Systems Engineer at NextGen Federal Systems
Washington
—
Jul 29, 2026
Washington
Sep 25, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A systems engineer role supporting a DHS/CBP aerostat radar surveillance program (TARS) through design, integration, testing, and sustainment of complex hardware and software systems. The work spans requirements analysis, configuration management, technical documentation, and cross-functional coordination with engineering, logistics, and operations teams. Suited to candidates with a defense or government systems engineering background and the ability to obtain a CBP background investigation.
Mid level · 4+ years · Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV · Secret clearance · Full-time
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How this req sits in the market our data
What the occupation pays Median $129,834 (middle half $101,882–$164,857).
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Aug 1, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (7)
The clearance requirement is a CBP Background Investigation (positive adjudication required). This is a DHS/CBP-specific investigation rather than a standard DoD clearance tier; it is mapped to Secret as the closest equivalent, but candidates should note it is CBP-specific.
The degree requirement is a Bachelor's in systems/computer/electrical engineering or related field, but the posting explicitly accepts 'significant systems engineering experience in a government or defense-related environment' in lieu of a degree, so no minimum degree is flagged as a hard gate.
The 4-year minimum experience requirement is stated for a cluster of skills (DoD/DHS environments, lifecycle processes, configuration management) rather than for a single named technology; it is captured as the overall role-level experience floor.
Radar systems, simulation systems, and ISR platforms are explicitly labeled 'preferred' in the posting.
'Systems engineering' and 'systems lifecycle processes' are retained as required skills here because they are named as concrete domain competencies gated in the requirements section, even though they are not discrete software tools.
Ignored 2 non-technology phrase(s) as skills (responsibilities/concepts, not named tools): systems engineering, configuration management.
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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