Civil Engineer

Summary

This position is located in an Area or State Office within USDA Rural Development (RD). The incumbent performs a variety of assignments requiring professional experience and technical competence in civil engineering activities, procedures, principles, techniques and evaluations utilized in the performance of supervised rural credit and development programs. This position is filled through the Office of Personnel Management's (OPM) Direct-Hire Authority for this occupation.

Duties

• •Duties are at the full performance level. Advises and consults with private groups, public bodies and state and/or federal agencies on the civil engineering aspects of projects financed by RD loan and grant programs.
• •Advises members of the engineering and architecture profession of RD requirements in regard to the planning, design, drawings and specifications, advertisement for bids, negotiation and awarding contracts, and construction management.
• •Provides technical guidance for project eligibility and priority. Reviews planning documents/Preliminary Engineering Reports (PER) and completed analyses and recommendations regarding the technical merit of applications for funding.
• •Reviews projects for modesty in size, cost, and design, compliance of the facility with Federal, State and local laws, regulations, and standards applicable to funding policies and regulations, cost effectiveness and other requirements.
• •Works with staff, applicants and their consultants with respect to the suitability of proposed PERs as well as other documents associated with applications for funding and projects approved for funding.

Qualifications

Applicants must meet all qualifications and eligibility requirements by the closing date of the announcement including time-in-grade restrictions, specialized experience, education, and/or professional certifications, as defined below. In addition to meeting the basic requirement listed below in Education, qualified applicants must possess: Time in Grade: Current federal employees applying for a promotion opportunity must meet the time in grade requirement of 52 weeks of service at the next lower grade level in the normal line of progression for the position being filled. GS-11: Applicants must possess one (1) year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade level (GS-09); or its non-federal equivalent. Specialized experience is defined as assisting in the review of construction project preliminary plans, drawings, designs, specifications and cost estimates; advising/consulting with private groups, public bodies and other agencies on civil or environmental engineering and architectural aspects of projects; assisting in providing advisory and technical services in the engineering, planning and design process for projects that may include single or multi-family housing, wastewater facilities, businesses, community facilities, GS-12: Applicants must possess one (1) year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade level (GS-11); or its non-federal equivalent. Specialized experience is defined as reviewing construction project preliminary plans, drawings, designs, specifications and cost estimates. Advising/consulting with private groups, public bodies, and other agencies on civil or environmental engineering and architectural aspects of projects. Experience providing advisory and technical services in the engineering, planning and design process for projects that may include single or multi-family housing, wastewater facilities, businesses, and community facilities. 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 and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience.

Education

A transcript must be submitted with your application if you are basing all or part of your qualifications on education Basic Requirements: A. Degree: Engineering. To be acceptable, the program must: (1) lead to a degree in a school of engineering with at least one program accredited by 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 OR B. 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: Professional registration or licensure -- Current registration as an Engineer Intern( EI), Engineer in Training (EIT)1, 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 example, an applicant who attains registration through a State Board's eminence provision as a manufacturing engineer typically would be rated eligible only for manufacturing engineering positions. Written Test -- Evidence of having successfully passed the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) 2 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. Specified academic courses -- Successful completion of at least 60 semester hours of courses in the physical, mathematical, and engineering sciences and that included the courses specified in the basic requirements under paragraph A. The courses must be fully acceptable toward meeting the requirements of an engineering program as described in paragraph A. Related curriculum -- Successful completion of a curriculum leading to a bachelor's degree in an appropriate scientific field, e.g., engineering technology, physics, chemistry, architecture, computer science, mathematics, hydrology, or geology, maybe accepted in lieu of a degree in engineering, provided the applicant has had at least 1 year of professional engineering experience acquired under professional engineering supervision and guidance. Ordinarily there should be either an established plan of intensive 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.)