Clarification from the agency

Open to all U.S. Citizens.

This Writer/Editor position is located in Public Affairs, Transportation Security Administration (TSA), Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Duties include but are not limited to:

• Responding and coordinating information requests from external customers and researching, writing, coordinating, editing, and disseminating responses received from the program offices.
• Providing advice and guidance to professionals, managers and employees under the general direction of a manager on matters such as content, presentation, and interpretation.
• Editing a variety of materials including talking points, position papers, manuals, reports, correspondence etc., for format, punctuation, spelling and grammar
• Reviewing and recommending for approval proposed publications for style, design, and similar editorial characteristics prior to release for printing, publication.

 This position is also being announced through Public (US Citizen) procedures under Announcement #HQ-PA-19-647763-GA. Candidates who wish to be considered under both Public (US Citizens) and Government-Wide procedures must apply to both announcements.

Conditions of employment

• You must possess U.S. Citizenship or be a U.S. National.
• You must be able to obtain and maintain a Secret Clearance.
• You must complete a favorable Background Investigation (BI).
• Selective Service registration is required.
• See additional "Conditions of Employment" and "Other Information" section

Applying to this announcement certifies that you give permission for DHS to share your application with others in DHS for similar positions.

Any offers of employment made pursuant to this announcement will be consistent with all applicable authorities, including Presidential Memoranda, Executive Orders, interpretive U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) guidance, and Office of Management and Budget plans and policies concerning hiring. These authorities are subject to change.

Qualifications

To qualify for the SV-G pay band (equivalent to the GS-11 grade level), you must meet one of the qualification requirements (A, B, or C) outlined below:

A. Experience: You must have one year of specialized experience at the SV-F pay band or GS-9 grade level in the Federal service or equivalent experience in the private sector. Specialized experience is defined as experience that has equipped you with the knowledge, skills, and abilities to successfully perform the duties of the position. Specialized experience for this position is:

• Designing, formatting and developing content of reports, publications, directives, forms speeches, newsletters, press releases, correspondence, position papers, articles for publication and other information products; AND
• Collaborating with working groups, on matters relating to the development of written material in support of organizational missions, functions, processes, and procedures.

OR 

B. Education:  Achievement of a Ph.D. or equivalent doctoral degree; OR 3 full years of progressively higher level graduate education leading to such a degree; OR an LL.M., if related.

OR

C. Combination of Education and Experience: Combinations of successfully completed graduate level education and experience may be used to meet total qualification requirements for this pay band, and may be computed by first determining your total qualifying experience as a percentage of the experience required for the band level; then determining your education as a percentage of the education required for the band level; and then adding the two percentages. The total percentages must equal at least 100 percent.

GRADUATE EDUCATION: Education at the graduate level in an accredited college or university in the amounts indicated above meets the requirements for this pay band. Such education must demonstrate the knowledge, skills, and abilities necessary to do the work. One year of full-time graduate education is considered to be the number of credit hours that the school attended has determined to represent one year of full-time study. If that information cannot be obtained from the school, 18 semester hours should be considered as satisfying the one year of full-time study requirement.

NOTE: Credit for experience is given based on a 40-hour workweek. Part-time experience is credited on a part-time ratio, i.e., working 20 hours per week for two months equals one month of experience. No additional credit is given for overtime.

National Service Experience (i.e., volunteer experience): Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religious; spiritual; community, student, social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience.

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) must authorize employment offers made to current or former political appointees. If you are currently, or have been within the last 5 years, a political Schedule A, Schedule C, Non-career SES or Presidential Appointee employee in the Executive Branch, you must disclose this information to the Human Resources Office.

You must meet the qualification requirements for this position no later than the closing date of the vacancy announcement.

How you will be evaluated

You will be evaluated for this job based on how well you meet the qualifications above.

You will be evaluated based on a comparison of the position requirements against the quality and extent of the experience and/or related education as reflected in your resume and supporting documentation.  You are encouraged to ensure work experiences clearly show possession of the competencies required for this position.  We will compare your resume and supporting documentation to your responses on the assessment questionnaire. If, after reviewing your resume and any supporting documentation, a determination is made that you have rated yourself higher than is supported by your application materials, your category placement may be adjusted and/or you may be excluded from consideration for this job.

Candidates will be rated and ranked using Category Grouping procedures.  Under Category Grouping, candidates will be rated and ranked into one of three categories:

Best-Qualified: Applicants possessing experience that substantially exceeds the minimum qualifications of the position and demonstrate high proficiency in all of the critical competencies, including all Selective Placement Factors (SPF) as determined by the job analysis.

Well-Qualified: Applicants possessing experience that exceeds the minimum qualifications of the position and demonstrates acceptable proficiency in all of the critical competencies, including all SPFs as determined by the job analysis.

Qualified: Applicants possessing experience that meets the minimum qualifications of the position and demonstrate basic proficiency in most of the critical competencies, including all SPFs as determined by the job analysis.

If you are best qualified, you may be referred to the hiring manager for consideration and may be called for an interview.

Your qualifications will be evaluated on the following competencies that are relevant to the duties of this position and must be fully supported by information in your resume:

• Ability to communicate effectively, both orally and in writing with different groups of people in potentially difficult or adversarial situations.
• Ability to make presentations to a broad range of audiences with varying levels of knowledge of communication tools.
• Skill in writing and editing a wide range of documents such as: speeches, newsletters, press releases, correspondence, position papers, articles for publication, etc.
• In-depth knowledge of technical and presentation writing styles, grammar, proofreading and electronic editing.
• Ability to analyze, synthesizes, and correlates data and other information with the goal of briefing targeted audiences and recommending specific action.