Associate Agile Developer in Test

Our client is looking for an Associate Agile Developer in Test for a contract opportunity located in Phoenix, AZ.

Position & Schedule Overview

• Position Title: Associate Agile Developer in Test (SDET Intern / Recent Graduate)
• Location: Phoenix, Arizona (Hybrid)
• Hours: 20-40 hours/week (flexible around college class schedules)
• Duration: 6-month internship
• Work Model: Hybrid (First 2-3 days onsite for onboarding, followed by once a month in-office; remaining time is remote)

Quality is a shared responsibility across our teams-we are actively modernizing our test strategy to shift-left and increase automation coverage earlier in the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC). In this role, you will help with release verification while contributing to our automation strategy by designing, building, and delivering test cases. You'll work alongside developers, QA engineers, and Dev Ops partners to improve system reliability and reduce manual regression effort.

Key Responsibilities

• Release Verification: Support release verification activities (smoke/regression validation, release readiness checks, documenting results).
• Test Design: Create, review, and maintain test cases aligned to user stories, acceptance criteria, and risk areas.
• Test Automation: Build and expand automated test suites using Java, JUnit, Selenium, and Cucumber (BDD).
• Shift-Left Collaboration: Partner with developers early in the development cycle to clarify requirements/edge cases, identify test scenarios up front, and establish automated quality gates.
• Framework Maintenance: Improve test assets and automation framework components (page objects, step definitions, test data utilities, and reusable helpers).
• Defect Triage: Help analyze test failures and contribute to defect triage with clear reproduction steps, logs, screenshots, and root-cause hints.
• Documentation: Contribute to documentation and continuous process improvement (test strategy notes, coverage tracking, and regression checklists).

• Education: Current college student (Undergraduate or Master's) or a recent graduate in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Systems, or a related field.
• Target Experience: Current college student or very recent graduate looking for hands-on, real-world development and test automation experience.
• Core Programming: Working knowledge of Java and Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) concepts (coursework or personal projects are acceptable); familiarity with Spring Boot is a plus.
• Software Testing: Basic understanding of software testing concepts, including Unit Testing (e.g., JUnit) and the defect lifecycle.
• Databases & Scripting: Foundational SQL database querying skills (Oracle or MongoDB exposure is a plus) and basic scripting knowledge in at least one language (Bash/Shell, Power Shell, or Python).
• Tools & Agile: Exposure to build tools like Maven and comfort working collaboratively in an Agile environment.
• Work Authorization: Candidates must be currently authorized to work in the United States without requiring visa sponsorship now or in the future.

• CI/CD & Dev Ops: Exposure to continuous integration tools (Jenkins, Git Hub Actions) and artifact repositories (Nexus).
• Cloud & Containers: Basic familiarity with Docker or Kubernetes.
• Automation Tools: Exposure to Cucumber (BDD/Gherkin) and Selenium UI automation principles (locators, page objects).
• Performance Testing: Fundamentals of performance/load testing (e.g., JMeter, Load Runner) to analyze response times and throughput bottlenecks.
• Application Security: Basic theoretical understanding of application security concepts, the OWASP Top 10, or security scanning tools (e.g., OWASP ZAP, Burp Suite, Veracode).
• AI & Innovation: Interes…