IT Spec (ENTARCH) "Platformsite Reliability Engineer", GSFPL GS-14 (DH)

APPLICATION LIMIT: This vacancy announcement is limited to the first 250 applications received and will close at 11:59PM Eastern Time on the day that we receive the 250th application or at 11:59PM Eastern Time on the listed closing date whichever occurs first.

This position is eligible for Remote/Virtual work. However this position may fall under the Presidential Memorandum titled Return to In-Person Work which will require you to go into the office if you are located within 50 miles of a Department of Education facility in these locations: Washington DC Dallas TX San Francisco CA Seattle WA Kansas City MO Chicago Il Atlanta GA Philadelphia PA New York City NY and location is negotiable. Actual salary will be based on location of selectee. Locality pay tables available at .

We encourage you to read this entire vacancy announcement prior to submitting your application.

As a Platform/Site Reliability Engineer you will lead the design development and evolution of the cloud platforms automation and reliability systems that power FSAs applications. You will develop infrastructure tooling and observability capabilities that enable teams to deliver secure reliable and high-performing services at scale. Youll collaborate with cross-functional partners to standardize cloud architectures improve system reliability and modernize FSA into a platform-driven engineering-centric organization.

This role blends the mission of public service with the complexity of major commercial cloud and SRE organizations. Your job is to lead the creation of the platforms guardrails and reliability practices that let teams ship changes safely and confidently. If you enjoy designing scalable infrastructure optimizing system reliability and enabling engineers to move faster this is the role.

As a Platform/Site Reliability Engineer GSyou will be responsible for:

• Serving as an advisor to the IOG Director and Chief of the Network Support Division acting as a network architect and engineer to develop and implement solutions across cloud and on-premises environments while designing reusable platform services container environments identity integrations networking patterns and infrastructure components.
• Provide input to design and technical documentation review final deliverables and ensure adherence to the enterprise network operations engineering framework through leadership while serving as a principal-level expert in platform engineering cloud architecture Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) practices and infrastructure automation.
• Engage with technology leaders business partners and contractors to ensure operational requirements and needs are met while clearly communicating technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders and producing platform standards design documents and technical evaluations.
• Evaluate system security plans and procedures manage and direct office support contractors address IT compliance issues and oversee project planning and updates while designing and maintaining continuous improvement/continuous Development (CI/CD) pipelines to support automated testing deployment change control and compliance validation.
• Drive network engineering direction and response for CISA Binding Operational Directives (BODs) impacting data center operations developing plans and processes to strengthen security while implementing secure cloud configurations identity and access management (IAM) models encryption and zero-trust architectural patterns.

• Must be a US Citizen.
• Must complete a Background Investigation and Fingerprint check.
• Males 18 and over must be registered with the Selective Service.
• Relocation will not be paid.
• You may be subject to serve a one-year probationary period.

Condition of Employment:

As a condition of employment for accepting this position you may be required to serve a probationary period or trial period during which we will evaluate your fitness and whether your continued employment advances the public determining if your employment advances the public interest we may consider:

• Your performance and conduct;
• The needs and interests of the agency;
• Whether your continued employment would advance organizational goals of the agency or the Government; and
• Whether your continued employment would advance the efficiency of the Federal service.

Upon completion of your probationary period OR trial period your employment will be terminated unless you receive certification in writing that your continued employment advances the public interest.

You must meet all qualification requirements within 30 days of the closing date of this vacancy announcement.

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 can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. We will consider all qualifying experience including any volunteer experience.

Minimum Qualification Requirements

Specialized Experience for the IT Specialist (INFOSEC) GS
One year of experience in either federal or non-federal service that is equivalent to at least a GS-13 performing two (2) out of three (3) of the following duties or work assignments:
1. Direct technical experience designing deploying and operating scalable cloud platforms using Infrastructure as Code (IaC) CI/CD containers and automated security controls to accelerate engineering delivery and ensure compliance.
2. Direct technical experience enhancing reliability and observability for distributed systems including use of tracing/metrics/logs for observability SLO/SLA development incident response and analysis and/or measurable performance/automation improvements.
3. Experience translating platform and reliability engineering concepts into clear documentation technical standards and architecture guidance for non-technical audiences and influencing engineering practices across multiple teams.

Basic Experience Requirements

You must possess IT related experience (paid or unpaid experience and/or completion of specific intensive training (e.g. IT certification) as appropriate) demonstrating each of the nine competencies listed below.
1. Attention to Detail - Is thorough when performing work and conscientious about attending to detail.
2. Customer Service -Works with clients and customers (that is any individuals who use or receive the services or products that your work unit produces including the general public individuals who work in the agency other agencies or organizations outside the Government) to assess their needs provide information or assistance resolve their problems or satisfy their expectations; knows about available products and services; is committed to providing quality products and services.
3. Decision Making- Makes sound well-informed and objective decisions; perceives the impact and implications of decisions; commits to action even in uncertain situations to accomplish organizational goals; causes change.
4. Information Management -Identifies a need for and knows where or how to gather information; organizes and maintains information or information management systems.
5. Interpersonal Skills -Shows understanding friendliness courtesy tact empathy concern and politeness to others; develops and maintains effective relationships with others; may include effectively dealing with individuals who are difficult hostile or distressed; relates well to people from varied backgrounds and different situations
6. Oral Communication- Expresses information (for example ideas or facts) to individuals or groups effectively taking into account the audience and nature of the information (for example technical sensitive controversial); makes clear and convincing oral presentations; listens to others attends to nonverbal cues and responds appropriately.
7. Problem Solving -Identifies problems; determines accuracy and relevance of information; uses sound judgment to generate and evaluate alternatives and to make recommendations.
8. Teamwork -Encourages and facilitates cooperation pride trust and group identity; fosters commitment and team spirit; works with others to achieve goals.
9. Technical Competence Uses knowledge that is acquired through formal training or on-the-job experience to perform ones job; works with understands and evaluates technical information related to the job; advises others on technical issues.

Knowledge Skills and Abilities (KSAs)
The quality of your experience will be measured by the extent to which you possess the following knowledge skills and abilities (KSAs). You do not need to provide separate narrative responses to these KSAs as they will be measured by your responses to the occupational questionnaire (you may preview the occupational questionnaire by clicking the link at the end of the Evaluations section of this vacancy announcement).

1. Skill in designing and implementing cloud and hybrid network solutions including reusable platform services container environments identity integrations and infrastructure components.
2. Skill in applying systems engineering and Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) concepts to ensure reliability performance scalability security and maintainability across complex multi-cloud environments.
3. Knowledge of platform and reliability engineering principles and the ability to apply them through real-world implementation debugging optimization and modernization of cloud environments.
4. Skill in computer engineering cloud automation observability tooling testing frameworks and Continuous improvement/Continuous development (CI/CD) pipelines including telemetry logging alerting and distributed tracing.
5. Ability to leverage modern cloud data and security technologies to design test and deploy resilient platform and reliability systems that support mission-critical applications.