Hydrologist and Hydrologic Technician Core Questions for OARS Advertisements

In Reply Refer To: 
Mail Stop  409 


Memorandum


May 1, 2001 

To:       All Supervisors and Managers in the Water Resources Discipline         

From:     Robert M. Hirsch  /signed/ 
          Associate Director for Water         

Subject:  Hydrologist and Hydrologic Technician Core Questions for OARS 
          Advertisements         

Over the past year, a number of you have expressed your frustration to me 
about the inability of the Online Automated Recruitment System (OARS) to 
attract and identify candidates for your vacant positions that were truly 
the most highly qualified for those jobs.  In many cases it was our lack 
of understanding about OARS's true capabilities that prevented us from 
asking the right questions of our human-resource professionals to ensure 
the quality of our candidate pool. Needless to say, I heard you, and 
recently asked the Office of Personnel to look into these issues, and, in 
particular, to examine the quality of the OARS questions and responses 
used in vacancy announcements, specifically for hydrologist and hydrologic 
technician positions.  As a result, a workgroup of technical 
subject-matter experts in our water-resources program (including selecting 
officials) and representatives of our human-resources offices was convened 
to identify means to enhance the OARS experience for supervisor-users.  I 
believe this team made remarkable progress in this enhancement effort, and 
I thank each member for their individual and collective contributions. 

The workgroup's efforts produced two sets of core questions and associated 
responses that can be used for hydrologist, GS-1315-9/11/12, and 
hydrologic technician, GS-1316-5/6/7/8/9/10/11, vacancy announcements in 
OARS.  The identification of core questions and associated responses by 
the workgroup is an attempt to relieve supervisors from starting with a 
blank page and sorting through a large number of possible questions and 
associated responses from the OARS library.   Supervisors still have the 
option of choosing other questions in addition to, or in lieu of, the core 
group for use in their vacancy announcements.  They have the option of 
identifying certain core questions as selective factors as well.  Not all 
core questions are to be used in every vacancy announcement.  Some of 
these questions are applicable to one grade level only; others are 
applicable to multiple grades; and some read similarly, but are different 
based on the discipline or specialty to which the core question relates.  
Although the core questions were developed for the identified grade 
levels, a supervisor and the servicing human-resources specialist might 
agree that some questions are appropriate for use at grade levels below, 
or even above, those identified.  In all cases, the selection and use of 
core questions, as well as other questions in a vacancy announcement, must 
be validated through a job analysis that is conducted by the supervisor 
with the assistance of the human-resource specialist for the specific 
position to be filled. 

Attached to this memorandum are Word documents for the two subject 
series.  Each document identifies the KASOC's that the core questions are 
derived from and the core questions themselves with associated response 
choices.  The format of these documents is slightly different than the 
format in which the questions appear in OARS, but should serve as a 
worthwhile reference for supervisor-users and human-resource specialists, 
alike. 
  
I am also pleased to announce that partly, as a result of discussions in 
the workgroup, an OARS Information Guide is now in final draft and should 
be formally announced by subsequent memorandum in about a week.  It will 
be available online at: 
http://www.usgs.gov:8888/ops/hro/personnel/oars_guide.   

If you have questions relating to the use of the core questions for 
hydrologist or hydrologic technician vacancies, please contact your 
Servicing Personnel Office.   

Copies to:      Deputy Director 
                Associate Directors 
                Regional Directors 
                Personnel Officers 

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