More students hoping to go into tech are applying to jobs in the government, while traditional tech giants, like software and internet companies, saw their share of applications decrease over the last year. A report from Handshake, an online job board, shows that tech majors’ applications submitted to government employers more than doubled between 2022 and 2023. Meanwhile, the share submitted to tech companies fell six percentage points in that same timeframe.

“Tech has been one of the most attractive industries for new grads over the past [10 plus] years, while government employers have had a harder time attracting early talent,” said Christine Cruzvergara, chief education strategy officer at Handshake, in an email. “So to see tech losing its share of applications while the government experiences gains is a fundamental shift, and we believe both are related to underlying changes in what early talent is looking for.”

That’s a trend that has been emerging recent years, dating back to the tech job losses in 2022. Recent instability showcased by hundreds of Big Tech layoffs at Apple, Google, Tesla and others have cast doubt on the stability of that job market, and young people seem to have been paying attention, she said.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if what they saw felt particularly shocking, especially as much of this generation grew up watching these companies scale and dominate the tech market,” Cruzvergara said.

Driving an uptick in government tech work is also the fact there are more jobs available. Public sector openings are up 25%, while popular private sector opportunities have fallen, according to the report. Seeking to capitalize on the young workforce, the federal government has made a more concerted effort to build up training and hiring for burgeoning AI initiatives in particular.

To be sure, tech companies are still receiving more job applications on the whole than the government is — by about three times. Finance firms also receive a large share, about 20% of all job applications, compared to 7% for the government. But Wall Street, too, has been hit with job losses in the first quarter of 2024, with companies like PayPal and Citigroup each announcing thousands of upcoming cuts, according to Reuters.

Against that backdrop, students are evaluating their options on the market, and perceptions of stability could be the determining factor in as many as 76% of individual cases. Job security remains the single biggest factor influencing graduates’ job searches, followed by location, employer reputation and then pay.

“I received an offer to work for a federal agency while in college,” said one respondent interviewed in the report. “After graduating, I expect to be converted permanently with a raise. Working for the federal government will open doors for me, and I’m extremely thankful to be in a secure position where I don’t have to worry about being laid off.”

Stability is where government work often wins. The necessity of government work provides for a relatively stable source of employment that has fluctuated little in the last two decades.

The Biden administration claims to have made progress attracting younger workers to the government. For years, the number of federal workers under 30 has hovered around 7% — a small fraction of the 2-million strong workforce. However, according to the Office of Management and Budget, that share has increased by 13% in the last few years. Even so, it will take time for recruiting efforts to materialize within agencies, as the hiring process is often slower than in the private sector. This administration in particular echoed feedback from HR reps who have said students pass up federal internships for better pay, quicker offers and less red tape surrounding workplace benefits, like telework.

Outreach remains key to luring young people to government work, federal HR officials have said. With some agencies simply writing vague job announcements and posting them online with few additional insights into culture, there’s an opportunity missed to connect with students on a more personal level.

And the data shows that’s what they want.

Three-quarters of recent graduates read reviews from current and former employers before submitting a job application, and a majority are more keen on applying if they know about a company’s culture or values, according to the findings.

Another pressure facing new grads is student loan debt. As many as 70% of them will have student debt by they time they graduate with a bachelor’s degree, according to the Urban Institute. And with the federal government operating on a meritocracy that rewards experience, young professionals may find themselves on the lower end of the pay scale with less room to negotiate.

Knowing these issues can be a significant barrier to recruitment, federal unions and employee groups have long pushed for pay reform to modernize the General Schedule to be more reflective of a more educated and skills-diverse society.

On USAJobs, the federal government’s premiere job board, some starting salaries for fresh graduates range from about $36,000 to $70,000. Some of the jobs are based in big cities, like New York and Washington, D.C., but do not offer remote work. And some agencies still offer internships that are unpaid.

“The cost of living is so high right now, and salaries seem so low,” said another respondent to Handshake’s survey. “I have so much I want to save for, but I’m looking at starting salaries of $40,000 a year, which means half my salary would go to my rent. What about health insurance, car insurance, utilities, student loans? Everything seems so expensive and working eight hours a day isn’t enough.”

The Pathways program, devised by the Obama administration to fix a recruitment problem that to this day confounds federal human capital officers, is widening its eligibility and lifting administration burdens that have frustrated students and hiring managers.

