Department: Department of Veterans Affairs
Location(s): Anchorage, Alaska, Anchorage County, Alaska, Fairbanks, Alaska, Phoenix, Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, Camp Pendleton, California, Fort Irwin, California, Fresno, California, Loma Linda, California, Long Beach, California, Los Angeles, California, Moreno Valley, California, Naval Medical Center, San Diego, California, Oakland, California, Sacramento, California, San Diego, California, Twentynine Palms, California, Hagatna, Guam, Hilo, Hawaii, Honolulu, Hawaii, Boise, Idaho, Pocatello, Idaho, Albuquerque, New Mexico, Las Cruces, New Mexico, Las Vegas, Nevada, Reno, Nevada, Eugene, Oregon, Portland, Oregon, Roseburg, Oregon, White City, Oregon, Ogden, Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, Bremerton, Washington, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington, Lakewood, Washington, Mount Vernon, Washington, Seattle, Washington, Spokane, Washington, Vancouver, Washington
Salary Range: $77161 - $121371 Per Year
Job Summary: The Vocational Rehabilitation Specialist (VRS) position is located within the Veteran Readiness and Employment (VR&E) program. The VRS is responsible for the provision, supervision, and coordination of the rehabilitation services for Veterans or service members participating in various programs. The VRS is the coordinator of services and liaison between the service providers and the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Major Duties:
Qualifications: To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the cut-off date and/or closing date of this job opportunity announcement, 03/17/2026. NOTE: Applicants must meet both the Individual Occupational Requirement (IOR) and the Specialized Experience as stated below. Individual Occupational Requirement (IOR): Education Undergraduate and Graduate Education: Major study -- vocational rehabilitation, vocational or educational counseling, or other fields related to the position. OR Experience Specialized Experience (for positions above GS-5): Examples of qualifying specialized experience include: Work that required obtaining and applying occupational information for people with disabilities, knowledge of the interrelationships of the involved professional and specialist services, and skill in employing the methodology and techniques of counseling to motivate and encourage individuals served by the program. Experience that demonstrated knowledge of the vocational rehabilitation problems characteristic of the disabled, including familiarity with available resources and skill in identifying, evaluating, and making effective use of such resources to serve individuals with disabilities; or of the disadvantaged, including knowledge of adjustment problems of the educationally or culturally disadvantaged, familiarity with available adult education and training resources, and ability to recognize problem areas needing special attention. Experience in vocational guidance or teaching in a recognized vocational rehabilitation program or school, developmental or supervisory work in programs of vocational rehabilitation or training programs for the disadvantaged, or personnel or employment placement work that provided extensive knowledge of the training and adjustment requirements necessary to place persons having disabilities or social adjustment problems. In addition to the IOR applicants must possess specialized experience and/or education as described below: Specialized Experience: To qualify at the GS-09 grade level: Applicants must have one (1) year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade (GS-07) in the federal service or private sector. Specialized experience is work experience that equipped the applicant with the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) to successfully perform the duties of the position. Specialized experience for this position is defined as: Experience in rehabilitation, counseling, disability, therapy, health, employment, wellness or human development theory and principles; and experience in career development process and career development theory. OR Applicants may substitute education for experience to qualify at the grade GS-09 grade level. Master's or equivalent graduate degree or 2 full years of progressively higher-level graduate education leading to such a degree or LL.B. or J.D., if related. OR Applicants may combine education and experience to qualify at the GS-09 grade level. Combination of specialized experience and education beyond 1 full year of graduate level education. To qualify at the GS-11 grade level: Applicants must have one (1) year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade (GS-09) in the federal service or private sector. Specialized experience is work experience that equipped the applicant with the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) to successfully perform the duties of the position. Specialized experience for this position is defined as: Experience in rehabilitation, counseling, disability, therapy, health, employment, wellness or human development theory and principles; rehabilitation counseling skills, techniques and resources needed to work with individuals with multiple disabilities, homebound individuals, individuals with acute or chronic mental disabilities and those with problems adjusting to social and occupational requirements. OR Applicants may substitute education for experience to qualify at the grade GS-11 level. Ph.D. or equivalent doctoral degree or 3 full years of progressively higher-level graduate education leading to such a degree or LL.M., if related. OR Applicants may combine education and experience to qualify at the GS-11 grade level. Combination of specialized experience and education beyond 2 full years of graduate level education. Note: 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 you document, to include volunteer experience.
