Senior Software Engineer

Your Role

The Senior Software Engineer for Ignite Reading is responsible for leading software development projects in support of scaling Ignite to serve at least 1,00,000 students.

Ignite Reading uses technology to enable the delivery of our virtual tutoring services, maximize the learning of our students, and accelerate our ability to scale. To this end, the product is focused on four key technology needs: 

1. A tutoring logistics platform, which enables us to schedule, conduct and report on our tutoring sessions. 
2. A tutor workflow platform, which lets tutors know exactly what to teach each student every day. 
3. An extended learning application, which enables students to practice what they learn in their tutoring sessions after they return to the classroom or go home at night. 
4. An AI/ML implementation, which will enable us to ensure lesson fidelity as we scale. 

Key Responsibilities

• Assessing the state of technical needs and platforms across the organization. 
• Designing, testing, and developing key software projects, building and optimizing solutions to meet the short and long term needs of Ignite Reading. 
• Partnering with tutoring, academic, and operations teams to create and deliver solutions that meet the needs of internal and external customers. 
• Meeting or exceeding project timelines and deliverables. 
• Ensuring consistent functionality with Ignite Reading platforms. 
• Supporting the development of the engineering function at Ignite Reading. 
• Providing a continuous feedback loop on the customer experience in order to drive innovative program solutions and improvements. 

Qualifications

• 7+ years of pragmatic, real-world experience as a software engineer. 
• In-depth knowledge of modern web development technologies, OOP languages, and relational databases. Our first product has been built using Ruby on Rails 7, Hotwire, Tailwind, and Postgres all deployed in Heroku. Candidates with experience in similar web tech stack (Python/Django, JavaScript/Node, PHP/Laravel, Java/Spring, .NET, etc.) are highly encouraged to apply. 
• Product focused. You utilize product management methodologies and have the ability to understand the needs of our users and translate those needs into prioritized product features. 
• Quality focused. You maintain high standards of code and lead thoughtful application design to ensure platform performance, uptime, and scale, and have excellent debugging and optimization skills. 
• An orientation to collaboration
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills. 
• Exceptional organizational, project management and time management skills 
• Experience at early stage startups is a plus 
• Ability to be self-managing and flexible while working in a remote environment 
• Ability to roll up your sleeves and do whatever it takes to get the job done while balancing long-term projects with the urgency of immediate demands in a fast-paced startup environment. 
• Experience with Test-Driven Development (TDD) and Pair-programming a plus. 

At Ignite Reading, we’ve decided to embrace a transparent compensation structure for a few reasons:

To promote fairness and equity: This approach supports fairness within our structure. When everyone knows how compensation decisions are made, it reduces the likelihood of pay discrimination based on factors like gender, race, relationships, or negotiation skills. 

To provide accountability for our approach: The same role receives the same compensation, with no negotiation.

Salary: $170,000 - $200,000