“The updates to the Pathways programs will increase opportunities and remove barriers to hire interns, fellows, apprentices, recent students and trainees which will help federal agencies boost their talent pipelines to serve the American people,” said Kiran Ahuja, the director of the Office of Personnel Management, in a statement April 11.

In fiscal 2022, the latest for which data is available, the federal government made more than 8,500 appointments via the Pathways program. That’s a shadow of what the program used to bring in at its peak years ago, but the new regulations aim to support participation by recognizing graduates who opt for skills certifications instead of four-year degrees and giving hiring officials more time to onboard participants.

The rule has been in the works since it was first introduced last summer, and it is one of several actions the administration has taken to address a problem that has gone on for years. With just 7% of the federal workforce under age 30, the federal workforce is older, on average, and competes heavily with the private sector on pay, benefits and ease of recruitment.

This rule softens some of the rigidity surrounding government hiring, but it also acknowledges that the success of these changes are not guaranteed. Having the right internship coordinators in place at an agency, sufficient funding to recruit and a welcoming culture can influence whether the number of hires actually increases.

To be eligible for permanent federal employment through Pathways, an individual must complete one of the three “paths”: the Internship Program, the Recent Graduates Program or the Presidential Management Fellows Program. Now, technical education programs or work experience, like an apprenticeship or Peace Corps duty, will satisfy eligibility requirements for Recent Graduates.

Interns can be now slotted into a full-time position after completing 480 hours in their internship, instead of 640 hours.

Agencies now have 180 days, up from 120, to make these conversions. OPM said it approved this provision because it give students more time to get the official documents they need to prove they received their degree and agency officials more time to process background checks or other employment actions.

And third, with respect to pay, OPM is allowing agencies to hire recent graduates at a GS-11 starting salary, instead of a GS-9. That’s a potential difference of $10,000.

Next steps for agencies include additional guidance to be posted online, an updated program handbook and a toolkit for managers and supervisors to get up to speed on the changes.

“This major revision of the Pathways programs, the first in decades, will strengthen the federal government’s early career talent pipeline and ensure federal agencies have even greater access to diverse talent across the country,” said Jason Miller, deputy director for management at the White House Office of Management and Budget.

According to the White House’s budget, a Pathways conversion database to track progress will launch in 2024.

Challenges are too complex and unintended consequences too common. But sometimes simple, proven tactics deliver the best outcomes. At a moment when employers struggle to find skilled talent, individuals increasingly question the cost (and value) of many higher education paths, and as shifting demographics threaten to leave important roles from the classroom to the construction site left unfilled, one of the oldest forms of training – apprenticeship – is gaining a well-deserved lift.

An executive order from the Biden White House this month to scale and expand Registered Apprenticeships is welcome news for policymakers, employers, and training providers working to meet the unprecedented demand for skilled labor. The executive order calls on all federal agencies to include provisions in its grants and contracts to incentivize employers who utilize or hire from Registered Apprenticeships, paving the way for this “earn-and-learn” system to open up opportunities for workers and allay labor shortages across a wide swath of industries and occupations.

Registered Apprenticeships are not a new concept for training, but they are an effective one. Workers receive training at no cost to them, putting them on a path to well-paid careers without saddling them with debt. Employers, meanwhile, develop a robust pipeline of talent with the exact skills they need, leading to increased productivity, all while reducing turnover and recruitment costs.

Recent efforts to revitalize Registered Apprenticeship programs have been met with success. The trucking industry has launched more than 100 Registered Apprenticeship programs in the three months since the administration enacted the Biden Trucking Action plan, which aims to boost safety and resilience in the sector in part by alleviating labor shortages. A similar initiative in cybersecurity has led to the creation of more than 200 such programs in just four months.

The executive order builds on efforts the Administration has done to prioritize Registered Apprenticeships. Through provisions in the CHIPS and Science Act, semiconductor firms in Phoenix recently announced a Registered Apprenticeship effort to help train the technicians needed to staff their facilities.

The initiative comes at a crucial moment. Recent federal investments in rebuilding America’s infrastructure, connecting millions to high-speed broadband, bringing manufacturing back to the U.S., retrofitting houses, and scaling new electrification needs will require thousands of well-trained workers. Yet the demand for workers is even broader than infrastructure: communities everywhere are scrambling to recruit teachers, nurses, and engineers.

