Food Services Specialist

The position is in the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), Veterans Health Administration (VHA), at a VA Medical Center (VAMC) in Nutrition and Food Services. As Food Service Specialist, the incumbent is fully responsible for the culinary technical standard ensuring that efficient, safe and high-quality Food Services are provided to the Veteran, both inpatient and outpatient.Qualifications: To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement, 12/29/2023.
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-9. 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.
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-9 in the normal line of progression for the occupation in the organization. Examples of specialized experience would typically include, but are not limited to: serving as the technical and quality expert of culinary standards, analyzing and performing quality improvement tasks for menus and food service arrangements, providing forecasts of required food items based on advanced understanding of edible portions of yield and waste factors, identifying culinary and food service developmental and training needs of employees, providing or arranging for needed development and training, performing quality control on plate presentations, recipe compliance, taste quality control, plate waste studies and overall culinary controls, serving as lead culinary specialist, researching, advising, training and educating in the advancement of culinary arts for the service, developing culinary technical standards for food service team. OR,
• Education: Applicants may substitute education for the required experience. To qualify based on education for this grade level you must have a Ph.D. or equivalent doctoral degree obtained in an accredited college or university or 3 full years of progressively higher level graduate education leading to such a degree or LL.M., if related. OR,
• Combination: An equivalent combination of successfully completed post-high school education (beyond the second year) and specialized experience, as described above, which meet the total qualification requirements for this grade level. This education must have been obtained at an accredited college or university.

You will be rated on the following Competencies for this position:

• Administration and Management
• Food Service
• Quality Management
• Technical Competence

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.
Note: A full year of work is considered to be 35-40 hours of work per week. Part-time experience will be credited on the basis of time actually spent in appropriate activities. Applicants wishing to receive credit for such experience must indicate clearly the nature of their duties and responsibilities in each position and the number of hours a week spent in such employment.
Physical Requirements: The work requires physical exertion such as lifting, bending, pushing, frequent walking, standing, stooping, reaching, stretching. Also unpacking and/or tagging supplies and equipment and carrying moderately heavy items such as personal computers, equipment, subsistence, supplies and chemical supplies
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/.Education: A transcript must be submitted with your application if you are basing all or part of your qualifications on education.
Note: Only education or degrees recognized by the U.S. Department of Education from accredited colleges, universities, schools, or institutions may be used to qualify for Federal employment. You can verify your education here: http://ope.ed.gov/accreditation/. If you are using foreign education to meet qualification requirements, you must send a Certificate of Foreign Equivalency with your transcript in order to receive credit for that education. For further information, visit: http://www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ous/international/usnei/us/edlite-visitus-forrecog.html.Employment Type: FULL_TIME