicums community education classes summer camps student association activities and demonstrations.

• Learning materials preparation: In consultation with professors contributes to the development of food science and nutrition courses including learning activities lab experiments and recipe preparations for culinary courses to ensure alignment between lecture and lab materials. Collaborates with professors to create and maintain laboratory manuals ensuring consistent formatting accurate and current technical terminology.

• Maintenance of laboratory equipment: Responsible for the operation maintenance calibration and troubleshooting of the laboratorys equipment. Performs minor repairs to equipment trains teaching-assistants and other users to use equipment properly and safely. Ensures the availability and proper set-up as well as maintains the inventory of equipment and supplies needed for each laboratory. Keep track of the equipment use maintenance and calibration.

• Testing: Oversees the testing of new learning activities/experiments to ensure that they work meet the intended pedagogical objectives are feasible with the existing installation and equipment and are repeatable by students according to their level of knowledge of the discipline. Corrects existing learning activities/experiments which are not working properly.

• Health and safety protocols: Ensures compliance of all users with health safety and security standards in the food analysis and food processing labs as well as public health standards in the food preparation lab sensory lab and servery.

• Purchasing and budget planning duties: Participates in budget planning for food food supplies equipment and other laboratory supplies necessary for teaching labs. Prepares all related requisitions according to the approved budget and creates expense reports and collaborates with the finance administrative agent to reconcile all p-card transactions. Recommends the purchase of new equipment and the allocation of resources to the School Director.

• Software management: Manages and updates laboratory courses in Brightspace to provide access to electronic information (ex: lab protocols lab schedules) to students and professors. Manages and trains users on specialized software related to food science and nutrition required for running the analytical equipment such as Chromeleon Chromatography Data System software OpenLab softwareTexture Pro software in addition to software required for nutrition labelling recipe reformulations and reverse engineering (ex: TechWizard).

What you will bring:

• Graduate degree in Food Sciences (Ph.D. preferred).

• Food handler certificate from a recognized Canadian organization.

• Minimum of 5 years experience in a similar position working in a lab-related environment.

• Knowledge and extensive experience of laboratory protocols and procedures in food preparation and analysis.

• Comprehensive knowledge of application software such as web site applications data collection software databases spreadsheets word-processing etc.

• Knowledge of scientific and specialized software such as Chromeleon Chromatography Data System software OpenLab software Texture Pro software etc.

• Must be able to communicate difficult concepts and procedures in a clear and concise manner.

• Good interpersonal skills.

• Ability to design and implement experiments by integrating existing equipment installations and sound scientific methods into learning experience to support and enhance course theory.

• Ability to analyze troubleshoot and resolve issues in learning activities/experiments while maintaining their educational and scientific validity.

• Fluent in speaking writing and reading French and English.