The goals of economic opportunity from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act are not met without a skilled federal workforce. The new action will help address that challenge, stipulating that firms that employ apprentices will be in a stronger position to receive federal funds. The order will not only support the construction sector – where Registered Apprenticeships are already prevalent – but will also apply to burgeoning fields like teaching and civil engineering.

For example, the U.S. Department of Education can provide additional funding to school districts that offer Registered Apprenticeships to train and hire teachers. Similarly, the Department of Health and Human Services can use the order to promote Registered Apprenticeships to hospital systems to train nurses, physician assistants, and lab technicians. This not only provides new, faster ways to fill these critical jobs but also offers millions of Americans without a college degree pathways to quality jobs that offer career advancement, family sustaining wages, and worker benefits.

The President is not just calling on private employers to step up and start new Registered Apprenticeships, he’s challenging his own government to do the same. The Executive Order calling on federal agencies to work with the Office of Personnel Management to start and scale federal Registered Apprenticeship pathways can be a game changer for federal employment. The federal government is the nation’s largest employer and many of its jobs are far outside the beltway. Historically, federal employment played a role in helping grow the Black middle class.

This order comes at a moment when the federal government, like many employers, is struggling with a growing number of retirees and increased staff turnover. A third of all federal employees are nearing retirement, while just 7% are younger than 30. At the same time, navigating the federal hiring process can be cumbersome and confusing. By expanding access to Registered Apprenticeships, the federal government can offer new and current employees a chance to gain the skills needed for the job and career advancement. The practice has the potential to break down barriers to high-quality jobs among underrepresented communities.

The federal government is putting up the support and incentives to provide a pathway for skilled workers. It’s now up to employers to step up and utilize the benefits to meet their demands or continue on the cycle relying on a misaligned workforce system.

Harin Contractor is the Director of Workforce Innovation at The Burning Glass Institute and former Director of Labor Policy at the White House National Economic Council.

Patrick Combs is vice president of the Center for Apprenticeship & Work-Based Learning at Jobs for the Future. Previously, Combs served as the interim CEO and chief program officer for the Chicago Cook Workforce Partnership, where he led the second-largest local workforce area in the country.

The job portal now makes use of shared certificates, which is a strategy the Office of Personnel Management has been pushing as a way to allow recruiters to “share” candidates across departments.

“Pooled hiring reduces applicant burden by allowing job seekers to apply once and be considered by multiple agencies for selection,” said Veronica Hinton, OPM’ associate director of workforce policy and innovation in the announcement Dec. 1. “It also speeds time to hire for agencies who can fill vacancies from the shared certificate of candidates who have already completed rigorous assessments and been found qualified.”

Members of the Chief Human Capital Officers Council previously said that they’ve found such “bulk” hiring tactics successful for occupations that are in demand at more than one agency, like HR specialists and data analysts. It’s one of several tools OPM has identified to close longstanding skills gaps government-wide. That effort remains a top management challenge in fiscal 2024, according to the Office of Inspector General’s October report.

One of OPM’s newly stated goals for 2024 and 2025 is to generate 28 shared hiring actions resulting in 700 agency hires by Sept. 30, 2025, according to Performance.gov.

Generally, agencies share certifications for positions that are similar in grade level, duty location and performance level.

Then, within selections must be made within 240 days of the certificate’s issue date. In the past, agencies have made dozens of appointments off one certificate.

The new functionality on USAJobs shows candidates that have already expressed interest in working for the federal government, so hiring managers likely have a greater chance of success when reaching out to them. Candidates on shared certificates have also already met minimum requirements or skills tests for the job, thereby also pushing them ahead in the process.

“Most agencies strive to fill their open positions within 80 days or sooner,” according to the Partnership for Public Service. In the past, that number has crept up to 100 days, and agencies have said they’re working on findings ways to cut it down.

The tool embedded in USAJobs allows recruiters to preview certificates to see if they can make contact based on candidates who opted-in to being discoverable. Its success, however, is contingent on agencies who initiate certificates sharing them, OPM said.

Job postings from federal employers on Handshake increased by 22% over the past year, according to a report by the company, which presents itself as a job board for college students.

The average number of applications per job increased by 55% for federal jobs, compared to 38% for other industries. Growth was particularly strong for jobs in tech, customer support, accounting and environmental science.

