Students and recent graduates now have three clear paths to internships and full-time employment in the federal government as a result of new rules issued by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) on May 11.

Students and recent graduates now have three clear paths to internships and full-time employment in the federal government as a result of new rules issued by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) on May 11.

Established by Executive Order 13562, Recruiting and Hiring Students and Recent Graduates, the Pathways Programs will provide talented individuals who are in school or who have recently received a degree with greater access to federal jobs and internships, as well as meaningful training, mentoring and career development opportunities.

Comprised of the Internship Program, Recent Graduates Program and Presidential Management Fellows Program, the framework of the Pathways Programs will help federal agencies be more competitive in recruiting, hiring, developing and retaining the talent needed to fulfill their missions.

INTERNSHIP PROGRAM

This program offers current students in a wide variety of educational institutions with paid opportunities to work in federal agencies and explore different career paths. It replaces the Student Temporary Employment Program (STEP) and Student Career Experience Program (SCEP).

Upon successful completion of an internship, including 640 hours of work, participants will be eligible for conversion to full-time federal employment. Agencies may waive up to 320 hours of the work experience requirement for outstanding performers.

RECENT GRADUATES PROGRAM

This is a dynamic, one-year developmental program designed for individuals who have received undergraduate or graduate degrees from qualifying educational institutions or programs. Candidates must apply to the Recent Graduates Program within two years of degree or certificate completion, with the exception of veterans, who have up to six years to apply due to military service obligations.

Participants in the Recent Graduates Program will receive a minimum of 40 hours of training and professional development, complete an individual development plan and be assigned a mentor. Additionally, upon successful completion of the program, they will be eligible for conversion to full-time federal employment.

*Students who graduated after the executive order was issued and before the final regulations take effect have been granted two full years of eligibility from July 10, 2012 to apply to the Recent Graduates Program.

PRESIDENTIAL MANAGEMENT FELLOWS PROGRAM

The Presidential Management Fellows (PMF) Program has been and will continue to be a government-wide leadership development program for graduate and professional degree candidates. The new Pathways Programs regulations preserve this program, while at the same time increasing its flexibility to attract talent to federal agencies. For example, under the new regulations, the school nomination requirement has been eliminated and the eligibility window has been expanded to allow individuals who received a qualifying advanced degree within the preceding two years to apply to the program.

PMFs will participate in an orientation program, receive 80 hours of training and professional development, complete an individual development plan, be assigned a mentor, and have at least one rotational or developmental assignment. Upon successful completion of the program, participants will be eligible for conversion to full-time federal employment.

During the next two months, agencies will be working to implement the Pathways Programs. While some organizations will begin to advertise these initiatives now, they will not be able to use them to hire students and recent graduates until July 10, 2012. In the meantime, agencies will continue to use STEP, SCEP and the competitive service to bring talent on board.

You will begin to see postings for Pathways Programs opportunities on USAJOBS.gov later this summer. However, the majority of jobs and internships will be announced during the fall recruiting season and onwards.

For more information about the Pathways Programs, visit OPM’s website or USAJOBS.gov

The Partnership for Public Service will host a webinar for the Call to Serve Network to provide colleges and universities with additional details about these initiatives later this summer, as well as continue to update campuses through Call to Serve eNews. If you have any questions about the Pathways Programs, please email calltoserve@ourpublicservice.org

Office of Personnel Management establishes new intern guidelines

Office of Personnel Management establishes new intern guidelines

The Washington Post, By Timothy R. Smith

Starting in July, students and recent graduates will have a clear path into the federal workforce, under new rules the Office of Personnel Management will issue Friday.

The rules, which establish three separate Pathway Programs, are in response to an executive order issued by President Obama in December 2010 that shut down the Federal Career Intern Program. Critics said the intern program was not limited to students, was often used to fill civil service vacancies and undermined the hiring preferences for veterans.

