Drupal Frontend Engineer

Job Description

Client requires the services of a contractor Web Developer with strong Drupal expertise to support the development, maintenance, and modernization of District government websites, including DC.gov and associated agency digital properties.

Contract w2/1099/C2C

• Design, develop, and maintain Drupal-based websites supporting DC.gov and District agency platforms.
• Build and customize Drupal modules, themes, content types, taxonomies, and views per agency requirements.
• Perform Drupal core and contributed module updates, security patches, and version migrations (e.g., Drupal 7 to Drupal 10/11).
• Integrate Drupal sites with enterprise systems, APIs, and third‑party services.
• Ensure deliverables comply with Section 508, WCAG 2.1 AA, and District web standards.
• Apply web security best practices consistent with Client and federal cybersecurity guidelines.
• