OPEN DATE: September 11, 2026
CLOSING DATE: October 12, 2026
POSITION TYPE: Trust Fund
APPOINTMENT TYPE: Temporary for 2 years
SCHEDULE: Full Time
DUTY LOCATION: Washington, DC, National Museum of Natural History
Position sensitivity and risk:
Non-Sensitive - Low risk
Who May Apply:
Open to all qualified applicants
What are Trust Fund Positions?
Trust Fund positions are unique to the Smithsonian. They are paid for from a variety of sources, including the Smithsonian endowment, revenue from our business activities, donations, grants and contracts. Trust employees are not part of the civil service, nor does trust fund employment lead to Federal status. The salary ranges for trust positions are generally the same as for federal positions and in many cases trust and federal employees work side by side. Trust employees have their own benefit program, which may include Health, Dental & Vision Insurance, Life Insurance, Transit/Commuter Benefits, Accidental Death and Dismemberment Insurance, Annual and Sick Leave, Family Friendly Leave, 403b Retirement Plan, Discounts for Smithsonian Memberships, Museum Stores and Restaurants, Credit Union, Smithsonian Early Enrichment Center (Child Care), Flexible Spending Account (Health & Dependent Care).
Conditions of Employment
- Pass Pre-employment Background Check and Subsequent Background Investigation for position designated.
- Complete a Probationary Period.
- Maintain a Bank Account for Direct Deposit/Electronic Transfer.
- The position is open to all candidates eligible to work in the United States. Proof of eligibility to work in U.S. is not required to apply.
- Applicants must meet all qualification and eligibility requirements within 30 days of the closing date of this announcement.
This position is located in Washington, DC, within the Forest Global Earth Observatory (ForestGEO), Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI), under the Office of the Under Secretary for Science and Research at the Smithsonian Institution (SI).
STRI provides a global platform for research on tropical forests and marine ecosystems, biodiversity, and human well-being.
The ForestGEO program is a global network of scientists and forest research sites dedicated to advancing the long-term study of the world's forests.
The GEO-TREES initiative builds on this network to improve the accuracy and verification of global forest carbon estimates through collaboration among forest research sites worldwide. The Data Scientist supports the Forest Global Earth Observatory (ForestGEO) and GEO-TREES programs as a liaison between site-based data collection and the development of analytical data products.
Data Management, Scientific Analysis, and Software Programming (50%)
- Performs data-management, computational, and bioinformatics assignments supporting research in tropical biology, ecology, and forestry.
- Develops, implements, modifies, and maintains data-processing pipelines used to process plot-based tree inventory and related ecological data and to derive estimates such as forest woody biomass density.
- Evaluates the performance of existing data-processing pipelines and recommends modifications or improvements based on data characteristics, analytical requirements, user needs, and experience working with ForestGEO and GEO-TREES site teams.
- Develops and modifies computational procedures for analysis of ForestGEO and GEO-TREES scientific data using established data-science principles, methods, and practices.
- Processes, validates, organizes, and manages tree inventory, Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), Airborne Laser Scanning (ALS), and Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) data for scientific analysis and long-term storage.
- Supports the archiving and long-term management of scientific datasets to ensure appropriate organization, documentation, accessibility, and usability.
- Develops and maintains data-management solutions and informatics workflows for data acquisition, formatting, validation, processing, analysis, use, and storage.
- Implements established data standards and contributes to the development and modification of data structures and architectures appropriate to assigned projects.
- Writes, tests, documents, troubleshoots, and maintains computer code used in data-processing and analytical workflows.
- Uses programming languages and tools such as R, Python, SQL, Git, GitHub, GIS applications, and related scientific and data-management software.
- Identifies data-quality problems, inconsistencies, missing values, formatting issues, and other anomalies and determines appropriate methods for correcting or documenting them.
- Works with researchers and other technical personnel to ensure that processed data and analyticalproducts meet established scientific and program requirements.
Requirements Gathering and Technical Support (25%)
- Works closely with researchers and program personnel to identify data-processing, analytical, software, and data-management requirements for assigned scientific projects.
- Conducts technical analyses of available methods and alternatives and recommends appropriate software tools, workflows, calculations, and analytical approaches.
- Assists researchers in translating scientific requirements into practical data-processing and
- computational solutions.
