Letter to the editor
I just read the letter to the editor, "Stepped Over," from Nov. 6, 2001.
I'm afraid I do not have much sympathy for those information technology
personnel who are classified as computer specialists and, boo-hoo, only
at the GS-13 level! My goodness, those GS-12s will catch up with you pretty
quickly.
How would you feel if the Office of Personnel Management insisted on
classifying you as a computer clerk/assistant and exempted you from ANY
special pay raises? You get no credit for computer specialist (systems administrator)
work you've done for more than three years, and you can't get considered
for a computer specialist position because you cannot get that credit or
those pesky little computer specialist "skills codes" loaded on your personnel
records.
This effectively locks one into a GS-335 computer clerk/assistant job
that tops out at a GS-09, costing this GS-09 about $10,000 per year.
And how would you like to be downgraded to a computer clerk/assistant?
If I were sitting at a GS-13 level, I would be quiet about my situation.
If I were you, I wouldn't call attention to myself or you too could be among
the ranks of the downgraded.
The whole problem with Janice LaChance's nifty little IT improvement
plan was that it was based on blatant discrimination, and it hurt far more
people than it helped. They were only interested in attracting new blood
to the government's IT workforce, ignoring those of us who have done the
work for years and are considered expendable. It figures, doesn't it?
Name withheld by request