Post One

Salutations! I am in the process of applying to join the Foreign Service. I'll briefly go through the process so anyone who is unfamiliar can get caught up.

So far, I've passed the written exam (FSWE), passed the Super Critical Needs Language (SCNL) telephone test, and have submitted my Personal Narrative Questions (PNQ). Right now, my application is being reviewed by the Qualifications Evaluation Panel (QEP), which considers my resume, FSWE score, and PNQ responses to determine if I'll be invited to an oral interview. Passing the SCNL telephone test gives bonus points at this stage, but if I failed that test, I wouldn't be docked anything. The examining committee told all of us who passed the FSWE that the QEP results should be out by mid-October, but I'm guessing it'll be late September based on the way the last few test cycles have gone.

There are many excellent blogs written by current Foreign Service Officers (FSOs). But a lot of them include details about their political views, family life, and other information that makes the blogs more personal and less about the foreign service.

This blog will be about the foreign service.

The Yahoo group is an excellent resource, but also heavily bogged down with questions that a quick search of the State Department website would have answered.

I currently work as an attorney in a civil litigation firm. I am very happy with my job, but I'm also very interested in the foreign service. And there's no guarantee that I'll get hired by State. If I don't, this blog will end. But if I end up on the FS path, this will be a nice way to keep track of my experiences and how I felt at the different stages. And if some passerby who's looking for FS information gets something out of it along the way, all the better.

So thanks for reading, and here I go publishing my first post...