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Interdisciplinary Engineer/Mathematical Statistician (Advanced Analytics)

Employer
USAJobs
Location
Washington, D.C
Closing date
Sep 20, 2019
Duties

Summary

This position is located in GAO's Science, Technology Assessment, and Analytics (STAA) Team - Innovation Lab. STAA's mission is to produce technology assessments, technical performance audits, science oversight audits, engineering sciences analyses, and advanced analytics and cybersecurity research to Congress and GAO overall.

Learn more about this agency

Responsibilities

  • Supports or leads the development of advanced analytical techniques and innovates next generation methods and/or tools with emerging technologies in support of current and future audits (financial and performance), investigations, business operations, and evaluations for any and all of GAO's mission or support teams on problems such as fraud detection, improper payments, visualization of large data sets, and/or estimation of duplication, overlap, or fragmentation in federal programs, among others.
  • Innovates and expands the agency's advanced analytics and computational research and offerings to support greater analytic capability through a rigorous problem definition, ideation, review, revision, and execution process to determine to most promising ideas and approaches which, if successful, could profoundly change the business of audit, investigations, and program evaluation for the future GAO.
  • Develops or acquires advanced software systems and/or algorithms based on skills and experience in working with data representation, data structures, file systems, operating systems, computer languages, software development methodologies, and network protocols.
  • Performs advanced analytics projects in addition to consulting with others. Prepares written assessments of advanced analytics pilots for publication on GAO's intranet website which describes the problem, approach, and outcome of each advanced analytic pilot tested out in the Innovation Lab. Works with experts outside GAO to determine best practices for advanced analytics as necessary. Provides related oral presentations to both internal GAO customers and external customers such as Congressional staff as determined by the Chief Data Scientist (CDS).
  • Develops findings for supportable conclusions/outcomes based on sound advanced analytics and/or data science methodological practices.
  • Provides expert advice, guidance and support to engagement teams across GAO on advanced analytics and related areas. Identifies key deficiencies in problem statements and/or proposed approaches or data access issues which are significant to the design, execution, and reporting out of advanced analytics pilots of the Innovation Lab.


Travel Required

Occasional travel - Some travel may be required.

Supervisory status
No

Promotion Potential
NA

Requirements

Conditions of Employment

  • You must be a U.S. citizen
  • You may be required to submit a financial disclosure statement.
  • Employees new to GAO in Analyst and Attorney positions must complete a two year probationary period.
  • Registered for Selective Service, if applicable. (www.sss.gov)
  • You must be suitable for federal employment.


Qualifications

In addition to the education requirement, applicants must have 1 year (52 weeks) of specialized experience at the next lower band or level equivalent to the GS-12 in the Federal Service, or comparable private/public sector experience which has equipped the applicant with the skills and knowledge to successfully perform the duties of the position. Specialized experience for this position is defined as practical experience developing and implementing quantitative and qualitative advanced analytics research designs and methods (i.e. development of advanced analytical techniques and innovate next generation methods and/or tools with emerging technologies in support of current and future audits (financial and performance), investigations, business operations, and evaluations for GAO's mission or support teams on problems such as fraud detection, improper payments, visualization of large data sets, and/or estimation of duplication, overlap, or fragmentation in federal programs); and experience guiding others to use these approaches to effectively perform advanced analytics pilots/experiments and related applied research.

You must meet all the requirements before the announcements closes.

Education

This position has a positive education requirement. Documentation to verify your education MUST be submitted with your application in order to be considered.

An interdisciplinary, professional position is a position involving duties and responsibilities closely related to more than one professional occupation. As a result, the nature of the work enables people with education and experience in either of two or more professions to be considered equally well qualified to do the work. The final classification of the position is determined by the qualifications of the person selected to fill it. You may qualify for this position based on one of the professional occupations below.

Mathematical Statistics Series, 1529:

Basic Requirements:

  • Degree: that included 24 semester hours of mathematics and statistics, of which at least 12 semester hours were in mathematics and 6 semester hours were in statistics.

    OR
  • Combination of education and experience -- at least 24 semester hours of mathematics and statistics, including at least 12 hours in mathematics and 6 hours in statistics, as shown in A above, plus appropriate experience or additional education.

  • All Engineering Professional Engineering Positions, 0800:

    Basic Requirements. To qualify for this occupational series, you must posses one of the following :

    A. Degree: Successful completion of a professional engineering degree. To be acceptable, the program must: (1) lead to a bachelor's degree (or higher) in a school of engineering with at least one program accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (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. Such education must demonstrate the knowledge, skills, and abilities necessary to do the work of the position.

    OR

    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:

    1. Professional registration or licensure - Current registration as an Engineer Intern (EI), Engineer in Training (EIT), 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 more information about EI and EIT registration requirements, please visit the National Society of Professional Engineers website at: http://www.nspe.org

    2. Written Test - Evidence of having successfully passed the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) 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 The FE examination is not administered by the U. S. Office of Personnel Management. For more information, please visit: http://www.nspe.org/Licensure/HowtoGetLicensed/index.html .