OPM’s new Pathway Programs will have three routes for students and graduates to enter the federal workforce. An Internship Program will be limited to currently enrolled high school, college or post-graduate students at qualifying educational institutions. After 640 hours, interns would be eligible to convert to the civil service, though a supervisor could recommend conversion after 320 hours. Only actively enrolled students can be called interns, a change from old regulations, when interns could be graduates.

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Perspectives from a Government Agency

Perspectives from a Government Agency

By Owen Highfill

This article addresses what new federal employees—especially young college graduates—might expect when they land in Washington, D.C. Sharing this information with students (or anyone interested in federal employment) should be a goal of all career services professionals.

When I speak to students around the country about working for the federal government, I get a lot of tough questions. My goal when speaking at universities is not only to answer questions but also to explain why I do what I do. When I first graduated from school and entered the work force, my primary goal was to contribute to society in a meaningful way. I considered staying in academia or pursuing a career at a nonprofit, but ultimately, I’m thankful I decided to become a civil servant and work for our nation’s largest employer.

What is the work environment like?

Most of the questions I hear are about the atmosphere in Washington, D.C. But when I announce I work for the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), the regulator of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and the Federal Home Loan banks, the questions get even tougher—everybody wonders about the future of the housing market and government-sponsored enterprises. So I approach both types of questions separately.

I tell the students it is a historically difficult time for our nation’s economy, but the atmosphere in Washington, D.C., is exciting. Although there are a tremendous number of changes and challenges ahead, it is also a time of incredible opportunities for federal employees. Within the past few years, new agencies have been created, including my agency, FHFA, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and the new Office of Financial Research. New agencies not only mean new jobs, they mean more and new areas of opportunity for careers in the federal government.

Additionally, President Obama has announced a number of changes to the federal hiring process. These changes make the application process for federal jobs more accessible and easier to navigate. For example, the government is

• eliminating the old requirement to list knowledge, skills, and abilities from the first step of the application process;

• allowing applicants to apply with a resume and cover letter;

• improving hiring speed

• notifying applicants of their status throughout the hiring process.

In addition, the Pathways Programs are three excepted-service programs for students and recent graduates:

1. The proposed Internship Program is a paid federal government internship for current high school, college, and graduate students. It replaces the current Student Career Experience Program and Student Temporary Employment Program programs.

2. The proposed Recent Graduates Program is a two-year career development program in the federal government for people who graduated from college or graduate school in the past two years. It also covers military veterans who graduated in the past six years.

3. The proposed Presidential Management Fellows Program is a two-year program for people who have graduated from graduate school within the past two years. It’s designed to develop potential future federal government leaders.

The new programs are expected to be finalized this year, but until then, the current student programs will remain in place.

The Harder Questions

I really enjoy telling students about all the potential career options in the federal government, but I especially like answering those tough questions about the housing market and my agency.

I began working for the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO) in July 2008, just before former President Bush signed the Housing and Economic Recovery Act, which created FHFA by combining the staffs of OFHEO, the Federal Housing Finance Board, and a mission office of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Just six weeks later, FHFA used its new authority and placed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (the Enterprises) into conservatorships.

The recent financial crisis has been an extremely challenging time for our economy and the housing market, and the future of the government-sponsored enterprises is uncertain. In February, my agency sent Congress a strategic plan for the conservatorship of the Enterprises outlining the steps FHFA has taken and will be taking to address the challenges of the conservatorships. It’s a groundbreaking document that proposes a roadmap for what promise to be historic changes in the housing finance market while leaving room for Congress and the Administration to decide the fate of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Making a Positive Difference

Students and other people considering employment in the federal government can benefit from knowing what they might experience. Seeing a federal agency created from the ground up and dealing with the challenges of conservatorships for the past three years has been a fascinating experience. I learn something new every day and get to be a part of history in the making. It is a privilege to work for an agency working on such important issues, and I am thankful to be a part of a tremendously dedicated group of federal employees. Even with the ever present changes and challenges in Washington, DC, in the federal government, and in my agency, I know I am making a positive difference in my country through a rewarding career in public service.

