Who May Apply: US Citizens
In order to qualify, you must meet the education
and experience requirements described below. 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). You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience. Your resume must clearly describe your relevant experience; if qualifying based on education, your transcripts will be required as part of your application. Additional information about transcripts is
in this document.
Basic Education Requirement: In order to be qualified for this position, applicants must meet the following qualification requirement: Degree: in operations research; or at least 24 semester hours in a combination of operations research, mathematics, probability, statistics, mathematical logic, science, or subject-matter courses requiring substantial competence in college-level mathematics or statistics. At least 3 of the 24 semester hours must have been in calculus.
Evaluation of Education:
The primary requirement of operations research work is competence in the rigorous methods of scientific inquiry and analysis rather than in the subject matter of the problem. Therefore, applicants should have sufficient knowledge of applied mathematics to understand and use the fundamental concepts and techniques of operations research methods of analysis. In addition, some positions may require knowledge of a specific subject area.
Courses acceptable for qualifying for operations research positions may have been taken in departments other than Operations Research, e.g., Engineering (usually Industrial Engineering), Science, Economics, Mathematics, Statistics, or Management Science.
The following are illustrative of acceptable courses: optimization; mathematical modeling; queueing theory; engineering; physics (except descriptive or survey courses); econometrics; psychometrics; biometrics; experimental psychology; physical chemistry; industrial process analysis; managerial economics; computer science; measurement for management; mathematical models in social phenomena; and courses that involved application of operations research techniques and methodologies to problems of management, marketing, systems design, and other specialized fields; or other comparable quantitative analysis courses for which college-level mathematics or statistics is a prerequisite. Courses in theory of probability and statistics are highly desirable but are not specified as minimum educational requirements because to do so would possibly exclude some applicants who would otherwise be well qualified.
In addition to meeting the basic education requirement above, applicants must also meet the below specialized experience:
Specialized Experience: One year of specialized experience which includes applying National Security Strategy and National Military Strategy to evaluate their impact on organizational and future force structure decisions; analyzing combat formations, equipment, and munitions to integrate them into an existing combat model; leading or advising study teams to present results to senior leaders for informed decision-making; analyzing combat formations to understand the art of war and the collaborative dynamics of military formations for battlefield success.
This definition of specialized experience is typical work performed at the next lower grade/level position in the federal service (GS-13).