Christine Cruzvergara, Handshake’s chief education strategy officer, said in an interview that there are a few reasons why public sector hiring is looking up. Certainly, she said, the White House’s Office of Personnel Management has made recruitment of recent graduates and young professionals a governmentwide priority. Congress, too, has raised concerns over aging groups of employees retiring and leaving vacancies, particularly in IT jobs. But for a long time, efforts to hire have been hampered by the fact that agencies are often slow to extend an offer and onboard employees, meaning they lose out on interested talent.

“It’s a challenge for the government because [it] might lose really good talent to other sectors and other areas,” she said in an interview. “And they can’t always move as fast as they might want to.”

That dynamic has changed recently, though. Hiring for the government’s biggest competitors has slowed, Cruzvergara said.

Hiring in the U.S. has been slower over the summer. However, posts at the federal, state and local level represented a fifth of all new jobs created in the first eight months of this year, the Wall Street Journal reported in September.

“For example, with the tech sector slowing down on hiring, federal government has actually been able to come in and scoop up a lot of that really great talent,” Cruzvergara said.

The director of OPM, the federal government’s HR agency, previously said in a statement that the federal government is going to make a “concerted effort” to attract these individuals laid off by the tech sector. The average number of applications to federal software developer openings grew by 200% over the past year.

Cruzvergara also said that agencies are coming to understand that they cannot just post generically worded job descriptions on one platform, like USAJobs, and expect to get a robust pool of applicants. That’s especially true for the government’s hard-sought demographic of younger people.

“[Engagement] is very, very important, especially for this [younger] generation,” she said. “They want to talk to young alumni. They want to talk to other employees, so that they’re getting what they consider the ‘real deal’ or the authentic experience of somebody on the ground, not just the glossy marketing.”

The average federal employer on Handshake messaged a quarter more students this year and reached out to 2,000 more schools, an increase of about 25%. They also registered for a total of 3,000 career fairs this year, an increase of 15%.

Visits to federal employer profile pages were up by 26%, compared to an increase of 17% across all employers.

USAJobs, the federal government’s premiere online job site, has been listing opportunities for interns and fresh college graduates for years, though not every agency’s program is included. It’s why the Partnership for Public Service unveiled a tool Thursday that pulls from agencies’ websites and filters information by pay level, application deadline and agency.

The listings include professional opportunities for students and recent graduates, as well as government-sponsored academic opportunities.

“One of the biggest challenges for students is to better understand the full landscape of federal opportunities,” said Michelle Amante, vice president of federal workforce programs for the Partnership, in an interview. “We know that there are hundreds of additional internship opportunities that agencies use that are not posted through USAJobs, so students were missing a huge piece of the puzzle.”

Agencies often post their own information about specific programs, like the State Department’s FAIT Fellowship, on standalone websites that may not be included in broad databases.

Revamping the federal internship recruiting process has been a high priority for the government for some years as the number of internship programs has decreased and agencies have struggled to hire and retain younger workers in general. This year, the Biden administration tweaked its USAJobs portal to break out occupation-specific job boards and provided more mentorship and support for government interns through the Office of Personnel Management.

OPM also proposed regulations to reform the Pathways program, which would make it easier to convert interns into full-time employees.

Still, though, 7% of permanent full-time federal employees are younger than 30 compared with 20% in the broader labor market.

“Internships are meant to be a pathway to a job, and it’s discouraging for students if they go into an agency and have a great experience, become dedicated to that mission and then there are no opportunities for them to get a full-time job with the agency,” Amante said. “Traditionally agencies will use their open slots for more mid-career or advanced placements, and obviously we need to bring in experienced folks into federal government. However, most agencies are not being strategic about building their early career pipeline.”

Amante said the Partnership encourages agencies to reach out to advertise an internship program they’re recruiting for and said that the website will be updated quarterly to reflect new openings.

Today, the majority of these programs, or at least the ones run by the Office of Personnel Management, are compensated, though there are some “volunteer” programs out there, like this one at the International Development Finance Corporation.

Since internship pay is regulated on an agency-by-agency basis, due to there not being a law mandating a specific level of compensation, some internships can be unpaid, some pay minimum wage and some pay the equivalent of full-time salaries.

So the only easy answer to “how much will I be paid as an intern for the government?” is: it depends.

“It depends on your level of experience and expertise and the position you’re hired into, and the work that you’re expected to do,” said Michael Mahoney, who manages the hiring policy office at OPM.

Some 60,000 paid internships were given out within the federal government in 2010, however, according to the White House’s proposed fiscal year 2022 budget, that number has dropped to just 4,000.

