Senior Data Scientist

Role Description

The Senior Data Scientist supports the SBA Office of Inspector General's Technology Solutions Division (TSD) in designing, testing, and deploying statistical and machine learning models that identify loan fraud, improper payments, and non-compliance within SBA programs. The role works alongside the Data Engineering position under this task order to translate existing TSD data assets, code repositories, and models into actionable analytic products for OIG auditors and criminal investigators.

• Provide highly skilled and authoritative expertise on analytic methods in support of TSD's data analytic products.
• Perform data quality analysis on source tables to identify abnormalities or inconsistencies.
• Review, maintain, and support all existing loan fraud indicators developed by TSD.
• Develop and refine repeatable processes for combining and analyzing large data sources, including relational tables and structured and unstructured datasets.
• Collaborate with criminal investigators to determine and execute analytic strategies supporting loan fraud cases and adhere closely to federal rules of criminal procedure governing protected information.
• Design, develop, test, calibrate, and deploy advanced statistical and machine learning models targeted at identifying financial fraud, improper payments, or non-compliance within SBA programs.
• Develop and test predictive models using indicators of potential loan fraud, improper payments, or non-compliance.
• Assist in developing case leads for SBA OIG investigations based on model outcomes.

Qualifications

• Five (5) or more years designing, implementing, and maintaining advanced AI systems and predictive models, including both supervised and unsupervised approaches.
• Five (5) or more years developing analytic rules and models using current analytic tools and best practices.
• Five (5) or more years developing regression, classification, and other statistical models to identify anomalies, patterns, and predictive variables.
• Three (3) or more years providing data support for criminal investigations into financial fraud or abuse of government funds, with working knowledge of federal rules of criminal procedure governing protected information (e.g., Rule 6(e)).
• Three (3) or more years manipulating data in Python, with required proficiency in Pandas.
• Three (3) or more years working in a modern cloud environment (Azure, AWS, or GCP); relevant certifications are preferred.
• Two (2) or more years conducting advanced data analysis in SQL, including SQL Server and PostgreSQL.
• Two (2) or more years developing and scaling natural language processing (NLP) solutions.
• Two (2) or more years presenting analytic methods and findings to both technical and non-technical stakeholders, orally and in written products and visualizations.

Education

• A Master's, Ph.D., or doctorate-level equivalent degree in data science, machine learning, computer science, mathematics, or a related field.
• In the absence of an advanced degree, ten (10) years of applied work experience in data science, machine learning, computer science, mathematics, or a related field.

Required Certifications

• Certifications aligned to the cloud environment requirement such as Microsoft Certified: Azure Data Scientist Associate, AWS Certified Machine Learning Specialty, or the Google Professional Data Engineer credential, are preferred but not required.
• Certifications supporting SQL Server, PostgreSQL, or natural language processing tooling are preferred but not required.

Benefits

• Health, dental, and vision insurance
• 401(k) retirement plan
• Paid time off (PTO) and holidays
• Group Term Life and Accidental Death and Dismemberment Insurance
• Voluntary Term Life Insurance
• Short and Long-term disability insurance