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Conditions of Employment
- You must be a U.S. Citizen to be considered for this position.
- You must successfully pass a background investigation.
- Selective Service registration is required for males born after 12/31/1959.
- You must be able to obtain and maintain a Government credit card.
- Please review "Other Information" section for additional key requirements.
To ensure the accomplishment of our mission, DHS requires every employee to be reliable and trustworthy. To meet those standards, all selected applicants must undergo, successfully pass, and maintain a background investigation for Public Trust as a condition of placement into this position. This may include a credit check after initial job qualifications are determined, a review of financial issues, such as delinquency in the payment of debts, child support and/or tax obligations, as well as certain criminal offenses and illegal use or possession of drugs (please visit: Mythbuster on Federal Hiring Policies for additional information). For more information on background investigations for Federal jobs please visit OPM Investigations.
Please ensure you meet the qualification requirements described below.
Qualifications
The qualification requirements listed below must be met within 30 days of the closing date of the announcement.
You qualify for this position at the GS-12 level (starting salary $84,886) if you possess the following: One full year of specialized experience equivalent to the next lower grade (GS-11) in the Federal Service. This experience may have been gained in the federal government, a state or local government, a non-profit organization, the private sector, or as a volunteer; however, your resume must clearly describe at least one year of specialized experience. You must meet at least three of the specialized experience criteria listed below:
- Contributing to the administration of natural hazard mitigation programs (such as Flood Insurance Studies and Risk Map Projects);
- Supporting senior-level engineers in the oversight and monitoring of civil engineering studies;
- Reviewing plans, hazard maps, or flood risk studies to make recommendations for change;
- Communicating technical information to a variety of audiences and stakeholders; or
- Interacting with diverse partners, including coordination with state/local stakeholders.
You qualify for this position at the GS-13 level (starting salary $100,940) if you possess the following: One full year of specialized experience equivalent to the next lower grade (GS-12) in the Federal Service. This experience may have been gained in the federal government, a state or local government, a non-profit organization, the private sector, or as a volunteer; however, your resume must clearly describe at least one year of specialized experience. You must meet at least three of the specialized experience criteria listed below:
- Serving as a civil engineer or project manager for administering various programs for mitigation of hazards (including, but not limited to; earthquake, flood and tornado and working with the National Flood Insurance Program);
- Providing oversight and monitoring of civil engineering studies;
- Performing project management duties such as identifying work assignments, timelines, and goal setting;
- Dealing with hydrology, hydraulics, topographic data collection or surveying practices; or
- Communicating technical information to a variety of audiences and stakeholders.
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.
NOTE: Qualifications are based on breadth/level of experience. In addition to describing duties performed, applicants must provide the exact dates of each period of employment (from MM/YY to MM/YY) and the number of hours worked per week if part time. As qualification determinations cannot be made when resumes do not include the required information, failure to provide this information may result in disqualification. Applicants are encouraged to use the USAJOBS Resume Builder to develop their federal resume. For a brief video on How to Create a Federal Resume, click here.
Current or former FEMA Reservists/DAE employees: To accurately credit your experience for these intermittent positions, make sure to list the dates (from MM/YY to MM/YY) of each deployment, along with the job title and specific duties you were responsible for during each deployment. Failure to provide this information may result in disqualification.
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.
Education
This position has a positive education requirement. In addition to the specialized experience requirement, you must meet the listed education requirement below. (Submission of transcript is required.)
A.) Degree: Engineering. To be acceptable, the program must: (1) lead to a bachelor’s degree in a school of engineering with at least one program accredited by ABET; or (2) include differential and integral calculus and courses (more advanced than first-year physics and chemistry) in five of the following seven areas of engineering science or physics: (a) statics, dynamics; (b) strength of materials (stress-strain relationships); (c) fluid mechanics, hydraulics; (d) thermodynamics; (e) electrical fields and circuits; (f) nature and properties of materials (relating particle and aggregate structure to properties); and (g) any other comparable area of fundamental engineering science or physics, such as optics, heat transfer, soil mechanics, or electronics.
OR
B.) Combination of education and experience -- college-level education, training, and/or technical experience that furnished (1) a thorough knowledge of the physical and mathematical sciences underlying engineering, and (2) a good understanding, both theoretical and practical, of the engineering sciences and techniques and their applications to one of the branches of engineering. The adequacy of such background must be demonstrated by one of the following:
Professional registration or licensure -- Current registration as an Engineer Intern (EI), Engineer in Training (EIT)1, or licensure as a Professional Engineer (PE) by any State, the District of Columbia, Guam, or Puerto Rico. Absent other means of qualifying under this standard, those applicants who achieved such registration by means other than written test (e.g., State grandfather or eminence provisions) are eligible only for positions that are within or closely related to the specialty field of their registration. For example, an applicant who attains registration through a State Board's eminence provision as a manufacturing engineer typically would be rated eligible only for manufacturing engineering positions.
Written Test -- Evidence of having successfully passed the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE)2 examination or any other written test required for professional registration by an engineering licensure board in the various States, the District of Columbia, Guam, and Puerto Rico.
Applicants who have passed the EIT examination and have completed all the requirements for either (a) a bachelor's degree in engineering technology (BET) from an accredited college of university that included 60 semester hours of courses in the physical, mathematical, and engineering sciences, or (b) a BET from a program accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) may be rated eligible for certain engineering positions at GS-5. Eligibility is limited to positions that are within or closely related to the specialty field of the engineering technology program. Applicants for positions that involve highly technical research, development, or similar functions requiring an advanced level of competence in basic science must meet the basic requirements in paragraph A. Because of the diversity in kind and quality of BET programs, graduates of other BET programs are required to complete at least 1 year of additional education or highly technical work experience of such nature as to provide reasonable assurance of the possession of the knowledge, skills, and abilities required for professional engineering competence. The adequacy of this background must be demonstrated by passing the EIT examination.
Specified academic courses -- Successful completion of at least 60 semester hours of courses in the physical, mathematical, and engineering sciences and that included the courses specified in the basic requirements under paragraph A. The courses must be fully acceptable toward meeting the requirements of an engineering program as described in paragraph A.
NOTE: If you are qualifying based on education and/or are selected for a position which requires a college degree to meet minimum qualification requirements, you will be required to submit your official college transcript(s) at time of selection.
How You Will Be Evaluated
You will be evaluated for this job based on how well you meet the qualifications above.
Direct Hire authority will be used to fill this position. Veterans' preference, category rating and traditional rating and ranking of applicants does not apply to positions filled under this announcement.
Career Transition Assistance Plan (CTAP) / Interagency Career Transition Assistance Plan (ICTAP) Eligible: If you have never worked for the federal government, you are not CTAP/ICTAP eligible. View information about CTAP/ICTAP eligibility on OPM’s Career Transition Resources website. To be considered under CTAP/ICTAP, you must meet the well-qualified standards for the position. A well-qualified applicant must satisfy the following criteria: In addition to meeting minimum qualifications, including selective factors, education, and experience requirements, the applicant must be able to perform the duties of the position upon entry. In addition, you must submit the supporting documents listed under the required documents section of this announcement.
All applicants who meet the basic qualification requirements at the grade level for which they are applying will be forwarded to the Selecting Official for consideration.
Interview Requirement. Interviews may be required for this position. Failure to complete the interview may result in removal from further consideration.
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