Senior Database Engineer II

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Job Overview

We are seeking a Senior Database Engineer to join our dynamic team of 100+ software engineers, designers, project managers, and specialists who are passionate about building innovative, high-quality solutions. Our work spans a wide range of impactful and forward-thinking technologies, including:

• Advanced algorithms for computer-adaptive testing

• Highly scalable, high-performance distributed systems

• Comprehensive learning management systems

• Universally accessible user interfaces

• AI-driven scoring and assessment tools

Job Responsibilities

• Develop state-of-the-art database solutions to meet the stringent performance, scalability, and integrity needs of high‑transaction systems

• Design database schema based on data modeling of business requirements and entities

• Write stored procedures, functions, views, triggers, constraints, etc.

• Create deployment and rollback scripts for all database objects manually or auto‑generated

• Analyze access patterns and propose the best combination of indexes, constraints, foreign keys, and queries

• Troubleshoot performance problems and propose short‑term fixes and long‑term solutions

• Work with architects and drive developers in the future evolution of the data layer, researching options and developing prototypes before eventual introduction into the tech stack

• Stay current with evolving databases, AWS, microservices, and cloud‑native technologies; prototype new tools/features for adoption.

Job Requirements

• B.S. in Computer Science (or related field) and 5+ years related experience or M.S. degree and 3+ years of experience.

• 5+ years of hands‑on SQL Server development experience.

• Expert knowledge of all aspects of SQL Server including the ability to write and deploy effective triggers, stored procedures, and user‑defined functions.

• Authoritative understanding of SQL Server concurrency features, transactions, and locking; excellent data modeling and schema design skills, including normalization and denormalization.

• Thorough understanding of best practices for database maintenance, including index and file management, backups, failure recovery, database defragmentation, documentation; ability to analyze disk space requirements and hardware utilization, automate error notification.

• Basic SQL Server administration skills, such as backups, restores, snapshots, user/role security, access permissions.

• Experience operating SQL Server in AWS:
Amazon RDS for SQL Server, RDS Custom, or SQL Server on EC2.

• Familiarity with AWS microservices architecture: designing databases to support a microservice‑based application.

• Experience optimizing data access from microservices (e.g., minimizing cross‑service latency, designing efficient APIs, minimizing coupling).

• Knowledge of containerization (Docker), orchestration (Kubernetes, AWS ECS/EKS) in microservices context.

Why Work With Us?

• Our systems are highly scaled and mission critical, serving over a third of all students in grades 3‑8 in the United States.

• Our web applications are highly interactive and universally accessible.

• Our machine scoring methods are driven by artificial intelligence, allowing computers to perform complex grading tasks more accurately than humans.

• Our processes use intensive algorithmic computing, enabling a customized experience as the exam adapts in real time based on answers given.

In the 2024 school year, we delivered more than 126 million online tests, and successfully supported peak testing volumes exceeding 1.5 million simultaneous test takers.

Remote First Work Environment

Our Remote First approach gives employees the flexibility and trust they need to effectively balance work with life. It creates a culture in which all employees are valued and where success is measured in results, allowing us to work collaboratively, inclusively, and for greater positive impact regardless of individual locations.

If you will be working remotely, either occasionally or on a permanent basis, you must have a reliable internet connection through a cable or fiber‑optic broadband service with minimum speeds of 10 Mbps…