UPDATE: The positions are now closed.
We’re seeking highly qualified scientists to serve as scientific review officers in the Scientific Review Branch (SRB) of our Division of Extramural Activities.
SRB conducts the initial evaluation for scientific and technical merit of applications for funding through grants and cooperative agreements in areas of research that NIGMS supports. The SRB’s key mission is to ensure that NIGMS grant applications receive expert, timely peer review, while avoiding bias and conflicts of interest in accordance with federal law and departmental policies.
The selected candidates will be responsible for conducting the initial administrative and scientific merit review of grant applications for research programs and/or research training and career development grants. Candidates with experience with training mechanisms (e.g., T32s) and/or experience with center/resource mechanisms (e.g., Ps, U54s, R24s) are strongly encouraged to apply.
Duties include (1) ensuring fairness and consistency of the scientific peer review process by managing the scientific and administrative review of applications; (2) acting as the designated federal official in convening review panels, ensuring NIH review policies are followed and writing summary statements to complete the review process; and (3) providing guidance to applicants, reviewers, and Institute staff on peer review policies and procedures.
Applicants should have a graduate or higher-level advanced degree in a medical, health sciences, or allied sciences field related to the work of the position. These positions require outstanding written and oral communication skills, and familiarity with NIH extramural funding as an applicant, awardee, reviewer, or NIH scientific administrator is a plus.
These positions are included in the NIH global recruitment for health scientist administrators. There are two GS-12/13/14 HSA vacancy announcements for each position: one for federal employees (candidates with current or former federal employment status) and one for the public (candidates without such status). We’ll accept applications for remote, local remote, and local duty stations in separate vacancy announcements. Links to the vacancy announcements are on the NIGMS job vacancies webpage. The announcements open today (September 18) and close on September 27.
In preparing an application, the webpage on applying for scientific administration jobs at NIGMS may offer other useful information. You may also find the NIGMS tip sheet [PDF] for global recruitments helpful.
All interested candidates should send a letter of interest and CV to me, along with any questions about these positions. If you have questions about the recruitment process, contact the NIGMS Workforce Team.
Not looking for a position right now? Please help us out by forwarding this information to others who might be interested in these opportunities.
The consistency of reviews is a HUGE problem. I know of many applications that are very close to the payline, address all the criticisms, and then the resubmitted grant is triaged. Other times, two of the three reviewers praise the proposal whereas one dislikes it. in this situation, the proposal is usually not discussed. Not sure what can done because everything has become subjective rather than objective. It might be optimal to maintain the original reviewers. Actually, increasing the overall level of funding is probably the only way to correct these problems. Good luck with your efforts. Unfortunately, the top-rated universities and institutes are training people to join industry rather than continue in academic research. You already know all of this, but good luck with your efforts.