Near Space Network Systems Administrator & Mission Support Engineer / Space Communications Program
Peraton · Greenbelt, MD
$86,000–$138,000from the description
Jul 16, 2026
Greenbelt, MD
Jul 21, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
This role sits inside a 24/7 NASA operations center in Greenbelt, MD, where the engineer maintains and troubleshoots physical IT infrastructure — server racks, networking hardware, cabling, and user consoles — while also building and securing systems in a mixed government/contractor environment. Day-to-day work involves hands-on hardware support, time-sensitive incident resolution, and direct coordination with NASA civil servants and contractors across mission-critical activities including launch operations.
Senior level · 5+ years · Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV · Secret clearance · Full-time
“or” means any one of them counts — you don't need all of them.
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
How this req sits in the market our data
Most people in this occupation already list these. Still required — just not what gets you shortlisted.
What the occupation pays Median $128,188 (middle half $100,819–$156,589). This posting is about at that midpoint.
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Jul 28, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (9)
The role is titled 'Systems Administrator & Mission Support Engineer' with no seniority level in the title — advertised seniority is Unspecified. However, the required qualifications gate on 5 years with a BS/BA (or 9 years with an AA/AS), plus 4+ years supporting a varied user base and 2+ years in network data processing operations, supporting a Senior classification.
Degree requirement is marked None: the JD accepts equivalent experience in lieu of a degree (5 yrs with BS/BA vs. 9 yrs with AA/AS — experience substitutes for the higher degree).
A DoD Secret clearance is a hard gate: candidates must be able to obtain and maintain it, and must be US citizens.
SOC confidence is Medium: the role blends hands-on systems/network administration (15-1244) with hardware engineering and mission support analysis (15-1211). The primary day-to-day work — maintaining servers, racks, cabling, consoles, and Windows-based systems — leans toward 15-1244.
All tools listed under 'Desired Qualifications' (Active Directory, BitLocker, CloneZilla, SentinelOne, BigFix, PuTTY, ServiceNow/Maximo, Ubuntu, RedHat, BMC Remedy, Ansys STK, VeCOAX) are preferred, not required.
VeCOAX channel creators is a very niche product; it appears only under Desired Qualifications and has no common substitute — listed as preferred.
NASA RISCS appears only under Desired Qualifications alongside other preferred tools; it is a NASA-specific compliance/risk system with no common industry substitute and is omitted from the skills list as it is not a widely recognized named technology tool.
The overall years minimum of 5 reflects the minimum path (BS/BA + 5 years); the 9-year path applies only to candidates without a bachelor's degree.
Requires a Secret clearance — the cleared population is a small fraction of this occupation, so the real candidate pool is materially smaller than the estimate below, which does not model clearance.
Read the full posting
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