Summary The ideal candidate for this position will provide authoritative technical expert in adult learning/training, instructional systems design and the application of adult learning theories/principles and instructional strategies, with considerable emphasis in multiple analysis techniques, design of plan of instruction and lesson plans, and development of instructional materials. For specific salary information related to your location, please review the OPM salary tables. Responsibilities What will I do in this position if hired? In this Instructional Systems Specialist position, you will be serving as the Instructional Systems Specialist in the Workforce Development Branch within the Office of the Chief Human Capital Officer. Typical assignments include: Producing targeted, highly polished, state of the art learning and performance support products with all supporting documentation. Consulting with curriculum designers, course writers, instructors, and subject-matter specialists to coordinate instruction system analysis leading to producing PowerPoint presentations, eLearning, virtual classrooms, webinars, webcasts, training portals, and other audiovisual materials or special interactive training tools. 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. Requirements Conditions of Employment 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 Public Trust/Moderate Risk as 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. Conditions of Employment: You must be a U.S. citizen to be considered for this position. You must successfully pass a background investigation. You must be able to obtain and maintain a Government travel card. Selective service registration is required for males born after 12/31/59. Travel may be required. Qualifications All qualifications and eligibility requirements must be met by the closing date of the announcement. To qualify for this Instructional Systems Specialist position at the IC-12 level, you must possess one full year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the IC-11 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: Establishing and applying instructional systems design (ISD) concepts and methods. Assessing proposals for innovative alternative approaches from the standpoint of instructional systems development likelihood of success, feasibility, cost, priority, and consistency with overall program objectives. Applying and developing criteria or requirements for treating and evaluating new approaches and concepts for training problems of a highly controversial nature. Selective Placement Factor: In addition to the minimum qualifications described above, you must meet the following requirement(s) to be considered qualified for the position: In conjunction with the Specialized Experience, applicants must also meet the Individual Occupational Requirements (IOR) for Training Instruction Series 1750 per the OPM Operating Manual for Qualification Standards for General Schedule Positions: Education Requirements: Degree: that included or was supplemented by at least 24 semester hours appropriate to the work of the position to be filled. The course work must have included study in at least four of the following five areas: Learning theory, psychology of learning, educational psychology: Study of learning theories as they relate to the systematic design, development, and validation of instructional material. Instructional design practices: Study of the principles and techniques used in designing training programs, developing design strategy and models, and applying design methods to the improvement of instructional effectiveness. Educational evaluation: Study of the techniques for evaluating the effectiveness of instructional/educational programs, including developing written and performance tests and survey instruments, and determining reliability and validity of evaluation instruments. Instructional product development: Study of the techniques appropriate for developing training materials, including identifying learner characteristics, specifying objectives, applying training strategy, validating training materials, and evaluating training. Computers in education and training: Study of the application of computers in education and training, including selecting appropriate computer software. Some positions in this series may specialize in one or two functional areas, where more specific academic preparation may be necessary. For such positions, agencies may require course work in the applicable functional area(s) as part of the above-required 24 semester hours. 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 Education Positive Education Requirement: This position has a positive education requirement, as outlined in the "requirements" section. You must submit a copy of your transcripts (unofficial are acceptable) with your online application. Once selected and prior to appointment, applicants must provide official college transcripts. Education completed in foreign colleges or universities may be used to meet Federal qualification requirements if you can show that your foreign education is comparable to education received in accredited educational institutions in the United States. For example, specific courses accepted for college-level credit by an accredited U.S. college or university, or foreign education evaluated by an organization recognized for accreditation by the Department of Education as education equivalent to that gained in an accredited U.S. college or university. It is your responsibility to provide such evidence with your application. Visit the Department of Education's Recognition of Foreign Qualifications for more information. Additional Information STAFFORD ACT EXCEPTED SERVICE APPOINTMENTS: Cadre of On-Call Response/Recovery Employee (CORE) is an appointment type granted under the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act, Section 306 (b), which authorizes FEMA to appoint such temporary employees as necessary to accomplish work authorized under the Act. Appointments under this authority within FEMA are made to the excepted service and are nonpermanent in nature. If you receive a conditional offer of employment for this position, you will be required to complete an Optional Form 306, Declaration for Federal Employment, and to sign and certify the accuracy of all information in your application, prior to entry on duty. False statements on any part of the application may result in withdrawal of offer of employment, dismissal after beginning work, fine, or imprisonment. DHS uses E-verify, an internet-based system, to confirm the eligibility of all newly hired employees to work in the United States. Learn more about E-Verify, including your rights and responsibilities. The salary range indicated in this announcement reflects the minimum locality pay up to maximum locality pay for all duty locations listed. The range will be adjusted for selected duty location. General Schedule locality pay tables may be found under Salaries & Wages. Please note: first time hires to the Federal Government are typically hired at the Step 01. Deployment travel may be required, based upon agency needs. Deployment expectations can vary and will be discussed with candidates during the selection process. During the application process you will have an option to opt-in to make your resume available to hiring managers in the agency who have similar positions. Opting in does not impact your application for this announcement, nor does it guarantee further consideration for additional positions.