DOS Application and Hiring Process (It’s long)
Want to be a medical provider with the foreign service?
To start you need at least 5 years of full time working NP/PA experience before you can apply- it’s a pretty rigid rule and you won’t get past the first step if you don’t meet this requirement. The job posting on the Department of State website states a preference for family practice experience but my colleagues seem to have an array of experience including urgent care and ER. My experience prior to the FS was in family practice/primary care. I worked for 8 years as an inpatient critical care nurse and for the past 7 years have been working as a NP in Family practice. Most of my NP experience was in Federally Qualified Health Centers- serving uninsured and immigrant populations.
There are hiring cycles throughout the year and you can sign up for updates with the DOS to be notified when a hiring cycle has opened. It seems like they open about every 3 months or so and are usually open for one month before closing again. The application does have some essay questions and you can make a profile and save changes to come back to your application at a later time. I recommend putting in some time and effort into these questions. Definitely don’t rush through the application process. They say about half of applicants don’t make it past this first step.
After applying you wait to see if your application made it through the Qualifications Evaluation Panel (QEP) and if it does you will receive an email that you passed QEP and then you wait to be contacted for your interview AKA Oral Assessment (OA). After passing QEP, I waited for several months before being contacted for my OA. When I finally was contacted it was by phone and I was able to set up my OA for the very next week- so there was not a lot of lag time between the call and my actual interview.
The Oral Assessment and Beyond…
The OA is a fairly grueling two day interview process, mine was completely remote (due to COVID) which was nice since I’m located on the west coast. The first thing to note is the formality of the exam. Mine was conducted with a FSO and two MED NP’s and there were no warm and fuzzy smiles or prompts- this is all business. Once I embraced the formality my nerves cooled a bit and I was able to just go with it. There are a mix of medical scenarios and general scenarios on working with colleagues. I did not feel like they were trying to trick me, it just felt like they wanted to assess my baseline medical knowledge and my reasoning behind answers. One great line of advice I received from a current NP in the FS was: They want to make sure you are capable of making level headed decisions and that you know when to ask for help. They don’t want anybody to go rogue and be a cowboy. So don’t be a cowboy, you have been warned :)
The best advice I could give on preparation for the oral assessment would be to know the 12 dimensions of Foreign Service Specialist Qualifications. As corny as it sounds this is really what they are looking for, so incorporate examples with these principles into your responses as best as you can. The good news is that you are notified right after your oral assessment if you passed or not, so there is no waiting around. After my OA we took a video break for 20 minutes so they could convene, then I jumped back onto the call to receive my results. Once I received my passing score the NP’s were very welcoming and even helped connect me to other providers who went in the FS with small children. Note: Your actual OA scores are emailed to you at a later time.
After passing your OA the process of background checks and medical clearances officially begins! You will receive an email with all the instructions. Through an online portal called E-QIP you fill out personal, family and travel history. If you have a spouse they will have to fill out their own E-QIP (at least mine did) and have a background check as well. The most time consuming part of the E-QIP for me was listing all international travel for the last seven years and listing family members. For those of you with large families living abroad it may seem daunting, but you really only need to list people that you are routinely in contact with. I didn’t include aunts and uncles that I literally never talk to- but did include a cousin I talk with weekly.
The Medical clearance is pretty straight forward and probably the easiest part of this entire process. Essentially everybody that will be traveling with you needs a medical clearance (including small children). You may need blood work to check for vaccine titers and a TB skin test- the paperwork is pretty self explanatory. Just print out the forms given and make an appointment with your primary care provider. Tips/Reminders: 1. You are given a generic MED cover sheet to include with all correspondence. Fill out your name and contact and make sure this is included as the first page when you email files to the DOS. This really helps to ensure things don’t get lost along the way. 2. When the time comes be sure to let your contacts know they will be contacted by an investigator, my contacts would not have responded to the calls and emails because they thought it was a scam (the investigators do initially come off a bit sketch).
Once you pass the background and medical clearances your file goes to the Suitability Panel where you get the final stamp of approval for employment. Then once you pass Suitability you officially go on the Register and wait for a slot to open up in a training program.
