Becoming a Foreign Service Officer
From Registration to Diplomat for the U. S. State Department
The first step to becoming an official diplomat of the United States involves registration for the Foreign Service Officer Test (FSOT). An applicant must provide a great deal of information, including a detailed employment and educational history, and personal essays that serve as an applicant's opportunity to outline personal character strengths and demonstrated contributions to the community, at work, school, or in society at large. Multiple essay questions are submitted for evaluation not only based on the content, but on the ability of the applicant to express himself properly.
The applicant must also choose a career track to be taken through the foreign service: the options are consular, economic, management, political, or public diplomacy. The initial choice of career track is very important because each track has only a limited number of job slots available during any hiring period, and the more popular the career track, the tougher it is to be among the top few candidates who progress.
Foreign Service Officer Test
After completing the initial application comes the opportunity to reserve a seat at a FSOT session, usually a few months after the initial application has been cleared. Testing sessions are held in specially designated testing centers, with many available throughout the US, and a number of sites also available in major cities throughout the world. The test is divided into 4 parts: general knowledge, English comprehension, biographic information, and an essay.
The general knowledge section covers a very broad range of information in multiple-choice format. Questions may be asked concerning US and world geography, history, politics, and government. There may also be questions about economics, computer applications, and management principles, in addition to items testing mathematical ability. The English comprehension portion is also multiple-choice, and mainly tests the applicant's ability to read, proofread, and understand reports and information presented in essays.
The biographic information section can be understood as more formal and specific than the registration questions, asking the applicant to assess his or her own work ethic and demonstrated ability to produce good results at work or school. The essay question challenges the applicant to express, in a limited amount of time, an intelligent opinion concerning a topic that may be controversial. The answer is evaluated not by the position taken in the essay, but rather based on proper English expression and how effectively the applicant is able to make an argument. A full explanation and links to study materials are available on the US Department of State Careers website.
Qualifications Evaluation Panel
The next round of testing is called the Qualifications Evaluation Panel (QEP), in which a panel of assessors performs a closer review of an individual's biographic pieces of information provided on the FSOT as well as during the registration process. Taking into account those answers, along with education, background, and FSOT scores from the general knowledge and English expression portions of the test, the applicant receives a grade. Though there is no set passing score for the FSOT, only around 10% of applicants proceed to the Oral Assessment stage, usually held a few months after a final positive report from the QEP.
Oral Assessment
For the Oral Assessment, candidates are invited to Washington D.C., or another major city, for a process that may take longer than a day of full-time work. A candidate is assessed based on criteria including leadership, cultural adaptability, integrity, and communication. The assessment consists of a group project with other applicants, and individual interviews covering the applicant's ability to read and understand reports, react to hypothetical scenarios, and exercise good judgment based on self-described past experience. The applicant receives pass-or-fail feedback immediately following the final interview on the day of the Oral Assessment, and successful applicants are given a conditional hiring offer, along with instructions regarding medical and security clearance.
Final Clearance
Medical clearance is necessary to determine whether or not the applicant is healthy enough to be sent overseas to potentially unstable and dangerous situations without adequate medical facilities. Foreign services officers are also expected to pass a comprehensive background check to determine their eligibility for a Top Secret level security clearance. Those who pass every test are assigned a rank, but, if the number of new foreign service officers needed exceeds the number of applicants who have passed, only the highest ranking candidates are hired into the foreign service for initial training.
Between registration and hiring, the process of becoming a foreign service officer may take 12 months, and the majority of applicants do not get in on the first try. Fortunately, 12 months after first registering, an applicant can re-register and try again to become a diplomat for the U.S. government.
From the State Department
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