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Owen Highfill, MA, holds a bachelor’s degree from James Madison University and a master’s degree from the University of Georgia, both in English literature. After graduate school, she was accepted into the Presidential Management Fellows Program and began working for the federal government in Washington, D.C. She currently works for the Federal Housing Finance Agency as a conservatorship operations specialist. She is also a part of the Partnership for Public Service’s Call to Serve Speakers Bureau. She can be reached at

Office of Conservatorship Operations
Federal Housing Finance Agency

Where do government employees live and work?

Where do government employees live and work?

By Ed O'Keefe

Which parts of the country have the highest percentage of government workers? It's not just Washington, D.C.

  

Nearly three in 10 workers in Hawaii, Alaska and the District work for local, state or federal governments, according to a new Gallup survey.

Maryland, Virginia, New Mexico and West Virginia are close behind, with 21 to 24 percent of state residents collecting government paychecks.

States with the lowest percentage of government employees included Pennsylvania (11 percent) and Michigan, Vermont, Indiana, Missouri, Minnesota and Maine, all with 12 percent.

The District, Virginia and Maryland had the highest percentage of federal employees, with 21 percent of D.C. workers earning federal salaries; 12 percent of Maryland and Virginia workers did as well.

The findings are from Gallup’s daily tracking interviews that quizzed more than 129,000 American workers during 2011.

And while Republicans and fiscal conservatives may complain about the growing size of government, just 16.3 percent of American workers said they worked for the government in 2011, down 1 percent since 2009. Gallup said their data is consistent with Bureau of Labor Statistics data that found a decline of 280,000 government jobs across the country last year.

At the federal level, just 4.4 percent of American workers reported working for the federal government, a drop of 0.3 percentage points from 2010.

States with higher percentages of government employment are located across the country, while states with lower percentages of government workers are mostly in the Northeast and Midwest, Gallup said.

The Federal Workforce in 2020

The Federal Workforce in 2020

• By Brittany Ballenstedt
• March 12, 2012

 

Younger workers have been brought up with an always-on connection to people and information thanks to technology. What impact will this have on the future of your agency workforce?

According to a new report by the Pew Internet and American Life Project and Elon University, it could mean good or bad news, depending on whom you ask.

A survey of 1,021 technology stakeholders and critics found opinions evenly split as to whether younger generations' connectivity could yield a net positive or net negative by 2020. Researchers said young people growing up hyperconnected to each other and the mobile Web will be nimble, quick-acting multitaskers who will do well in some key respects.

At the same time, however, connectivity also will drive young people to thirst for instant gratification, settle for quick choices and lack patience, the survey found.

More specifically, respondents were asked to read two statements and select the one they believe is most likely to be true in the year 2020. The majority (55 percent) agreed that the hyper-connected, multitasking lives of teens and young adults will yield helpful results in 2020. Some 42 percent agreed with the opposite statement -- that hyper-connectivity will yield "baleful results."

"While 55 percent agreed with the statement that the future for the hyper-connected will generally be positive, many who chose that view noted that it is more their hope than their best guess, and a number of people said the true outcome will be a combination of both scenarios," the report states.

Meanwhile, respondents were consistent in their predictions of the most desired skills for young people in 2020. The most popular skills were public problem-solving through cooperative work, or crowdsourcing; the ability to search effectively for information online and be able to discern the quality of information; synthesizing details; being strategically future-minded; the ability to concentrate; and the ability to distinguish between "noise" and the real message.

"Memories are becoming hyperlinks to information triggered by keywords and URLs," said Amber Case, CEO of Geoloqi, in response to the survey. "We are becoming 'persistent paleontologists' of our own external memories, as our brains are storing the keywords to get back to those memories and not the full memories themselves."