assistant professor

program coordinator

clerical worker

office specialist

early childhood teacher

Portland State University

The IT department (Office of Information Technology; OIT) has too many managers, most of whom aren't particularly competent.

There are many poorly run projects due in part to hit-or-miss (mostly miss) project management or any kind of consistent technical standards. Standard practices like code reviews and unit testing are discussed ad nauseam but aren't actually implemented.

Many systems are barely held together with duct tape and bailing wire, as the saying goes.

Promotions are awarded inconsistently, and there are many unqualified people in senior level positions. Often, lower level employees have to clean up after their higher level coworkers.

Workloads are inconsistent, where some employees get away with doing the bare minimum and others are overworked.

Upper level management is largely clueless about technology and what makes for a decent tech working environment; and they largely ignore feedback.

Budgets are spent capriciously at times, especially on "enterprise" systems and never ending migrations.

Salaries are far below market, and although the benefits are decent, they don't come close to making up for the low salaries (regardless of how much they try to convince you otherwise).

Overall, I'd say the environment in the IT department is fairly toxic. Although there are many good people working there, it can be difficult to get the internal support you need.

A typical day consists of working on multiple projects and doing several analysis, meetings, communication with others throughout the university, training and serving others,  and working on continuous process improvement. Every day you are learning something new as information is always shared with the team.

The management is very good about listening to new ideas, giving autonomy, investing in professional development and giving support. My co-workers are all great to work with in a team environment and continuously work on cross training. Each person works hard and still engages in bringing fun into the office.

The hardest part of the job is sometimes the deadlines for new projects that come up have a very short turn around time, however with the support of co-workers and a great manager the project always gets accomplished and you are never in it alone.

The best part of the job is knowing that I am serving others and producing quality deliverables in a changing environment to the decision makers in the university; making a positive difference in lives of the students.

A typical work day consists of me examining a series of reports from our payment software that show the transactions and the payment method from the previous work day. I compare these reports to the cash balancing worksheets that were filled out by the employees on shift. After assuring that all transactions and payments are correct I then allocate the money to the correct departments of the recreation center, and then create deposits to be taken to the bank. 
   As the business coordinator I have to make sure that any errors from those drops were corrected before I could go forward with the deposits. To ensure that errors are minimized, I coach employees through the transactions that they had troubles with and conduct periodic cash handling training sessions to make sure the till is always running smoothly. 
    The most enjoyable part of my job is getting to work with a wide variety of people, with very different backgrounds and learning styles. This has taught me that everybody has different learning styles, and that as a coordinator I have to approach and coach people differently depending on there personality and learning style.

Working at the PSU Student-Run Fund was a great opportunity to build experience before entering the job market. We applied all the knowledge and skills learned from the MS Finance program to perform duties as portfolio managers, sector analysts, and venture capital analysts by investing real money into the portfolio. It was a truly valuable experience that helped students secure jobs.


I was responsible for designing math and science curriculum for high school student in the program.  Typically I would start the day by working on curriculum and lesson planning for the afternoon.  I would also find and arrange internships for individual students,  I was also arrange summer learning opportunities for students with other TRIO programs at various colleges around the country.  I would also meet with Juniors to assess their academic progress at their current schools, guide them through the college application process, and ensure they met the requirements for college entrance exams.  I would teach math and science classes in the afternoons, as well as Test Preparation classes and content workshops on weekends.  I found the wide range of responsibilities both challenging and rewarding, exposing me to a larger learning community.

I would like to keep this review brief. Overall, working at Portland State as a summer intern was an excellent opportunity to gain research experience. I enjoyed my lab group as they were helpful and encouraging. A typical day at work entailed a briefing from my graduate student informing me of the agenda for that following day which was usually followed by the daily synthesis of mesoporous silica nanoparticles. To be concise, I learned how to clean glassware in acid/base baths and how to synthesis nanoparticles. The management was excellent. The workplace culture was fun and laid back which was helpful being that I was new to the lab. The hardest part of the job was quickly coming up with a titration method amidst the distraction of being home for the summer. I enjoyed spending time with my lab mates over the summer because they were down-to-earth and hilarious.

I loved my job here.
My typical day included answering the phone (a lot) and transferring calls to counselors, accepting new paperwork and filing it into the counselors' mailboxes, reading and alphabetizing hundreds of emails for specific counselors, and filing new and old paperwork in the back of the office. I also monitored the computer lab, and assisted note-takers in scanning and uploading notes.
My managers were fantastic; they were available for every question, and willing to handle any situation that made me feel uncomfortable or unsafe (which happened rarely).
The hardest part of the job was remembering all of the different processes, but having a good manager on hand helped me to learn everything a lot faster.
The most enjoyable part of the job was being able to help students get the help they needed.

Great place to work and they're working to make it better. Commitment by management and staff alike to make the organization and each member aware of and driven to improve diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace.

When folks come up with new ideas, the answer is rarely no - more often than not it's "How can we help," and then they actually help! It's pretty great!

Work week is pretty flexible, outside of those times when an employee is scheduled to either be in front of class or support the person(s) in front of class, and those dates and times are almost always scheduled well in advance (6-12 months or more). 

Benefits are great, including a staff family discount for tuition, access to the PSU library and gym (if you live on or work near campus), retirement and health benefits are decent, and the work-life is pretty great. It's an extremely family-friendly place to work.

I loved working with my coworkers here. We all had the same struggle as college students just trying to balance hectic school schedules with our equally hectic work schedules. I worked in OIT and it was great, but the managers were often so disorganized and disconnected from us employees that they had no idea what it was like to do our jobs, which led to a bunch of unnecessary changes to our daily roles as IT employees. We often showed our dismay with their changes but they insisted their changes were beneficial to us, even though they added more and more responsibilities and rarely provided raises for those extra responsibilities. However, I still would recommend a job at PSU's OIT because the people you work with are usually really nice and I made several long-lasting friendships there.

Working for Portland State University exposes you a multitude of different cultures from around the world. On a daily basis, through various tasks, you get to interact with all sorts of different people with different questions and concerns, figuring out how to best possibly support them. There is a focus on student development and and promotion of an inclusive environment for everyone. The job itself can get to be mundane at times, as there is a lot of repetition. It is with the people you interact with that the variety comes into play. The staff are all in the same boat as everyone is a student and there is a quick bond between everyone who works in this position. There is a unique trust and care for one another. This also extends to the supervisor who very much cares for the job, but also the staff, department and for PSU as a whole.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Assistant professor 7 salaries reported	$79,743 per year
Program coordinator 2 salaries reported	$2,667 per month
Clerical worker 9 salaries reported	$20.57 per hour
Office specialist 4 salaries reported	$17.85 per hour
Early childhood teacher 10 salaries reported	$19.42 per hour

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