- Evaluates existing workflows and recommends modifications when established approaches do not fully address the characteristics of the data or requirements of an assigned project.
- Coordinates with site representatives concerning timelines and technical requirements for acquisition and submission of plot inventory, TLS, ALS, GNSS, and related scientific data.
- Reviews submitted data to determine whether established ForestGEO and GEO-TREES formatting, documentation, and data-quality requirements have been met.
- Works with site personnel to resolve routine and moderately complex data-submission and data-quality problems.
- Coordinates with the Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO) and other appropriate technical staff to ensure assigned development activities follow applicable systems-development, documentation, version-control, security, and software-development practices.
- Prepares technical documentation describing data-processing workflows, code, data structures, analytical procedures, and related methods.
- Assists in testing new or modified software tools, workflows, and procedures prior to implementation.
Training and Collaboration (25%)
- Develops and provides formal and informal training to researchers, site personnel, and program partners concerning ForestGEO and GEO-TREES data systems, data-management procedures, formatting requirements, data-processing workflows, and related tools.
- Serves as a technical point of contact for tree-inventory teams and other users at assigned ForestGEO and GEO-TREES sites.
- Provides advice, training, troubleshooting assistance, and technical support concerning data collection, formatting, cleaning, validation, processing, documentation, and submission.
- Explains data standards, analytical procedures, software requirements, and data-management practices to researchers and partners with varying levels of technical expertise.
- Collaborates with scientists, data managers, programmers, and other personnel to identify and resolve data-management and processing problems.
- Participates in meetings, working groups, and collaborative activities involving ForestGEO, GEO-TREES, Smithsonian staff, and domestic and international research partners.
- Shares information concerning lessons learned, recurring data problems, workflow improvements, and effective data-management practices with program staff and partners.
Performs other duties as assigned.
Education and Experience:
- Professional knowledge of and skill in applying a wide range of data-science principles, concepts, methods, and practices sufficient to perform difficult data-management, processing, computational, and analytical assignments involving ecological and forestry data.
- Knowledge of data acquisition, data cleaning, validation, transformation, integration, storage, analysis, visualization, documentation, and reproducible computational workflows.
- Knowledge of computational and data-management methods is required to develop, modify, implement, and maintain processing pipelines for tree inventory, GNSS, ALS, TLS, spatial, and related scientific datasets.
- Knowledge of programming concepts and skill in applying programming languages and analytical tools such as R, Python, SQL, Git, GitHub, and related software to manipulate, process, analyze, and manage scientific data.
- Knowledge of algorithm development, software testing, version control, debugging, documentation, deployment, and maintenance practices is required to support scientific applications and data-processing workflows.
- Knowledge of spatial-data concepts, common spatial-data formats, and GIS software is required to process and evaluate geospatial information associated with ForestGEO and GEO-TREES projects.
- Knowledge of the scientific concepts associated with ecology, tropical biology, forestry, or related environmental sciences sufficient to understand data characteristics, research requirements, analytical objectives, and the relationships among data variables.
- Knowledge to select and modify appropriate data-processing and analytical methods; identify and resolve data-quality problems; evaluate alternative computational approaches; interpret results; develop recommendations; and prepare technical documentation and analytical products.
- Skill adapting or modifying established data-science techniques and procedures to address differences in data structure, quality, collection methods, analytical requirements, or site-specific circumstances.
Education completed outside the United States must be deemed equivalent to higher education programs of U.S. Institutions by an organization that specializes in the interpretation of foreign educational credentials. This documentation is the responsibility of the applicant and should be included as part of your application package.
Any false statement in your application may result in rejection of your application and may also result in termination after employment begins.
Join us in "Inspiring Generations through Knowledge and Discovery."
Resumes should include a description of your paid and non-paid work experience that is related to this job; starting and ending dates of job (month and year); and average number of hours worked per week.
What To Expect Next: Once the vacancy announcement closes, a review of your resume will be compared against the qualification and experience requirements related to this job. After review of applicant resumes is complete, qualified candidates will be referred to the hiring manager.
Relocation expenses are not paid.
The Smithsonian Institution provides reasonable accommodation to applicants with disabilities where appropriate. Applicants requiring reasonable accommodation should contact
[email protected]. Determinations on requests for reasonable accommodation will be made on a case-by-case basis. To learn more, please review the Smithsonian’s Accommodation Procedures.
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