Senior Data Engineer: Scalable DBs for ML & Data Science

Penn State University; University Park (TX); On-site; USD 122,000 - 266,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

75% tuition discount

Comprehensive benefits

Job summary

Penn State University in State College, PA or Reston, VA seeks a Senior Data Engineer to design scalable, high-performance data systems supporting data science and ML initiatives with strong PostgreSQL emphasis.

You will partner with data scientists to optimize data access, evaluate multiple databases, and lead data pipelines for structured and unstructured data used in model development.

Qualifications

• 5+ years in data engineering or related roles.
• Expert PostgreSQL: schema design, indexing, partitioning, replication.
• Experience with non-relational databases.
• Familiarity with ML workflows and data consumption for training and evaluation.
• Cloud database experience (AWS/GCP/Azure).
• SQL and Python proficiency.

Responsibilities

• Design and maintain scalable, high-performance database solutions for data science workflows.
• Partner with data scientists to optimize data access and storage strategies.
• Serve as SME on PostgreSQL including design, indexing, partitioning, and query tuning.
• Evaluate/ integrate other databases (MongoDB, Cassandra, Neo4j, Redis, DynamoDB) when advantageous.
• Lead data pipelines for structured and unstructured data used in model development.
• Ensure data integrity, security, and governance across storage systems.
• Implement monitoring, automation, and performance tuning for all database environments.
• Advise on data lifecycle management balancing R&D needs with compliance.

Skills

PostgreSQL

Data modeling

Query optimization

SQL

Python

Cloud DBs

Collaboration

ML workflows

Education

Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in CS / Data Eng

Tools

MongoDB

Cassandra

Neo4j

Redis

DynamoDB

AWS RDS/Aurora

GCP Cloud SQL

Azure Database

Job description

Penn State University in State College, PA or Reston, VA seeks a Senior Data Engineer to design scalable, high-performance data systems supporting data science and ML initiatives with strong PostgreSQL emphasis.

You will partner with data scientists to optimize data access, evaluate multiple databases, and lead data pipelines for structured and unstructured data used in model development.