Job opening: Oceanographer
Salary: $46 696 - 107 680 per year
Published at: Aug 22 2023
Employment Type: Full-time
This position is located within the Department of Commerce (DOC), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS), National Centers for Environmental Information with 1 vacancy located in Stennis Space Center, MS.
This position is also announced under vacancy number NESDIS NCEI-23-12039225-ST, which is open to Status Candidates. You must apply to both announcements if you want to be considered for both.
Duties
As an Oceanographer, you will perform the following duties:
Plans, organizes, conducts & administers studies & research of ocean phenomena to interpret, predict, utilize & control ocean forces & events.
Records and conducts integrated scientific analyses of coastal and marine environmental data sets.
Carries out research and inherent data stewardship activities in relation to an assigned organizational product area whose objectives are to build the long-term coastal data.
Serves as a Federal representative on NOAA, federal and/or intergovernmental committees including State-Federal partnerships.
Qualifications
Qualification requirements in the vacancy announcements are based on the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Qualification Standards Handbook, which contains federal qualification standards. This handbook is available on the Office of Personnel Management's website located at: https://www.opm.gov/policy.
BASIC REQUIREMENTS: This position has a positive Education Requirement in addition to at least one year of Specialized Experience OR substitution of education for experience OR combination (if applicable) in order to be found minimally qualified. Transcripts must be submitted with your application package. You MUST meet the following requirements: Degree: major study of at least 24 semester hours in oceanography or a related discipline such as physics, meteorology, geophysics, mathematics, chemistry, engineering, geology, or biology, plus 20 additional semester hours in any combination of oceanography, physics, geophysics, chemistry, mathematics, meteorology, computer science, and engineering sciences
OR
Combination of education and experience -- course work as shown in A above, plus appropriate experience or additional education. Applicants who qualify on the basis of major study in biology or geology must have had at least 6 semester hours in the major directly concerned with marine science or 6 semester hours in oceanography; applicants who qualify on the basis of other physical sciences or engineering must have had differential and integral calculus and at least 6 semester hours in physics.
AND
SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: Applicants must possess one year of specialized experience equivalent in difficulty and responsibility to the next lower grade level in the Federal Service. Specialized experience is experience that has equipped the applicant with the particular competencies/knowledge, skills and abilities to successfully perform the duties of the position. This experience need not have been in the federal government.
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.
To qualify at the ZP-2 or GS-07
SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: In addition to meeting the Basic Requirements above, applicants must also possess one full year (52 weeks) of specialized experience equivalent to the ZP-1 or GS-05 in the Federal service. Specialized experience MUST include all of the following:
Compiling, processing and analyzing scientific coastal and marine environmental data; and
Assisting in analyzing and preparing data and scientific information for publication.
OR
SUBSTITUTION OF EDUCATION: 1 year of graduate-level education or superior academic achievement. S.A.A. is based on (1) class standing, (2) grade-point average, or (3) honor society membership.1. Class standing -- Applicants must be in the upper third of the graduating class in the college, university, or major subdivision, such as the College of Liberal Arts or the School of Business Administration, based on completed courses.2. Grade-point average (G.P.A.) -- Applicants must have a grade-point average of: 2.9 or higher out of a possible 4.0 ("B" or better) as recorded on their official transcript, or as computed based on 4 years of education, or as computed based on courses completed during the final 2 years of the curriculum; or 3.5 or higher out of a possible 4.0 ("B+" or better) based on the average of the required courses completed in the major field or the required courses in the major field completed during the final 2 years of the curriculum.3. Election to membership in a national scholastic honor society in one of the national scholastic honor societies recognized by the Association of College Honor Societies.
To qualify at the ZP-3 or GS-11
SPECIALIZED EXPERIENCE: In addition to meeting the Basic Requirements above, applicants must also possess one full year (52 weeks) of specialized experience equivalent to the ZP-2 or GS-09 in the Federal service. Specialized experience MUST include all of the following:
Participating in data validation, analysis of ocean data sets for development, dissemination of scientific data products, and publications; and
Maintaining environmental data management systems, large data sets, metadata to establish permanent data archiving, data analysis, and data dissemination procedures.
OR
SUBSTITUTION OF EDUCATION: 3 years of progressively higher-level graduate education leading to a Ph.D. degree or Ph.D. or equivalent doctoral degree.
OR
COMBINATION OF EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE: A combination of education and experience listed above. Only graduate education in excess of two years is qualifying for combining education and experience.
Education
College Transcript: If you are qualifying based on education, submit a copy of your college transcript that lists college courses detailing each course by the number and department (i.e., Bio 101, Math 210, etc.), course title, number of credit hours and grade earned. You must submit evidence that any education completed in a foreign institution is equivalent to U.S. education standards with your resume. You may submit an unofficial copy of the transcript at the initial phase of the application process. If course content cannot be easily identified from the title of the course as listed on your transcript, you must submit an official course description from the college/university that reflects the content at the time the course was taken.
Note: Your college transcript is used to verify successful completion of degree, or college course work. An official college transcript will be required before you can report to duty.
Special Instructions for Foreign Education: Education completed in foreign colleges or universities must be evaluated in terms of equivalency to that acquired in U.S. colleges and universities. Applicants educated in whole or in part in foreign countries must submit sufficient evidence, including transcripts, to an accredited private organization for an equivalency evaluation of course work and degree. A listing of these accredited organizations can be found on the Department of Education's website. You
MUST provide a copy of the letter containing the results of the equivalency evaluation with a course by course listing along with your application. Failure to provide such documentation by the closing date of the announcement will result in lost consideration. For more information on how foreign education is evaluated visit:
OPM Foreign Education Evaluation.
Contacts
- Address NOAA Office of Human Capital Services (OHCS)
1315 East West Hwy
SSMC4
Silver Spring, MD 20910
US
- Name: Amanda Robinson
- Email: [email protected]
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