I work as the IT guy at a biological institute (fixing Windows boxes).
I don't know for sure that there are repetitive tasks that the graduates do there, I am pretty certain that there are some.
But there simply is no structure in place that would allow me to work for them. I could do it pro bono, but honestly I don't have the time for it. On the other hand they simply don't hire programmers to automate tasks, that's just not part of their budget.
And of course, the reason it's not part of their budget is because they are wasting money on boring stuff.
Have lunch with some of them. Schmooze with them the next time they call you for a hardware/software fix. Point out a single, simple way they could do something more easily by scripting it. Then recommend that the next time they want to someone to do some research, they instead hire an undergrad who can write code. Undergrads are cheap, and will get them thinking about what they can automate.
I don't know for sure that there are repetitive tasks that the graduates do there, I am pretty certain that there are some.
But there simply is no structure in place that would allow me to work for them. I could do it pro bono, but honestly I don't have the time for it. On the other hand they simply don't hire programmers to automate tasks, that's just not part of their budget.