Computer Scientist

Full Job Description

This position is in the Cooperative Studies Program (CSP) in the division of the VA Office of Clinical Science Research and Development (CSR&D) Service responsible for planning and conducting national multi-center studies.

This position is located at the Boston VA Medical Center in Boston, MA.

Basic Education Requirement: A Bachelor's degree in computer science or a Bachelor's degree with 30 semester hours in a combination of mathematics, statistics, and computer science.

At least 15 of the 30 semester hours must have included any combination of statistics and mathematics that included differential and integral calculus.

All academic degrees and course work must be from accredited or pre-accredited institutions.

Evaluation of Education: Applicants should have sufficient knowledge to understand the fundamental concepts and techniques of computer science.

Courses designed to provide an introduction to computer science techniques and methodologies, to problems of system design, and to other specialized fields are acceptable.

Courses or experience in teaching elementary, business, or shop mathematics are not acceptable.

NOTE: TRANSCRIPTS REQUIRED AND In addition to meeting the Basic Education Requirement above, you must also meet one of the following minimum requirements.

For GS-11: Possess at least one (1) full year of specialized experience equivalent to the next lower grade level (GS-9) in the Federal Service that has provided the particular knowledge, skills and abilities required to successfully perform the duties of this position.

Specialized experience is conducting and coordinating informatics, including building databases and software tools for complex, compute-intensive, data-intensive genomics analysis, as well as for clinical informatics applications.

OR Possess at least a Master's or equivalent graduate degree in mathematics, statistics, and computer science that provided the knowledge, skills, and abilities necessary to do the work.

One year of full-time graduate education is considered to be the number of credit hours that the school attended has determined to represent 1 year of full-time study.

If that number cannot be obtained from the school, 18 semester hours should be considered an academic year of graduate study. NOTE: TRANSCRIPTS REQUIRED.

OR Possess an equivalent combinations of successfully completed graduate-level education (beyond the first year) and specialized experience, as described above, which meet the total experience requirements for this grade level.

The education portion must have provided the knowledge, skills, and abilities necessary to do the work of this position (as described above).

NOTE: TRANSCRIPTS REQUIRED This position includes a Selective Placement Factor (skill, knowledge, ability or other worker characteristic basic to - and essential for - satisfactory performance of the job).

Selective Placement Factors are a prerequisite to appointment and represent minimum requirements for a position. Applicants who do not meet it are ineligible for further consideration.

The Selective Placement Factor for this position is: possess experience with using programming languages to include Structured Query Language (SQL), and SQL Server.

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; religions; 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.

For more information on these qualification standards, please visit the United States Office of Personnel Management's website at https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/.

Major Duties:

***THIS IS NOT A VIRTUAL POSITION, YOU MUST LIVE WITHIN OR BE WILLING TO RELOCATE WITHIN A COMMUTABLE DISTANCE OF THE DUTY LOCATION*** NOTE: This is a TEMPORARY appointment (not-to-exceed 1 year).

This appointment may be renewed for additional service in accordance with Agency needs for 1 additional year.

Temporary positions offer health insurance (if the employee is expected to work at least 130 hours per month for at least 90 days) but do not offer life insurance or retirement benefits and may be terminated at any time before the expiration date.

The appointment to a Temporary position does not confer eligibility for promotion or reassignment to other positions or the ability to be non-competitively converted to permanent employment.

Duties include but are not limited to the following.

Design and Implementation of Systems - 50% Works with researchers to determine their needs, performing analyses of the research studies and clinical trial protocols to perform systems analyses for determining the data requirements, design application and data storage systems and technologies, and complex issues of data migration/workflow processing that are appropriate for the storage methods.

Conducts hardware and software analysis, cost factors analysis, analyzing and determining vendor options, and then testing the vendors' products to determine their operational effectiveness and efficiency for the project/study requirements.

Performs mapping analyses needed to determine data assurance and security requirements for data migration.

Workforce and Position Utilization - 25% Proposes and develops strategic biomedical informatics programs to support better utilization and analysis of VA health, research, and genomic data to improve the care of Veterans.

Functions as a program leader to develop systems for projects/studies.

Quality Improvement Studies - 25% Develops and implements programs related to developing and monitoring quality Informatics programs, plans, procedures, and methodologies; and/or analyzing quality initiatives and processes.

Assists in developing CSP Quality Informatics Program plans, procedures, and methodology. Work Schedule: M-F (8am - 4:30pm) Recruitment & Relocation Incentives: Not authorized