    3. Specified academic course - Successful completion of at least 60 semester hours of courses in the physical, mathematical, and engineering sciences and in engineering that included the courses specified in the basic requirements under paragraph A (above). The courses must be fully acceptable toward meeting the requirements of an engineering program as described in paragraph A (above)

    4. Related curriculum - Successful completion of a curriculum leading to a bachelor's degree in am appropriate scientific field, e.g., engineering technology, physics, chemistry, architecture, computer science, mathematics, hydrology, or geology, may be accepted in lieu of bachelor's degree in engineering, provided the applicant has had at the least 1 year of a professional engineering acquired under professional engineering supervision and guidance. Ordinarily there should be either an established plan of extensive training to develop professional engineering competence, or several years of prior professional engineering -type experience, e.g., in interdisciplinary positions. (The above examples of related curricula are not all inclusive.)

    For more information on the qualifications for this series, go to https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/0800/files/all-professional-engineering-positions-0800.pdf

    **YOU MUST SUBMIT A COPY OF YOUR TRANSCRIPT(S) SHOWING THIS COURSEWORK. FAILURE TO DO SO WILL RESULT IN AN INELIGIBLE RATING.**

    Additional information

    This is a bargaining unit position.

    Based on the staffing needs, additional selections may be made through this vacancy announcement.

    Selectee may be required to file a Financial Disclosure Statement.

    Travel and relocation expenses will not be paid for by the GAO.

    Males born after 12/31/59 and at least 18 years of age must be registered with the Selective Service System. Visit http://www.sss.gov/.

    Please be aware that applicants will be required to complete questions contained on the Declaration for Federal Employment (OF-306) at the time a tentative job offer is made. If selected, at the time of appointment, selectees will be required to update the OF-306.

    If you are selected for this position, you will be subject to a determination of your suitability for Federal employment.

    The U.S. Government Accountability Office's policy is to provide equal employment opportunity for all regardless of race, religion, color, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, age, disability, genetic information, sexual orientation, or gender identity.

    The U.S. GAO is part of the Legislative Branch of the Federal government. As such, all positions are in the excepted service. Initial appointments, permanent or indefinite, to the GAO require completion of a one-year or two-year probationary period.

    How You Will Be Evaluated

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

    The position(s) advertised in this announcement are covered by a direct hire authority. Traditional rating and ranking of applicants, including category rating, does not apply to this vacancy. Your qualifications will be initially evaluated against the basic qualifications only. Qualified applicants will be referred for consideration in accordance with the Office of Personnel Management Direct Hire guidelines. Veterans' Preference does not apply to positions covered by a direct hire authority.

    Please make sure that your responses to the assessment questions are supported in your resume and follow all instructions carefully. If you provide incomplete answers, fail to provide a narrative response to any assessment question(s) that requires further explanation, or if your response to an assessment question is "see resume," your application may be affected or you may be determined ineligible.

    All applicants will be evaluated based on their responses to the assessment questions, in conjunction with the following Knowledge, Skills and Abilities (KSA's):
    • Thorough skill in applying data science and advanced data analytics, including structured, unstructured, or relational and data mining and machine learning techniques.
    • Mastery of quantitative techniques for analyzing and evaluating the effectiveness, efficiency, and productivity of programs and/or operations and communicating results; and educate others through reports and presentations.
    • Professional experience building complex data extraction, transformation, and loading, including Extract, Transform, and Load into structured databases, data warehouses, and data processing systems.
    • Skill in developing, testing, and applying optimized algorithms and statistical models for discovering new intelligence data, minimizing false positives, and recommending courses of action for internal and external stakeholders.
    • Skill in performing machine learning (ML), natural language (NLP), artificial intelligence (AI), text mining and statistical analysis methods, such as classification, collaborative filtering, association rules, sentiment analysis, topic modeling, time-series analysis, regression, statistical inference, and validation methods.
    • Knowledge of analytical concepts, principles, and practices related to detailed analysis and documentation to conduct the data collection, review, and analysis processes of the engagement.

    To preview questions please click here .

    Background checks and security clearance

    Security clearance
    Secret

    Drug test required
    No

    Required Documents

    You must provide a complete application package which includes:

    - Resume: must be created using the USAJOBS resume builder and show relevant work experience.

    - If you are using your education to qualify (even partially), you must submit a copy of your transcripts. Transcripts do not need to be official, but if you are selected for this position and you used your education to qualify, you will be required to provide official transcripts. Foreign Education: If you are submitting a transcript from a non-US educational institution, applicants must submit all necessary documents to a private U.S. organization that specializes in interpretation of foreign educational credentials, commonly called a credential evaluation service.

    - Current or former federal employees may submit their most recent Notification of Personnel Action (SF-50 or equivalent), showing tenure, type of service (competitive/excepted) and the highest grade held.

    Failure to submit any of the above mentioned required documents will result in loss of consideration due to an incomplete application package. It is your responsibility to ensure all required documents have been submitted.

    If you are relying on your education to meet qualification requirements:

    Education must be accredited by an accrediting institution recognized by the U.S. Department of Education in order for it to be credited towards qualifications. Therefore, provide only the attendance and/or degrees from schools accredited by accrediting institutions recognized by the U.S. Department of Education .

    Failure to provide all of the required information as stated in this vacancy announcement may result in an ineligible rating or may affect the overall rating.

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