Staff Software Engineer

Staff Software Engineer Location: Remote Reports to : Vice President of Engineering & AI Employment Type: Exempt / Full-Time About StrongMind StrongMind is a remote-first education and technology company on a mission to transform learning for students, families, and educators across the country. For more than 25 years, we’ve partnered with schools and districts to deliver innovative, student-centered learning experiences powered by technology, compassion, and bold thinking. We believe education should be flexible, human, and built for real life. That belief shapes how we design our products, support our partners, and work together as a team. At StrongMind, you’ll find smart people doing meaningful work, a culture rooted in trust and accountability, and leaders who genuinely care about both outcomes and people. The Team You Will Join You’ll be part of StrongMind’s Engineering organization, collaborating closely with Product Managers, Engineering Managers, and Principal Engineers across multiple product teams. This group is responsible for building scalable, reliable, and increasingly AI-enabled learning systems that support educators and students nationwide. The team culture is innovative, collaborative, and growth-oriented. You’ll have opportunities to influence engineering practices, advance AI-enabled product development, and shape shared technical patterns while partnering across StrongMind to deliver meaningful educational outcomes. The Difference You Will Make In this role, your work will directly impact learners, educators, and internal teams by shaping how StrongMind designs, builds, and operates AI-enabled products and systems. You’ll help translate product vision into scalable, maintainable architectures, elevate engineering quality and developer experience, and ensure AI is thoughtfully integrated into both our products and our development workflows. Your leadership will accelerate delivery while improving long-term system health and product impact. A Typical Day Looks Like While no two days are exactly the same, you can expect to: Lead design reviews and implementation for larger, cross-cutting efforts; set technical direction within a scope Establish reusable patterns—service templates, libraries, guardrails, and default configurations—that multiple teams adopt Drive refactors and reliability improvements that measurably reduce recurring defects and incident volume Introduce data contracts, validation gates, and coordinated migrations that align shared entities and ownership Improve performance practices by introducing dashboards, benchmarks, and post-incident systemic fixes; coach others on effective use of AI-assisted tools Introduce security and privacy guardrails (secure templates, CI checks, safer defaults) that reduce recurring findings across the team Lead team-level planning: establish shared expectations for breakdown, sizing, and sequencing; surface risks early and keep work flowing Create communication norms (design/decision docs, incident comms templates) and mentoring structures (onboarding plans, buddy systems) that scale the team Unblock teammates on hard technical problems and advocate for scope decisions in product terms This position requires availability to work core business hours of 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM Arizona time, Monday through Friday. This role balances deep technical execution, product thinking, and cross-team influence and is well-suited for someone who enjoys building impactful systems, elevating engineering craft, and integrating emerging technologies into real products. Your Expertise Includes We’re looking for someone who brings: 5+ years of professional software engineering experience shipping production code Extensive experience designing, building, and operating production software systems at scale Track record of setting technical direction for a team or major system and shipping the associated outcomes Demonstrated ability to establish shared patterns, templates, or guardrails that other engineers adopt Strong system design skills—scaling patterns, reliability controls (timeouts, retries, backpressure, caching), and first-class observability Experience leading refactors, deprecations, or modernization efforts that reduce long-term cost of change Proven ability to influence engineering direction across multiple teams through writing, reviews, and coaching Strong cross-functional partnership skills with Product, Design, and Engineering Management Excellent written and verbal communication, including decision docs, design summaries, and incident follow-ups Alignment with StrongMind's core values: Kindness, Accountability, Collaboration, Innovation, and Grit Bonus points if you also have: Experience shaping AI-enabled or data-intensive platforms, or establishing applied AI development standards Deep experience with AWS or a comparable cloud and distributed systems Experience improving developer experience, CI/CD, or internal platform capabilities EdTech or mission-driven product experience Experience introducing privacy-by-design or secure-SDLC practices across a team Our Commitment to Inclusion & Belonging At StrongMind, we believe the best ideas come from bringing together people with different perspectives, experiences, and ways of thinking. A diverse and inclusive workplace fuels creativity, strengthens collaboration, and helps us build better solutions for the students, families, and communities we serve. We are committed to welcoming a broad range of talent and encouraging all qualified individuals to apply. We strive to create an environment where everyone feels a sense of belonging and is empowered to contribute, grow, and do meaningful work. How We’ll Take Care of You We believe that when people feel supported, they do their best work. At StrongMind, your well-being isn’t a perk—it’s part of our culture. Our commitment to you includes: A competitive total compensation package , including medical, dental, vision, and voluntary benefits Well-being that works for real life —from an on-site gym, virtual wellness programs, and wellness coaching to flexible work options for select roles, because your well-being fuels your brilliance Unlimited PTO for exempt roles , plus additional “life happens” days when you need flexibility A fully paid holiday week off at Christmas , so you can truly rest, reset, and reconnect Recognition and rewards that celebrate birthdays, meaningful milestones, legendary work, and community service hours that let you give back Quarterly Town Halls that keep communication transparent, honest, and human Annual social events and traditions we genuinely look forward to—like Halloween celebrations, Wellness Fairs, and other moments that bring our community together We’re intentional about building a workplace where people feel valued, connected, and empowered to thrive—at work and beyond. Additional Info We welcome all qualified candidates eligible to work in the United States. At this time, we are unable to sponsor visas. We are proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer and provide consideration to all applicants regardless of race, religion, color, sex, gender, national origin, age, veteran status, marital status, or disability protected by law.