In response to that drastic cut, initiatives like the Pay Our Interns push to include interns in the federal budget have been urging the federal government to institutionalize and standardize paid intern opportunities. OPM, also at the request of lawmakers, has reviewed its flagship program called Pathways and put out proposed reforms last week.

The proposed changes to Pathways offer easier access to the program for people without degrees and make the process of converting an internship into a permanent position more flexible.

The Pathways Program is one popular route to finding a federal internship. Another is browsing USAJobs, the main website listing available federal internships, to find programs with salaries as much as $50,000 to $60,000 a year — more than some full-time jobs.

Many internship salaries, however, do not exceed the U.S. median income.

So because pay for federal interns can vary, check the job description, which should list compensation level, Mahoney advised.

Some federal internships, like internships at OPM, operate on the General Schedule scale.

“The internships at OPM administers, like the Pathways Program, their interns are paid in the same manner as other federal employees, such as myself,” said Mahoney. “Which is to say that for every position, there’s a grade level based on one’s level of education and experience and there’s a scale that comes with that — a pay range — which is sometimes adjusted for locality pay.”

The GS is generally how most federal employees are paid.

The less experience an applicant has when applying, the lower on the scale said applicant will be placed and vice versa. For interns, there is no one grade an applicant is automatically assigned, however, interns who have not earned a degree yet may get hired on the lower end, around levels two, three, four or five, according to Mahoney.

“Because oftentimes [interns] qualify just on the basis of a college degree or the fact that they’re in school getting a degree, they don’t have a lot of experience,” Mahoney said. “So, they’re going to make it on the lower end. But that isn’t always the case.”

Not every agency necessarily conforms to the GS as a default method of payment, however.

“Sometimes agencies do have their own pay scales in law,” Mahoney said. “But, generally speaking, we defer to the General Schedule, and in our rules we say ‘or equivalent’ to accommodate those agencies that might have something a little bit different.”

“Unpaid federal internships, they’re still valuable experiences,” said Brian Rowe, director of experiential education at American University’s career center. “I think there’s a lot of flexibility with volunteer internships. I see our students engaging in those experiences. I mean, they’re good experiences. They do give federal experience and give exposure to the federal work culture and to agencies and their missions. So yes, they’re there. They’re a part of the internship landscape.”

Some feel that valuable experience that unpaid internships can provide is not always a compelling enough reason to take one.

“I wish they were paid,” said Elizabeth Schill, assistant director for professional development at the Georgetown Cawley Career Education Center. “I think schools like Georgetown or American are unique in that a lot of students are already here in D.C. during the year. But it does prevent a lot of students who otherwise can’t afford to do an internship from doing these fantastic internships.

“I think unpaid internships just exclude a whole lot of students. And it becomes an area where the students who are in more elite classes have that it’s kind of that self perpetuating cycle where students who already have access to a lot of these programs and opportunities by virtue of their background, continue to do so,” she said.

While applicants should not expect that housing is provided during a federal internship, as it often is not, certain agencies, like the National Park Services, do provide it when sending you to a National Park, however, this does not necessarily mean that the pay is a liveable salary.

“It wasn’t possible for me to take up another job during the internship [because] I was working full time,” said Kira Carney, a former intern for the National Park Service. “Housing was provided, so that was helpful. Food and meal planning, and all of that was not provided. In general, it was not as well paying as it should have been, particularly in regard to how much it costs to travel there. Across the board, interns need to be paid significantly more for the incredible amount of work that they’re doing for organizations.”

The average cost of living in Washington, D.C., is 53% higher than the national average. Some estimates say that an intern should budget between $115 and $170 per week for general expenses in D.C. outside of rent.

“I think the standard was $15 an hour,” said Katie Gray, a former intern for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. “I can’t remember if I went up the GS, like up a grade, when I was there the second year, but if so, it was a very small amount, like only ten or fifteen cents more the second year. So, is it livable? Probably not.”

Aside from how much they’ll be paid, interns may also be wondering whether they’re likely to get hired after their internship.

Again, the answer: it depends.

“We do run a merit system, but as long as your background, your educational experience and/or your work experience [are good], I mean, there’s generally two ways to qualify for federal jobs: education, experience or a combination of both,” Mahoney said.

Each internship posting will specify if there are opportunities to move into a permanent position.

“First and foremost, conversion is always at the discretion of the hiring manager or the agency that’s employing them,” Mahoney said. “And sometimes there are realities in which the agency wants to but can’t convert people [like] budget constraints.”

