Senior Wide Area Network Engineer

Responsibilities

• Maintains and operates MDREN's statewide wide area network (WAN) infrastructure, including core, edge, and optical transport layers.
• Ensures high availability, performance, and resilience across all backbone and interconnection services.
• Responds to and corrects problems within the MDREN network.
• Maintains related computer systems, software packages, and network appliances in support of the network.
• Develops implementation plans and schedules.
• Maintains documentation, policies, procedures, and methods for the operation of the MDREN network.
• Designs, engineers, and maintains MDREN's statewide WAN, including backbone, regional aggregation, and partner interconnects.
• Led architecture and deployment of dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) optical transport systems, including wavelength services, reconfigurable optical add-drop multiplexer (ROADM) configurations, and optical path engineering.
• Collaborates with member institutions and partner research and education networks (RENs) on interconnection design and capacity planning.
• Serves as a primary technical resource for member institutions on network services and connectivity.
• Troubleshoots and resolves member-reported network issues.
• Communicates network changes, outages, and upgrades to affected members.
• Serves as a technical support and guidance to MDREN member institutions.

Requirements

• Minimum Qualifications Required Education Level/Certifications: High School Diploma or GED.
• Required Experience: 7 years' experience in the networking field with increasing responsibility. Demonstrated experience in managing large networking design and implementation projects. Experience in changing and evolving environments. Experience supervising staff.
• Required Knowledge/Skills/Abilities: Ability to establish goals, priorities, structures, and processes necessary to implement a complex network infrastructure. Leadership and teambuilding skills to strengthen and cultivate relationships to internal and external institutions. Ability to network and interact, as well as support effective partnerships with key constituencies and institutions both inside and outside the USM. Ability to prioritize ongoing and new projects, as well as conduct research and gather information. Must be skilled as a technical troubleshooter with the ability to think logically to define and solve problems, collect data, establish facts, and draw valid conclusions. Strong interpersonal, written, and verbal communication skills with the ability to communicate complex network issues or strategies to audiences with varying network knowledge or experience. Knowledgeable and experienced in various networking technologies, services and protocols that are typical of a large enterprise network including Ethernet, TCP/IP, SNMP, SMTP, DHCP/BootP, DNS, OSPF, ARP/RARP, VPNs, VLANs, BGP, Subnets, and Routing. Knowledgeable in use of network management and command language and graphical analysis tools. On-hands experience with Cisco/Juniper/Brocade/Arista switches and routers. Demonstrated skill in programming in more than one language. Must be able to work in a collaborative, team environment. Must be a "self-starter" and be able to proactively identify problems (or potential problems) and propose solutions.

Benefits

• Paid Leave: 22 days of annual leave, 15 days of sick & safe leave, 16-17 holidays, 3 personal leave days, and paid family medical leave.
• Health Benefits: Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage with flexible spending accounts.
• Retirement Plans: Mandatory and supplemental options with major providers like Fidelity and TIAA.
• Life Insurance: Optional term life and AD&D benefits through MetLife.
• Tuition Benefits: Tuition remission for employees and their families.
• Training & Development: Free professional development conferences and unlimited LinkedIn Learning access.
• Credit Union Access: Membership eligibility for SECU, Maryland's largest credit union.
• Employee Assistance Program (EAP): Free counseling, legal, financial, and work-life support services.