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U.S. Office of Personnel Mgt.

United States Office of Personnel Management

Operating Manual

Qualification Standards for General Schedule Positions

Individual Occupational Requirements for

GS-131:    International Relations Series

The text below is extracted verbatim from Section IV-B of the Operating Manual for Qualification Standards for General Schedule Positions (p.IV-B-29), but contains minor edits to conform to web-page requirements.

Use these individual occupational requirements in conjunction with the "Group Coverage Qualification Standard for Professional and Scientific Positions."

Basic Requirements:

  1. Degree: major or equivalent, or a combination of courses totaling at least 24 semester hours in international law and international relations, political science, economics, history, sociology, geography, social or cultural anthropology, law, statistics, or in the humanities; or 12 semester hours in one of the above disciplines and 12 semester hours in statistics/quantitative methods.

    OR

  2. Combination of education and experience--courses equivalent to a major, or a combination of related courses totaling at least 24 semester hours, in one or more of the social sciences, or in the humanities, as shown in A above, plus appropriate experience or additional education.

    OR

  3. Experience--four years of appropriate experience in one or more of the fields listed above in work associated with international organizations, problems, or other aspects of foreign affairs.

Evaluation of Experience: Qualifying experience that provided an intimate knowledge of a foreign country or geographic area may have been gained through residence, study, teaching, business or commercial activities, military service, newspaper work, military or civil government activities, missionary or inter-national relief work, or other experience in foreign countries. It may also have been gained through teaching college-level courses in international relations or problems associated with a specific foreign geographic area.

To qualify for positions at grades GS-12 and above on the basis of experience, this experience must have included either (a) responsibility for the direction and coordination of research, analysis, or other professional work in one or more of the fields listed in A above, or (b) specialized professional work involving a high level of difficulty and responsibility in one or more of these fields.

Updated 06 November 1998