Under the current regulations, interns can convert to other agencies if they accrue so many hours. When in doubt, ask your internship coordinator, Mahoney said, and be prepared to be flexible.

Applicants applying to a government internship might feel inclined to copy and paste the same resume that has been submitted to other positions outside the federal government. But there are some key differences and tips to know when submitting a resume to Uncle Sam.

For one, while private sector hiring managers prefer resumes that do not exceed one page, federal job applications do not adhere to this standard. Government jobs actually prefer multiple-page long resumes that list experience, education, job titles and descriptions, salaries, employment dates for timeline comparisons, successes made during previous employment and how an applicants skills and abilities apply to the job description, according to USAJobs.

USAJobs, the premiere job board for agencies looking to hire, offers a template that helps create a uniform, succinct resume tailored to government work. That’s a good place to start, but experts interviewed by Federal Times offered additional tips to help applicants submit the best resume and cover letter possible, prepare for an interview and complete an application properly.

Before an applicant can even get to the stage of applying, one must find the internship itself. Sadly, there is no exhaustive list of every available federal internship. However, USAJobs and the Pathways Program are both popular options that list many federal internship opportunities across agencies.

Pathways recently proposed changes to expand its eligibility and provide internship opportunities for individuals without a college degree.

Strict deadlines

After finding job listings that look promising, note the deadlines of the position as many federal positions have strict deadlines and due to the lengthy application process and security clearances, can come up sooner than expected. This means starting the process early and noting all deadlines before even beginning to fill out forms.

“Work on it early, especially if you are a university student,” said Brian Rowe, director of experiential education at American University’s career center. “Start to plan a path of exploration because internships can be exploratory. You don’t have to start an internship the very first minute you get to college, but start the process of evaluating what you’d like to explore, what you’d like to do and see how it fits into a path … Sometimes you have to get the ball rolling really quickly because of security clearances.”

Many federal internships use technology to sift out applications that do not satisfy their requirements, so make sure when applying to federal internships, buzzwords from the job listing are sprinkled throughout the resume.

“Try to use as many of the keywords that are in the job description in your resume,” said Kira Carney, a former National Park Services intern. “I’m pretty sure this internship had an electronic scanner that your resume is processed first electronically and weeded out, for federal jobs that’s definitely true. So using keywords is a great way to bolster and tie your resume as much as you can to the position.”

For agencies that do use an automated application process to sort through resume’s, the machine is not the only one doing the work. Applications that correctly fit the job application will be sent on to a human representative who will give them a more in-depth review.

So, when building a resume for a federal internship, focus on keeping the font neutral and readable and make sure the formatting is not confusing. Don’t try to be fancy, but highlight qualifications and let the work speak for itself.

Many federal internships are not expecting every applicant to have lots of previous employment, so experience like volunteer work, relevant in-depth projects, topical academic work and research are all relevant.

How to stand out

“To stand out, you want to take that job description and apply it [to your resume] because federal job descriptions are very clear,” Rowe said. “They aren’t ambiguous. Look at what it is saying. What is it asking for? What are the action verbs? What are the tasks? What are the skills that are required? And reflect that back in context for your experiences.”

An excellent cover letter also speaks volumes, Rowe acknowledged. The cover letter lets the hiring manager know why they should hire an applicant over anyone else. Use the opportunity a cover letter presents to tell a story.

“It’s a short way to give a narrative and focus on the skills and experience that the internship is looking for,” Rowe said. “Sometimes people describe their resume as the “what,” like what are my skills, what is my knowledge, what’s my training – academic or otherwise – and the cover letter can be a little more of the “why,” what’s my motivation, why am I applying for this, why am I really motivated to come in and do a great job?”

It’s also good to specify the federal agency’s name in the cover letter and mention something about it to show interest.

“I found it fascinating when applicants could mention the agency and the mission,” said Carol Wilkerson, former Press Director at the Small Business Administration and a former recruiter for the Peace Corps. “Those who mention the agency or the mission or something that was recent in the news relating to the internship position they are vying for, that helped me put that applicant at the top and that person got additional points pertaining to the interview level.”

It’s also important to keep in mind who the audience is. While it may not be apparent who exactly is reviewing each resume, knowing what hiring managers are looking for is important. On top of the job description, employers are looking for demonstrated commitment.

