About this opportunity
MITRE lists this Data Scientist opportunity in mclean, Virginia. Review the employer’s description below for duties, qualifications and application requirements.
Job description
Life-cycle cost estimating
At MITRE, your passion fuels work that impacts our nation and improves lives. This is where your skills strengthen national security, cybersecurity, health, transportation, and citizen services. We’re a nonprofit engineering, applied research, and advanced technology organization working in the public interest. With objectivity and integrity at our core, we lead federally funded research and development centers for U.S. government agencies – collaborating with industry and academia to deliver integrated, high-impact solutions that advance our nation’s health, security, and prosperity. Our people tackle the toughest technical challenges, supported by competitive benefits, meaningful career development, and a culture of innovation, collaboration, and technical excellence. Choose MITRE for a career with purpose — and help shape the future.
Department Summary
We are seeking a Senior Data Scientist for MITRE’s Acquisition Affordability and Business Analytics Department within the MITRE Technology and Engineering Acquisition Division. Our team partners across the FFRDC and with government partners to solve complex mission and business challenges through advanced analytics, economic modeling, and decision support capabilities.
Our work spans:
Cost Estimation and Analysis
Strategic Business & Financial Analytics
Investment Economics & Decision Analysis
MITRE is hiring experienced analysts to help expand and mature our business analytic and data science capability in support of a diverse set of internal and external sponsors. The work requires engagement with sponsors and multidisciplinary teams to frame analytic problems, identify and prioritize tasks, and report findings to support strategic and operational decision‑making. The ideal candidate will demonstrate strong analytical thinking, intellectual curiosity, effective communication skills, and the ability to translate complex data into compelling insights that drive action and mission impact.
The role covers the full analytic lifecycle, including:
Identifying, sourcing, integrating, and validating complex datasets
Exploring and cleaning structured and unstructured data
Applying statistical methods, predictive models, and analytic techniques to derive insights from data
Interpreting findings within the context of relevant policies, regulations, budgets, and broader political or operational environments
Translating technical analyses into meaningful conclusions and recommendations for stakeholders
Developing analytic tools, dashboards, or reusable capabilities to support ongoing decision-making
Delivering findings through written reports, presentations, and in‑person briefings to technical and non‑technical audiences
In addition to core data science activities, this position supports broader department capabilities that apply analytic rigor to sponsor problems across cost, economic, and business domains.
Work may include:
Life‑cycle cost estimating
Tradeoff and affordability analyses
Decision analysis
Portfolio investment analysis
Business case analysis
Business intelligence and performance analytics
Candidates should expect a dynamic and collaborative environment where tasks are rarely routine and often require innovative and adaptive approaches. Successful team members are comfortable working across multiple projects simultaneously, operating with limited structure or supervision, and engaging directly with sponsors to solve complex, ambiguous problems.
Roles & Responsibilities
Assist in identifying sources of information and gathering a wide range of quantitative and qualitative data to support decisions that have implications for MITRE and its government sponsors
Apply analysis skills, including exploratory data analysis, time series analysis, linear regression, text analysis, and machine learning
Draw conclusions from analyses and clearly and concisely articulate key findings in both written and verbal form
Assist in developing data visualization products that improve the presentation of complex data sets and analyses
Translate unstructured data and nontraditional sources of information into business insights
Support investment, economic, and decision analyses, including business case analyses, cost/benefit analyses, analysis‑of‑alternatives, and portfolio analysis
Support strategic business and financial analyses, including but not limited to economic studies, cost recovery strategies, budget development & planning, and affordability analysis
Assess government and industry cost estimates and economic analyses
Receives guidance, instruction, and direction from more senior staff while independently identifying and elevating relevant issues, risks, findings, or opportunities to senior team members.
Basic Qualifications
Typically requires a minimum of 5 years of related experience with a Bachelor's degree or 3 years and a Master's Degree in Operations Research, Mathematics, Statistics, Economics, Finance, Data Analytics, Data Science, Systems Engineering, or other engineering or quantitative analysis field
Proficient in python or R for data science and modeling
Proficient with code environment management and versioning (e.g.., Git, IDEs)
Ability to retrieve and work with data from remote data sources such as databases, APIs, and cloud‑based data lakes using standard analytical tools and programming languages
Proficient in data processing, exploratory data analysis, and work with both structured and unstructured data sources
Proficient at machine learning and natural language processing, including model tuning, computer vision, time‑series analysis, and related packages (e.g., scikit‑learn)
Ability to leverage AI as a responsible augmentation to work, including judgement when to validate and tune LLM outputs
Experience with data visualization approaches and software, including PowerBI, Tableau, Qlik, and visual development through leaflet, R Shiny, plotly, seaborn, ggplot, or other packages
Proficient at use of statistical methods including regressions, forecasting, and hypothesis testing
Excellent written and verbal communication skills
Proficient with MS Office Suite, especially Excel, Word, and PowerPoint
Must be eligible to obtain and maintain a Top Secret U.S Government issued Security Clearance. Per the U.S. Government’s eligibility requirements, you must be a U.S Citizen to be considered for a security clearance.
This position requires a minimum of 4 days a week on‑site
Preferred Qualifications
Master’s in Economics, Mathematics, Statistics, Finance, Business, Operations Research, Data Analytics, Data Science, Systems Engineering, or other engineering field
Proficiency in additional programming languages including SQL or java
Familiarity with data engineering and orchestration methods (e.g., APIs, LLM endpoint management)
Familiarity with software engineering best practices and agile devops software development processes
Experience with econometric/economic modeling and analysis
Working knowledge of federal budgeting and spending mechanics, processes, and data.Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution (PPBE) and OMB Circular A-11
Acquisition reform and PPBE reform initiatives
Federal Acquisition Regulations
Capital Planning and Investment Control (CPIC)
Federal spending data, including: USASpending.gov, SAM.gov, or FPDS-NG
Investment modeling and analysis, cost benefit analysis, experience in handling large datasets for data driven analysis, policy and investment analysis, and economic analysis in support of regulatory policy, pre- and post‑implementation analysis, forecasting, and applied research
Expertise and experience with data engineering and cloud computing (i.e., Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure)
Cost estimating experience, including development of Independent Government Cost Estimates (IGCEs) or use of parametric cost estimating tools (PRICE, SEER SEM, etc.)
Source selection cost evaluation experience
ICEAA Certification or Defense Acquisition Workforce Initiative Act (DAWIA) certification desired
Possess an active Top Secret level security clearance
This requisition requires the candidate to have a minimum of the following clearance(s):
None
This requisition requires the hired candidate to have or obtain, within one year from the date of hire, the following clearance(s):
Top Secret
Salary compensation range and midpoint
$124,400 - $155,500 - $186,600 Annual
Work Location Type
Onsite
It is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability.
Commitment to Non-Discrimination
All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to disability, status as a protected veteran or any other status protected by applicable federal, state, local or international law.
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Benefits information may be found here.
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Worksite address
mclean, VA, 22107, US
Who can apply
Review the original listing for work authorization, qualifications and employer requirements.