Incumbent is the Industrial Hygienist and acts under the authority of the Assistant Director on matters relating to occupational safety and health at the West Texas VA Health Care System (WTVAHCS). The Industrial Hygienist is responsible for planning, organizing, administering, and evaluating a comprehensive safety management program for the entire health care system
Qualifications:
To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement, 10/13/2026.
Time-In-Grade Requirement :
Applicants who are current Federal employees and have held a GS grade any time in the past 52 weeks must also meet time-in-grade requirements by the closing date of this announcement. For a GS-11 position you must have served 52 weeks at the GS-09. The grade may have been in any occupation, but must have been held in the Federal service. An SF-50 that shows your time-in-grade eligibility must be submitted with your application materials. If the most recent SF-50 has an effective date within the past year, it may not clearly demonstrate you possess one-year time-in-grade, as required by the announcement. In this instance, you must provide an additional SF-50 that clearly demonstrates one-year time-in-grade.
Note:
Time-In-Grade requirements also apply to former Federal employees applying for reinstatement as well as current employees applying for Veterans Employment Opportunities Act of 1998 (VEOA) appointment. This position has an Individual Occupational Requirement that must be met in addition to the experience/education requirement: The education must be accredited by an accrediting body recognized by the U.S. Department of Education at the time the degree was obtained. Applicants must meet one of the following requirements: A bachelor's or graduate/higher level degree in industrial hygiene, occupational health sciences, occupational and environmental health, toxicology, safety sciences, or related science; (TRANSCRIPT
REQUIRED
) or A bachelor's degree in a branch of engineering, physical science, or life science that included 12 semester hours in chemistry, including organic chemistry, and 18 additional semester hours of courses in any combination of chemistry, physics, engineering, health physics, environmental health, biostatistics, biology, physiology, toxicology, epidemiology, or industrial hygiene; (TRANSCRIPT
REQUIRED
) or Certification from the Board for Global EHS Credentialing (formerly American Board of Industrial Hygiene (ABIH)). (COPY
OF CERTIFICATION REQUIRED
) Courses in the history or teaching of chemistry are not acceptable. Evaluation of Education All science or engineering courses offered in fulfillment of the above requirements must be acceptable for credit toward the completion of a standard 4-year professional curriculum leading to a bachelor's degree in science or engineering at an accredited college or university. For engineering degrees to be acceptable, the curriculum must be in a school of engineering with at least one curriculum accredited by the ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology) as a professional engineering curriculum. Evaluation of Experience Qualifying experience involves the recognition, evaluation, corrective actions, and elimination of environmental conditions in the workplace that causes sickness, impaired health, or illness. This experience must demonstrate a professional knowledge of the theory and application of the principles of industrial hygiene and closely related sciences such as physics and engineering controls. Such work must have involved experience in all of the following areas: the acquisition of quantitative and qualitative data, and the measurement of exposures for a variety of chemical, physical, and biological stresses; the analysis of the data acquired and the prediction of probable effects of exposures on the health and well-being of workers; and the selection and recommendation of appropriate controls, including management, medical, engineering, education or training, and personal protective equipment. In addition to the IOR above, You may qualify based on your experience and/or education as described below:
Specialized Experience:
You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade GS-09 in the normal line of progression for the occupation in the organization. Examples of specialized experience would typically include, but are not limited to: Professional knowledge of industrial hygiene concepts, principles and practices that enables the employee to conduct industrial hygiene studies, to develop sampling or control methods, and to provide expert advice to staff in broad range of industrial hygiene matters; Knowledge of a wide range of occupational safety and health concepts, principles and practices, laws, and regulations applicable to the performance of complex safety management responsibilities; Knowledge sufficient to serve as a technical authority and make significant, far-reaching decisions or recommendations in the development, interpretation or application of the principal occupational safety and health policies or laws; Knowledge to develop and recommend to Healthcare System management critical programs that (a) may or may not require modification of known safety and occupational health techniques; and (b) are applicable to an extensive range of health care operations and potentially high hazardous health research activities; Knowledge of Microsoft Office products (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.) or other similar programs necessary to produce reports, inventory lists, and other administrative products.
OR, Education:
Applicants may substitute education for the required experience. To qualify based on education for this grade level you must have 3 years of progressively higher level graduate education leading to a Ph.D. degree or Ph.D. or equivalent doctoral degree (TRANSCRIPTS
REQUIRED
).
OR, Combination:
Applicants may also combine education and experience to qualify at this level. You must have a combination of specialized experience and education beyond a Master's degree (TRANSCRIPTS
REQUIRED
). 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/ .