“When I’m sifting through those resumes, I would always look at their scholarly achievements, where they are in their career goals or what they have done community service-wise and any volunteer activities that can show me that that person is committed and dedicated to this particular assignment,” Wilkerson said. “I do look at that timeline to see if this person is going to stay on the course with us.”

While waiting in the interim to hear back on whether an application will move forward to the interview phase, a follow-up email with a thank you note is a good step to boost an application’s chances of getting noticed.

“I actually reached out to the contact for the [internship] I ended up getting, just to follow up on my application,” Carney said. “And she actually told me that I was one of very few who followed up, so that’s why I got an interview because there were over 100 [applicants] and they started with people who took the initiative to follow up.”

Once an applicant has been selected for an interview, it is important to prepare for the interview. Do mock interviews, think of ways to answer popular questions, like the star method, research the agency’s missions and look for advice from trusted sources who might have experience in similar realms.

“I had jobs in high school and the beginning of college, but those were all server jobs, kind of your basic restaurant jobs,” said Katie Gray, a former intern at the Federal Bureau of Investigations. “They weren’t super serious, so this was my first real job interview so I talked to my parents for advice. I talked to a family friend who had been in the military for several years and had knew what to expect from government interviews. And then I made a list of some questions I was expecting and prepared some answers.”

Uh-oh.

You can’t help but think of that one time in college when you imbibed vodka cranberries a bit too freely, and now you’re worried the outcomes of that evening will come back to bite you in a dark room with sensors taped to your temples facing a mind-reading federal agent in Men-in-Black-esque shades.

“They’re not looking for a perfect person, but they are looking for an honest person,” said Matt Myers, associate director of employer and alumni engagement for George Mason University’s career services.

A few years ago, Myers and his team realized that the path to a cleared job, which is especially popular in the Capitol region for its allure, stability and prestige, isn’t always obvious, and that both students and employers could benefit from a sort of “runway” to security clearances instead of just initiating that process once a young jobseeker has left college.

That idea became GMU’s Clearance Ready Program, which doesn’t provide clearances but does help demystify the process and give students a sense of what to expect from it and how they can be prepared.

For one, it offers a reality check: the process is not instantaneous and students in search of a job need to be prepared for it to take weeks or months for a clearance, though the times have shortened post-pandemic and since the government has sought to reform the way it renews clearances.

It takes, on average, 54 days for a secret clearance and 83 days for a top secret, per a 2021 report from the Security, Suitability, and Credentialing Performance Accountability Council.

“What we’re hearing from a lot of our employers, especially on the intern side, is that they’re able to push some interns through within eight weeks or so if they have a relatively easy background check,” Myers said. “So things are speeding up [and] moving faster, but I would still advise any student to be able to plan for a long process and be pleasantly surprised if it’s quicker.”

Clearance = Money

What employers know and what students may not realize is that security clearances equal money.

First, it means money for companies who sponsor a job candidate’s clearance for them. That’s another thing to know: you as the applicant do not pay for all the questionnaires, background checks and investigations required to verify your eligibility.

“We’ve heard from organizations that putting somebody through for a clearance can cost the company upward of $30,000 depending on how complicated the clearance might be,” said Myers. “So if you already have one and the company doesn’t have to spend $30,000 to get you in the door, they’re gonna probably look at you first before somebody who doesn’t have a clearance already.”

The average salary increase for the cleared workforce in 2022 was 7%. If you’re clearance also requires a polygraph, that can further boost pay by $20,000, according to a report by ClearanceJobs.

And clearances are not just reserved for those in high-level positions; over half of the total cleared population earns a six-figure salary, ClearanceJobs reports. Myers said his team encourages students to go after an internship program that will net them a clearance because it makes them “far more” competitive when they graduate.

It’s a good thing to have if students are interested in government or national security work, but they should also be aware that going down this career path necessitates a certain lifestyle, Myers said.

This may require routine financial disclosures, reporting contact with foreign contacts, being extra careful with government computers and cellphones or being required to work in person at a secure location.

Pot precaution

That also means holding off on other things that might be sanctioned in private life but won’t fly as a government employee — like recreational use of marijuana.

There have been some fledgling efforts to prevent marijuana use from disqualifying an applicant from a clearance or employment but none of them have completely removed that from consideration.

“Every year, qualified and dedicated individuals seeking to serve our country are unable to secure federal jobs and security clearances because the federal government has not caught up with the widely established legal use of medical and recreational cannabis,” said Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, who introduced a bipartisan bill on the issue in July.

