Clarification from the agency

This position is open to current and former Federal employees with permanent status or reinstatement eligibility. Individuals who are eligible for a special appointing authority may also apply; such as applicants with a disability, former Peace Corps volunteers, certain military spouses, veterans seeking a VRA/VEOA appointment, or veterans who have been separated from armed forces under honorable conditions after 3 years or more of continuous active service.

• Process a wide variety of archival collections of personal papers, or historical records of arts institutions, art societies, art galleries, or arts associations according to national archival standards and best practices for archival processing, and the Archives’ written guidelines and procedures. 
• Process archival collections comprised of a wide variety of mixed media formats, including traditional paper-based documentation, sketches and sketchbooks, photographic materials, analog audiovisual formats, and born-digital formats.
• Prepare finding aids that meet current archival descriptive standards and best practices, including DACS (Describing Archives: A Content Standard) and the Archives’ written guidelines and procedures for content.  Encode finding aids in electronic formats and schemas, including EAD (Encoded Archival Description), employing AAA’s templates and/or databases and other automated systems and tools to create XML and/or HTML files that can be deployed to AAA’s website Archives’ website and to Smithsonian’s online finding aid interface.
• Assess and appraise new acquisitions to determine physical condition, format types, physical access level, research value, and preservation needs.

Conditions of employment

• Pass Pre-employment Background Investigation
• May need to complete a Probationary Period
• Maintain a Bank Account for Direct Deposit/Electronic Transfer

Qualification requirements, including one year time-in-grade at the next lower grade level for promotion candidates, must be met within 30 days of the job announcement closing date.

For information on qualification requirements, see Qualification Standards Handbook for General Schedule Positions viewable on the web at http://www.opm.gov/qualifications.

Qualifications

You must meet these Basic Education Requirements: 

1. Bachelor's degree in archival science or bachelor's degree with a major that includes 18 semester hours in archival science, history and/or in political science or government, and 12 semester hours in one or any combination of the following: archival science, history, American civilization, economics, political science, public administration, or government.

or

2. Combination of education and experience - at least 30 semester hours that included courses as shown in A above, plus appropriate experience or additional education.

In addition to Basic Requirements above, you must have following:

Experience: You qualify for this position if you possess one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the GS-7 level in the Federal Service or comparable pay band system.  For this position Specialized experience is defined as applying national archival standards, methodology, and best practices to all the activities that comprise collections archival processing, including arrangement, description in electronic formats, and preservation of archival collections comprised of a variety of media formats typically found in contemporary archival collections.  

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.

Part-time and/or unpaid experience related to this position will be considered to determine the total number of years and months of experience. Be sure to note the number of paid or unpaid hours worked each week.

Or Education: Two full years of progressively higher level graduate education leading to a master’s or equivalent degree related to the position may be 
substituted to meet the experience requirements.

Or a Combination: Education and experience may be combined to meet the basic qualifications. For a full explanation of this option please see the Qualification Standards.

Special Instructions for Foreign Education: If you are qualifying by education and/or you have education completed in a foreign college/university described above, it is your responsibility to provide transcripts and proof of U.S. accreditation for foreign study. For instructions on where to fax these documents, see the "Required Documents" section of this announcement.

How you will be evaluated

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

Your application will be evaluated first for the basic qualifications described above. The applications that meet the basic qualifications will be evaluated further against the following criteria:

• Ability to apply current national archival standards and best practices to all activities associated with processing archival collections documenting the field of American art or cultural history.
• Ability to work with a wide variety of mixed media formats found in contemporary archival collections, including documents, diaries, sketches, sketchbooks, artwork, photographic materials, analog audiovisual materials, and born-digital formats.
• Knowledge of the standards (DACS:  Describing Archives, A Content Standard), electronic formats and schemas (EAD: Encoded Archival Description), and automated systems (Archivists’ Toolkit or ArchivesSpace) for creating archival finding aids for archives and manuscript collections.
• Ability to appraise and assess the preservation needs of entire archival collections, as well as special formats and media found within collections, particularly, photographic materials, artwork, analog audiovisual materials, and born-digital formats.
• Ability to document assessment results in multiple automated systems.

Important Note: Your resume and supporting documentation will be compared to your responses to the occupational questionnaire or other assessment tool for consistency. If a determination is made that you have rated yourself higher than is supported by your resume, you will be assigned a rating commensurate to your described experience. Your resume should provide sufficient information regarding how your education and experience relate to this position, including the major duties and qualifications criteria listed.