September 27, 2015

Dr. Dwaynya GoodsonOffice of the Chief Human Capital Officer1400 Independence Ave. SW Rm 3140 South BldgWashington, DC 20250

Dear Dr. Goodson:

This letter of recommendation is in very strong support of Mr. Steven Thompson, who is applying to your program. Steven interned for me in the USDA/FSIS Office of Data Integration and Food Protection (ODIFP) for four consecutive summers (2011-2015), and I am certain that he is an excellent candidate for a position within the Agency.

My original interest in hiring Steven came when I had the opportunity to hire an intern to write and edit scientific documentation from my data analysis projects. While several candidates initially appeared to have microbiology credentials better suited to the position, Steven captured my attention with an intriguing essay on a relatively obscure but important scientist (an essay he had written in pursuit of a previous internship). I was impressed with his initiative and his writing, and hired him as my intern. I was delighted to find that my instincts were on target, and Steven proved to be the most productive intern hired by FSIS for the summer 2011. I was very pleased to be able to hire him for subsequent summer internship positions.

With a relatively small amount of training, Steven readily learned and comprehended both basic and advanced scientific spreadsheet and graphing techniques. Given his background and expertise in biological illustration and graphics, the tasks I assigned to him involved preparing tables and graphs for: a) internal FSIS documents, b) scientific manuscripts intended for publication in peer-reviewed scientific journals, and c) PowerPoint slides and posters intended for presentations at national meetings. Steven efficiently and rapidly completed the assignments that I gave him. He never complained, even when changes in the data prompted me to have him completely redo an entire table or chart (often, more than once). I frequently assigned Steven projects that would have taken me at least 4 hours to complete, and he always completed them in half the time I would have had to invest in doing it myself. In fact, our working relationship is at a point where I can simply say, “do X” and I know it will be done efficiently.

Steven’s assistance resulted in generating multiple publication-worthy documents. In fact, he had sole responsibility for creating and formatting several poster presentations for both the 2012 and 2015 International Association for Food Protection meetings. One of these posters (PPT) is attached here as an example of his work. As a second example of Steven’s work, I have also attached a document (.DOC) for which I asked him to convert multiple vertical Excel/PowerPoint charts into horizontal Tableau charts (Tableau being used to create superior charts; see pages 36-63).

Steven has a pleasant manner about him: he is courteous and well-mannered while engaging with others in the Agency. He is eager to learn new techniques, constantly improving his skills. It is apparent that he has a very strong work ethic, and clearly was committed to the success of our operation. I think Steven realized the opportunity that his internships at FSIS presented, and he consistently demonstrated that he has a great deal to offer.

For all these reasons (and more), I strongly recommend Steven as a candidate for an appropriate position at USDA with no reservations whatsoever. If you have any questions, or if I can supplement this recommendation with additional commentary, please feel free to contact me.

Sincerely,

/S/

Stephen W. Mamber, Ph.D.Data AnalystOffice of Data Integration and Food ProtectionUSDA Food Safety and Inspection Service Mail Stop 3793, PP3, Room 9-145B 1400 Independence Avenue, SWWashington, DC 20250-3700202-690-6474202-690-6459 fax202-465-6156 cellSteve.Mamber@fsis.usda.gov