Clarification from the agency

This position is announced under FEMA's Excepted Service, Stafford Act Hiring Authority for a full-time Cadre of On-Call Response/Recovery Employee (CORE) appointment. After three years of continuous service, CORE employees earn competitive eligibility to apply for permanent full-time positions at FEMA. Veterans Preference does not apply to the CORE selection process.

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What will I do in this position if hired? 

In this position, you will Serve as an Security Specialist for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Headquarters. The work includes a number of functional areas, particularly physical, information, industrial, and operational security that are an integral part of the FEMA missions and programs. The work involves the application of security policy, procedures, systems, and programs; identifying the need for protection and security; developing and maintaining the physical means which are used for protection and security; applying risk management best practices; and implementing and maintaining procedural and technical methods to enhance physical protection. The work requires use of a wide range of security concepts, principles, and practices to review independently, analyze, and resolve difficult and complex security problems. Typical assignments include: 

• Analyzing, planning, advising, evaluating work that has as its principal purpose, the development and implementation of policies, procedures, standards, training, and methods for identifying and protecting information, personnel, property, facilities, operations, or material from unauthorized disclosure, misuse, theft, assault, vandalism, espionage, sabotage, or loss.
• Evaluating and/or maintaining operating systems, policies, devices, procedures, and methods used for safeguarding information, property, personnel, operations, and materials.
• Implementing policies and procedures for analyzing and evaluating the character, background, and history of employees, candidates for employment, and other persons or purpose to be granted access to classified or other sensitive information, materials, or work sites.

What else do I need to know? 

At FEMA, our mission is to help people before, during and after disasters, and every employee at FEMA has a role in emergency management.  Every FEMA employee has regular and recurring emergency management responsibilities, though not every position requires routine deployment to disaster sites. All positions are subject to recall around the clock for emergency management operations, which may require irregular work hours, work at locations other than the official duty station, and may include duties other than those specified in the employee's official position description. Travel requirements in support of emergency operations may be extensive in nature (weeks to months), with little advance notice, and may require employees to relocate to emergency sites with physically austere and operationally challenging conditions.

This announcement is for a position as a CORE (Cadre of On-Call Response/Recovery Employee).  CORE employees are full-time employees hired to directly support the response and recovery efforts related to disasters. Appointments to CORE positions are typically between two years and four years in duration and may be renewed based upon workload needs and funding availability.  Employees are hired under the Robert T. Stafford Act and are excluded from the provisions of title 5, United States Code, governing jobs in the competitive service. They can be hired under a streamlined process instead of a competitive process. After three years of continuous service, Stafford Act employees may be granted competitive eligibility to apply for permanent full-time positions at FEMA.

FEMA is committed to ensuring that its workforce reflects the diversity of the nation.  At FEMA, our workforce includes the many identities, races, ethnicities, backgrounds, abilities, ages, cultures, and beliefs of the people we serve. To learn about FEMA’s ongoing diversity and inclusion efforts, reasonable accommodation process, and the FEMA Core Values, please visit www.fema.gov.    

Conditions of employment

• You must be a U.S. citizen to be considered for this position.
• You must successfully pass a background investigation.
• Travel may be required.
• You must be able to obtain and maintain a Government credit card.
• Selective service registration is required for males born after 12/31/59.
• 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 Secret - Non-Criticalas 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

All qualifications and eligibility requirements must be met by the closing date of the announcement.

To qualify for this position at the IC-09 level (starting salary $64,957), you must possess one full year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the IC-07 level in the Federal government, which has equipped you with the skills needed to successfully perform the duties of the position. Experience may be obtained in the Federal or Private Sector and must demonstrate all of the following: 

• Applying security principles, concepts, and methodologies in order to support inspections, surveys, risk assessments, and studies to improve existing physical security systems
• Analyzing security program policies and procedures to perform technical, administrative or evaluative tasks safeguarding information and operations related to personnel, physical, or information security
• Granting facility access control to include issuing and updating privileges on PIVs, HSPD-12, FIPS- 201, Identity Management System, and Integrated Security Management System

OR 

• Master's or equivalent graduate degree or 2 full years of progressively higher-level graduate education leading to such a degree or LL.B. or J.D., if related

OR  

• You may qualify by a combination of successfully completed graduate level education and specialized experience.

Please read the following important information to ensure we have everything we need to consider your application:

• Do not copy and paste the duties, specialized experience, or occupational assessment questionnaire from this announcement into your resume as that will not be considered a demonstration of your qualifications for this position.

• Please limit your resume to five pages.  If more than five pages are submitted, only the first five pages will be reviewed to determine your eligibility and qualifications. 

• Your resume serves as the basis for experience related qualification determinations, and you must highlight your most relevant and significant work experience and education (if applicable), as it relates to this job opportunity. Please use your own words, be clear, and specific when describing your work history. We cannot make assumptions regarding your experience.

Are you qualifying based on your work experience? 

• Qualifications are based on your ability to demonstrate in your resume that you possess one year of the specialized experience for this announcement at a comparable scope and responsibility.  To ensure all of the essential information is in your resume, we encourage you to use the USAJOBS online Resume Builder. If you choose to use your own resume, it must contain the following information organized by experience/position: (1) job title, (2) name of employer, (3) start and end dates of each period of employment (from MM/DD/YY to MM/DD/YY), (4) detailed description of duties performed, accomplishments, and related skills, and (5) hours worked per week (part-time employment will be prorated in crediting experience). Federal experience/positions must also include the occupational series, grade level, and dates in which you held each grade level.  

• Are you a current or former FEMA Reservist/DAE employee?  To accurately credit your experience from intermittent positions and Reservist Deployments, you must list the dates (from MM/DD/YY to MM/DD/YY) of deployments that are relevant to your qualifying experience, along with the job title and specific duties you were responsible for during each deployment.

• Determining length of General or Specialized Experience is dependent on the above information.  Failure to provide the above information in your resume may result in your application being found “not qualified.” 

• 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 provides valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience.

• For additional information on crediting experience and/or education, please reference the OPM General Schedule Qualification Standards

How you will be evaluated

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

We will review your resume, supporting documentation, and your responses to the occupational questionnaire to ensure you meet the minimum qualification requirements listed in the announcement.  If you are qualified, you may be referred to a hiring manager for consideration.

We recommend that you preview the online questions for this announcement before you start the application process.