Software Engineer, Backend

TrulyHired; United States; On-site; USD 173,000 - 200,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical/Dental + Orthodontics/Vision

401(k) Match

Flexible Paid Time Off

Monthly Technology Stipend

Home Office Setup Stipend

Professional Development Stipend

Paid Parental Leave

Volunteer Days

Diversity & Inclusion

Job summary

Seesaw is hiring a Senior Engineer for the Core Systems team to own backend development and large-scale infrastructure. You will work on HTTP APIs, data storage interactions, and cloud provisioning to ensure reliability and performance in classrooms worldwide.

You will lead cross-functional collaboration with product managers and engineers, driving architectural decisions, security, and cost optimization while delivering scalable, observable systems.

Qualifications

• 7+ years of backend development experience with durable systems thinking.
• Deep understanding of distributed systems concepts (eventual consistency, fan-in/fan-out, backpressure).
• Experience with AWS core services (EC2, Lambda, DynamoDB, S3, ECS/EKS) or similar.
• Proficient with CI/CD pipelines, preferably GitHub Actions.

Responsibilities

• Modify and diagnose code in the Python HTTP backend (Tornado) backed by Dynamo/Elasticsearch/Redis.
• Contribute to infrastructure-as-code repo for AWS provisioning.
• Reason about distributed systems to drive technical decisions.
• Own work from inception to production monitoring and alerting.
• Export best practices around code, tools, and observability to other teams.
• Ensure security and reliability of Seesaw's platform and address vulnerabilities.
• Optimize cloud infrastructure for cost-effectiveness.
• Help develop a technical roadmap and engineering culture.
• Partner with senior team members, product managers, and stakeholders to align infra with business goals.

Skills

Backend development

Distributed systems

AWS core services

CI/CD pipelines

Independent work

Infrastructure at scale

Job description

Software Engineer, Backend Full Description

About Us

Trusted and loved by 25 million educators, students, and families worldwide, Seesaw is the world's leading elementary learning experience company, offering an award-winning platform and a suite of digital curriculum products for teachers to deliver joyful, accessible instruction. Through interactive lessons, digital portfolios, and two-way communication features, Seesaw keeps everyone in the learning loop by providing continuous visibility into the student's learning experience to support and celebrate their learning.

Our Mission

Seesaw's mission is to provide every elementary student with joyful and connected learning experiences that lay the foundation for success in life.

Your Team

Seesaw provides a unique opportunity to impact the lives and learning of millions of students, educators, and parents in the US and across the world. The Core Systems team sits at the heart of the technology that powers the millions of interactions with our product every day, ensuring that the platform is reliable, available, performs well, and contributes meaningfully to learning in the classroom. The team is small and covers a broad surface area, so for high-performing and independent developers there is a vast potential for ownership and upward mobility by demonstrating high impact with their efforts. We value impact over effort, and work hard to preserve real work-life balance through our team culture and Seesaw's unique benefits.

Your Role

A Senior Engineer on the Core Systems team is expected to have a deep understanding of backend development and infrastructure at scale. This means expertise with the implementation of HTTP APIs, interaction of API code with data storage layers, infrastructure provisioning, and a thorough grasp on how software goes from being built by dozens of developers, tested, shipped, and run at scale with rock-solid reliability.

Your Responsibilities

• Modify, diagnose, and change code in our Python HTTP backend, which runs on Tornado and backed by data stored in Dynamo, Elasticsearch, and Redis.
• Contribute to our infrastructure-as-code repo, which is responsible for provisioning resources in AWS.
• Reason about distributed systems to drive good technical decision-making.
• Own technical work from the early stages of inception, to implementation, to production monitoring and alerting.
• Export best practices around code authoring, tool usage, and observability to other engineering teams at Seesaw.
• Ensure the security and reliability of Seesaw's platform, proactively identifying and addressing potential vulnerabilities and performance bottlenecks.
• Optimize cloud infrastructure for cost-effectiveness, leveraging best practices in resource management.
• Help develop a strong technical roadmap and engineering culture through design proposals, industry engagement, and more.
• Partner with senior team members, product managers, and other key stakeholders to drive strategic initiatives and align infrastructure development with business objectives.

Your Requirements

• 7+ years experience with backend development - durable systems-level thinking will always trump specific language experience.
• Thorough understanding of the mechanics of distributed systems - things like eventual consistency, fan-in fan-out patterns, backpressure, etc.
• Familiarity with AWS core services (EC2, Lambda, DynamoDB, S3, ECS/EKS) or similar cloud experience.
• Proficient with CI/CD pipelines, preferably Github Actions.
• Self-starter with an ability to execute independently, knowing when to stop and seek more information and when to forge ahead and boldly own your vision.
• Proven experience owning and operating the infrastructure that runs software at a high scale (think billions of incoming requests per month).

Compensation & Benefits

The annual hiring base salary for this position is: $172,500 - $200,000.

This is an Exempt position.

Benefits include: Medical/Dental + Orthodontics/Vision Coverage, 401(k) Match, Flexible Paid Time Off, Mindfulness First Fridays, Monthly Technology Stipend, Home Office Setup Stipend, Professional Development Stipend, Paid Parental Leave, Charitable Donation Matching, Volunteer Days.

Seesaw cares about building a diverse and inclusive team to better advocate for the needs of our incredibly diverse K-12 users.

We prioritize work-life balance and actually walk the walk - we care a lot about our work, but care more about our employee's well-being. We encourage everyone to work at a sustainable pace and have a flexible vacation policy that people actually use.

Seesaw provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, religious creed, color, sex, sex stereotype, gender, gender identity/gender expression/transgender, national origin, ancestry, physical or mental disability, medical condition, genetic information/characteristics, marital status/registered domestic partner status, age, sexual orientation, or military or veteran status. In addition to federal law requirements, Seesaw complies with applicable state and local laws governing nondiscrimination in employment in every location in which the company has facilities. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation, and training.

Seesaw is committed to protecting your personal data. Learn more about the personal information we collect, how we use it, and how to exercise your rights here: U.S. Privacy Notice.

Our company participates in E-Verify.