Senior AI/ML Engineer - DoD Secure AI/IL4/IL5

Ignite Digital Federal Services; Chesapeake (VA); Hybrid; USD 135,000 - 165,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive pay and PTO

Education stipends

U.S. federal government projects

Volunteer/community engagement

Growth opportunities

Supportive management

Job summary

You will work in DoD/IC environments (IL4/IL5), collaborate with cross‑functional teams, and ensure governance, security and deployment through CI/CD pipelines. Requires 7+ years in AI/ML and data engineering, Python/SQL, and active DoD SECRET clearance; salary around $150k+.

Qualifications

• 7+ years of hands-on experience in AI/ML model development and data engineering.
• Proficiency with Python, SQL, cloud services (Azure, AWS GovCloud), and AI/ML frameworks (PyTorch, TensorFlow, Scikit-learn).
• Experience building and deploying ML models in secure DoD/IC environments.
• Experience supporting Navy, NAVWAR, NIWC, or related Defense organizations.
• Understanding of DevSecOps pipelines, CI/CD, security scanning, and automated deployment.
• Excellent communication skills and ability to work with mission users and technical SMEs.
• Experience with semantic layer development, analytics pipelines, or operational decisions-support systems.

Responsibilities

• Architect, build, and deploy AI/ML models within DoD-aligned environments (IL4/IL5).
• Execute end-to-end data science workflows: data ingestion, cleansing, feature engineering, model development, and deployment.
• Develop secure cloud-native pipelines using Azure ML, Snowflake Cortex AI, Databricks or similar platforms.
• Implement model governance, versioning, lineage, and audit controls per Navy security requirements.
• Collaborate with Forward Deployed Engineers, data engineers, DevSecOps, and Navy stakeholders to operationalize AI/ML capabilities.
• Support automation of analytics workflows, dashboards, semantic layers, and predictive models for decision support.
• Coordinate with cybersecurity teams to comply with Navy security, classification, SCIF, and DD254 requirements.

Skills

AI/ML development

Data engineering

Python

SQL

Cloud services

CI/CD

Communication

DoD environment

Education

Bachelor's degree

Master's preferred

Tools

PyTorch

TensorFlow

Scikit-learn

Snowflake AI Data Cloud

Cortex AI

Databricks

Advana/Jupiter

Job description

You will work in DoD/IC environments (IL4/IL5), collaborate with cross‑functional teams, and ensure governance, security and deployment through CI/CD pipelines. Requires 7+ years in AI/ML and data engineering, Python/SQL, and active DoD SECRET clearance; salary around $150k+.