How to Apply: To apply for this position, you must complete the Application Preview and submit the documentation specified in the required documents section above. https://apply.usastaffing.gov/ViewQuestionnaire/12868800 The complete application package must be submitted by 11:59 PM (EST) on the cut-off date and/or closing date 03/17/2026 to receive consideration. 1. To begin, click apply online to create a USAJOBS account or log in to your existing account. Follow the prompts to select your USAJOBS resume and/or other supporting documents and to complete the occupational questionnaire. 2. Click submit my answers to submit your application package. Resume Format: Resumes must be legible so they can be reviewed for eligibility, minimum qualifications and other position requirements listed in the job opportunity announcement. Your resume must be 5MB or less. We recommend saving and uploading your resume as a PDF to maintain formatting and number of pages. We also accept GIF, JPG, JPEG, PNG, RTF, TXT, PDF, ODT or Word (DOC or DOCX). We do not accept PDF portfolio files. We recommend using a sans-serif font size like Lato, if available. Other widely available options are Calibri, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, Open San Source Sans Pro, Roboto or Noro Sans. Make your page margins 0.5 inches. Consider using 14-point size font for titles and 10-point for the main text in your resume. The resume builder can help you create a resume using these recommendations and uses the information in your USAJOBS profile to help you get started. Helpful Hints for Creating a Two-Page Resume: Prioritize most relevant and recent experience Use concise, results focused language Align language from the job announcement Focus on demonstrating skills and competencies Remove outdated or unrelated experience Use the USAJOBS resume builder Additional guidance on this new requirement and resume building tools can be found at: https://help.usajobs.gov/faq/application/documents/resume/page-limit https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/hiring-information/merit-hiring-plan-resources/applicant-guidance-on-the-two-page-resume-limit/ Note: It is your responsibility to ensure that your response and any appropriate documentation is submitted by the closing date of the announcement. To verify that your application is complete, log into your USAJOBS account, select the application status link, and then select the more information link for this position. The details page will display the status of your application, the documentation received and processed, and any correspondence the agency has sent related to your application. Your uploaded documents may take several hours to clear the virus scan process. To return to an incomplete application, log into your USAJOBS account and click update application in the vacancy announcement. You must re-select your resume and/or other documents from your USAJOBS account, or your application will be incomplete. Once your application is submitted, updates are no longer accepted. Additional information for your consideration when submitting an application: The Interagency Career Transition Assistance Plan (ICTAP) and Career Transition Assistance Plan (CTAP) provide eligible displaced Federal competitive service employees with selection priority over other candidates for competitive service vacancies. To be qualified you must submit appropriate documentation and be found well-qualified for this vacancy. A well-qualified candidate is defined as meeting all the minimum qualification standards and eligibility requirements as well as possessing skills that clearly exceed the minimum qualifications requirements for this position. Specifically, a well-qualified candidate will score 90 or above within the assessment portion of this vacancy. Information about ICTAP and CTAP eligibility can also be found: Here Notice to Applicants: It is the policy of the Government not to deny employment simply because an individual has been unemployed or has had financial difficulties that have arisen through no fault of the individual. Information about an individual's employment experience will be used only to determine the person's qualifications and to assess his or her relative level of knowledge, skills, and abilities. Although an individual's personal conduct may be relevant in any employment decision, including conduct during periods of unemployment or evidence of dishonesty in handling financial matters, financial difficulty that has arisen through no fault of the individual will generally not itself be the basis of an unfavorable suitability or fitness determination. If you are unable to apply online or need an alternate method to submit documents, please reach out to the Agency Contact listed in this job opportunity announcement.
Application Deadline: 2026-03-17