Department
PHYSICAL PLANT (NW-PHYP-IUNWA)
Department Information
The Physical Plant Department at Indiana University (IU) Northwest is responsible for maintaining a safe, clean, and welcoming campus environment for students, faculty, staff, and visitors. The department supports the universitys academic mission by maintaining campus facilities, classrooms, offices, laboratories, and common areas to high standards of cleanliness, safety, and operational readiness.
Custodial staff play a vital role in daily campus operations by supporting building sanitation, facility upkeep, and campus safety. This position collaborates with facilities staff and campus partners to ensure that IU Northwest provides a professional, well-maintained environment that supports learning, teaching, and community engagement.
Job Summary
Department-Specific Responsibilities
- Maintains the cleanliness and sanitation of academic buildings, offices, classrooms, laboratories, restrooms, and common spaces across the IU Northwest campus.
- Supports campus events and activities by assisting with room setup, breakdown, and cleaning as needed.
- Monitors building conditions and reports maintenance issues, safety hazards, or facility concerns to supervisors.
- Ensures cleaning supplies and equipment are maintained and used in accordance with university safety guidelines.
- Assists with campus seasonal operations, including snow removal, ice treatment, and inclement weather response.
- Follows university sanitation standards and safety protocols, including proper handling of cleaning chemicals and equipment.
- Provides courteous customer service to faculty, staff, students, and visitors when working in occupied spaces.
General Responsibilities
- Cleans floors, ramps, and stairs by sweeping, wet-mopping/dry-mopping, scrubbing, or vacuuming. Services, cleans, and supplies restrooms. Gathers and empties recycling and trash. Cleans and polishes fixtures. Replaces light bulbs. Cleans windows, glass partitions, and mirrors using soapy water or other cleaners, sponges, and squeegees. Mixes water and detergents or acids in containers to prepare cleaning solutions, according to specifications.
- Dusts furniture, walls, machines, and equipment. Steam cleans or shampoos carpets. Strips, seals, finishes, and polishes floors. Cleans, replaces, and hangs blinds, drapes, and entrance mats. Collects and delivers soiled items.
- Clears sidewalks, drives, and adjacent areas. Shovels snow.
- Locks, unlocks, and secures buildings. Maintains awareness of building sand facilities, reports abnormalities or security concerns. Identifies and reports needed building repairs.
- Performs other duties and responsibilities as assigned. Assists with snow removal activities as necessary.
Qualifications
EDUCATION
Required
- General knowledge at the high school level.
Preferred
- High school diploma or equivalent (such as HSED or GED.)
WORK EXPERIENCE
Preferred
- Custodial experience.
- Previous custodial, janitorial, or building services experience in educational institutions, healthcare facilities, government buildings, or commercial facilities.
- Experience with commercial custodial equipment, including floor buffers, auto scrubbers, carpet extractors, and industrial vacuums.
- Experience working in environments requiring strict sanitation or safety standards.
SKILLS
Required
- Ability to work in a safe and efficient manner.
- Proficient in written and verbal English communication.
- Maintains a high degree of professionalism.
- Demonstrates time management and priority setting skills.
- Demonstrates a high commitment to quality.
- Possesses flexibility to work in a fast-paced, dynamic environment.
- Seeks to acquire knowledge in the area of specialty.
- Highly thorough and dependable.
- Demonstrates a high level of accuracy, even under pressure.
- Excellent organizational skills.
- Ability to represent the company with external constituents.
- Ability to drive multiple projects to successful completion.
- Strong verbal communication and listening skills.
- Ability to build strong customer relationships.
- Knowledge of cleaning procedures and equipment and have ability to operate and use standard cleaning equipment and materials. Some knowledge of standard kitchen practices and sanitation methods (for positions in food service facility).
- Ability to follow safe work practices in biohazard and/or hazardous waste clean-up (i.e., bloodborne pathogens; toxic, reactive, explosive, and ignitable laboratory wastes; corrosive wastes from cleaning operations; other miscellaneous wastes from across campus). May involve training and tests in hazardous waste management.
- Ability to interact and communicate with a wide variety of people.
- Ability to perform work that requires medium to heavy physical effort.
- Ability to understand and follow oral and written instructions.
- Ability to work in a team environment.
Preferred
- Knowledge of proper cleaning techniques, sanitation practices, and chemical handling procedures.
- Ability to operate custodial equipment safely and efficiently.
- Strong attention to detail and ability to maintain high standards of cleanliness.
- Ability to work independently and manage assigned work areas.
- Strong teamwork and collaboration skills when working with facilities staff and campus partners.
- Reliable attendance.
- Ability to interact professionally with faculty, staff, students, and campus visitors.
Working Conditions / Demands
This role requires the ability to remain in a stationary position as well as the ability to move about the workplace for long durations. It requires effective communication, the ability to operate machinery, tools, and controls. The role requires the ability to ascend/descend ladders/stairs, and to position oneself in low level positions, detect a variety of chemicals and/or gases. The role requires the ability to ascend to rooftops and move in tight spaces to perform and complete inspections. The person in this role must be able to perform the essential functions with or without an accommodation.
Available to work during inclement weather (i.e. snow and ice) when weather emergencies dictate that the department is needed to take care of the campus.
Work Location
IU Northwest Campus
Gary, Indiana
Advertised Salary
$31,200.00 - $35,360.00 annually
Benefits Overview
For full-time staff employees, Indiana University offers a wide array of benefits including:
- Comprehensive medical and dental insurance
- Health savings account with generous IU contributions
- Healthcare and dependent care flexible spending accounts
- Basic group life insurance paid by IU
- Voluntary supplemental life, long-term disability, critical illness, and supplemental accidental death & dismemberment insurance
- Base retirement plan with generous IU contributions, subject to vesting
- Voluntary supplemental retirement plan options
- Tuition subsidy for employees and family members taking IU courses
- 10 paid holidays plus a paid winter break each year
- Generous paid time off plans
- Paid leave for new parents and IU-sponsored volunteer events
- Employee assistance program (EAP)
Learn more about our benefits by reviewing the IU Benefit Programs Brochure.
Job Classification
Career Level: Foundational
FLSA: Nonexempt
Job Function: Engineering, Trades & Facility
Job Family: Custodial
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Posting Disclaimer
This posting is scheduled to close at 11:59 pm EST on the advertised Close Date. This posting may be closed at any time at the discretion of the University, but will remain open for a minimum of 5 business days. To guarantee full consideration, please submit your application within 5 business days of the Posted Date.
If you wish to include a cover letter, you may include it with your resume when uploading attachments.
Equal Employment Opportunity
Indiana University is an equal opportunity employer and provider of ADA services and prohibits discrimination in hiring. See Indiana University Notice of Non-Discrimination here which includes contact information.
Campus Safety and Security
The Annual Security and Fire Safety Report, containing policy statements, crime and fire statistics for all Indiana University campuses, is available online. You may also request a physical copy by emailing IU Public Safety at iups@iu.edu or by visiting IUPD.
Contact Us
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Telephone: 812-856-1234