And in 2021, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence said in a memo that “disregard of federal law pertaining” marijuana use may be still relevant to a candidate’s file, but “not determinative” of eligibility.

Generally speaking, there are three “buckets” of security clearances: confidential, secret and top secret. And many applicants will also fill out the SF-86, a standard form that aids agencies in initiating a background check. (You can view what that form looks like here.)

“They’re going to ask you about your travels, your family, your finances, your activities at college, who your friends are, where they work,” he said. “Get ready and comfortable to answer those questions and answer them as honestly as you possibly can.”

Pathways, which includes three internship programs for students and recent graduates to train for federal employment, would expand to applicants who may not have attended college but nonetheless picked up skills via apprenticeships or other hands-on learning, such as the Peace Corps.

“In the years since the creation of the Pathways Programs, employment trends in other sectors have shifted to better recognize the value of and utilize skills-based hiring over reliance on degrees,” according to the proposed rule.

Pathways was established via executive order in 2010 by then-President Barack Obama. Since then, the number of paid federal internships has fallen by 90%, said Rep. Gerry Connolly, a Virginia Democrat who has proposed legislation to reform these programs.

The need for young employees in government, meanwhile, has only grown as the workforce has aged into retirement. It has been a priority of several administrations to ensure college graduates and early-career workers are attracted to public service to counteract attrition and bring moden skills.

“Early career programs are a critical pathway into public service,” said OPM Director Kiran Ahuja in a statement. “Updating the Pathways Programs will allow the federal government to better compete with other sectors for talent and ensure the paths to public service are clear and fair. Whether you’re entering the workforce for the first time or changing professions, the federal government offers opportunities in every sector and every industry.”

In order to be eligible for permanent federal employment through the Pathways Program, an individual must complete one of the three paths: the Internship Program, the Recent Graduates Program or the Presidential Management Fellows Program. The suggested changes to the Pathways Program will alter these paths with three goals in mind to help improve the Pathways Program and convert internships into permanent positions.

The first goal is to expand applicant eligibility for the Recent Graduates program to allow individuals without degrees, but with the necessary qualifications, to apply — a philosophy the Biden administration has been building on, called “skills-based” hiring. In lieu of a college degree, qualifications could include completion of a qualifying career or technical education through Americorps, Job Corps or registered apprenticeships. Many of these government programs already background checked these applicants, which can then assist federal agencies in then bringing them on more efficiently.

The second goal is to supply agencies with more time to convert interns into permanent employees. Agencies have 120 days to do so, but the proposed regulations lengthen that time to 180 days to allow more employment opportunities for agencies and applicants.

“Though we are extending the timeline to assist agencies and interns in securing conversion, we continue to urge agencies to move promptly to complete conversion upon the Intern’s completion of the degree or qualifying career or technical education program and program requirements,” the proposed rule says. “Lengthy delays in conversion can pose a financial hardship on the intern and lead to them seeking employment elsewhere.”

Securing eligibility

In particular, the Internship program portion of Pathways requires interns to work 640 hours to secure eligibility for a permanent job in the federal civil service.

A waiver can be filed to demote this number down to 320 hours, however the new regulations’ third and final goal is to make up to 320 hours of the required 640 applicable from time completed at the registered apprenticeship programs and Job Corps.

“The Pathways Programs are an effective tool to recruit young talent into the federal workforce and develop the next generation of public servants,” said Acting Secretary of Labor Julie Su. “Expanding this program to include graduates from Job Corps and Registered Apprenticeship Programs advances the President’s commitment to a federal government that reflects the diversity of the communities we serve and enables agencies to reach a broader pool of talent – because equity and excellence go hand-in-hand.”

And for the President Management Fellows program within Pathways, OPM is also proposing agency coordinators to permit part-time schedules to accommodate individuals who are caregivers or have some kind of medical need.

These proposed regulations also help advance the Workforce Priority of the President’s Management Agenda. Biden said in his 2023 budget he expects agencies to have hired 35,000 interns this fiscal year.

“The Pathways Programs has been a very welcoming experience” said Dwane Larkin, an intern-trainee at the Railroad Retirement Board, in a statement provided by OPM. “My plan is to transition to a full-time role at the end of my program. I love my job environment, and it is extremely challenging, pushing me to be a better version of myself daily. I would advise anyone interested in federal service to apply through the Pathways Program. It’s worth the effort, and the training is priceless.”