The score you received on your OA and the date you hit the register will determine where you fall on the register list. After you pass the OA you will receive an automatic monthly email (on the first of the month) that will indicate which stages you have pending and which ones you have cleared. You may not be notified when you receive medical or security clearance, but it will show up on this monthly email.
Once you are officially offered a position, you start the process of moving to Washington DC for about 3 months of training.
I know there is often interest about the hiring timeline so I’ll list mine below. As an FYI, my background check was on the longer side since my spouse is foreign born and we both had a large amount of international travel.
My Hiring Timeline (updated):
11/2020: Applied
2/2021: Received email that I passed Qualifications evaluation panel (QEP)
6/2021: Contacted by phone to schedule interview AKA oral assessment (Received absolutely no updates before this). Passed the oral assessment and submitted my E-QIP that same month
8/1/2021: Submitted my medical clearance paperwork
8/14/2021: The investigator reached out to me for my interview for the background check
9/21/2021: I received medical clearance. Took about the same time for my spouse and toddler- 6 weeks
12/22/2022: Background check cleared. I was not notified of this, it showed up on my monthly update email that comes automatically from the DOS
??? Unsure when my suitability panel cleared as I was never notified
2/7/2022: Received email that I was put on the register
4/29/2022: Received email that I was offered a seat in the July DC training program
5/18/2022: Received salary offer
6/13/2022: Received travel orders for DC
6/29/2022: Moving Day!!
7/2/2022: Flight from SFO to DC
7/5/2022: First day of orientation or A-100/SOAR (in person in DC)
8/9/2022: Flag day! The exciting moment we found out exactly where our first post would be.
8/12/2022: Last day of A-100/SOAR
8/15 - 8/19: FACT training
8/29/2022 - 9/16/2022: Med specific training
9/19-9/23: “Consultation Days” AKA get yo’ life together before flying out
That’s right, 20 months after applying I will be sitting in orientation. So don’t quit your job just yet.
Bonus points for language.
After my OA, I managed to gain a few extra points by passing the Spanish language test. It’s fairly easy and straightforward to schedule and set-up. You simply email the language department with potential dates and the language you would like to test in. My test (done in 4/2022) was conducted through video and was only oral with no reading portion. I highly recommend at least attempting a language test if you have any skills in another language. It won’t count against you if you don’t pass, so it’s really worth a shot IMO, especially if you want to bump up your score on the register. I scored a total of 5.7 and with the Spanish language points I was bumped up to a 5.87. Spanish gives .17 additional points but there are more sought after languages that confer even more extra points. I personally grew up with more of a Spanglish, but I speak Spanish for about 80% of my work day so that definitely helped.
My recommendation for the language test would be to watch the news daily in your language so you are up to date on current events and so you have the language to articulate these events. I also read a few Spanish novels while I was waiting. No soy tu hija perfecta mexicana is a teen novel but I really enjoyed it. The second was No somos de aqui, which is a heavy read both in the length of the book and the topic (TW: SA) but I found it to be absolutely beautiful and it really captured the experience of Central Americans fleeing their home to seek asylum at the U.S. border. Since you have to sign a NDA for the language test, that is about all I can disclose! Check out this link for more info on language testing
A few things I wish I knew earlier….
There are 4 yearly training programs (called SOAR or A-100). They generally occur in January, April, July and September. Keeping these months in mind will help you prepare a bit, in terms of knowing which class you are aiming for once you hit the register.
There is a Foreign Service Reddit group, Discord group (link can be found on the Foreign Service Reddit page) and there is a Foreign Service Specialist Facebook page. I believe if I had known about these earlier, I may have been better prepared for my OA and potentially scored higher. These are also great places to ask more in depth questions and connect with people along the way. Sometimes someone will set up what is called a “Shadow Register”, where everyone can put in their scores and the date they hit the register so you have a better idea where you stand. The process is slow and can be frustrating so it’s nice to commiserate with other hopefuls.
Hope this was helpful. Questions? Are you thinking of applying or currently in the process? Drop a comment below!
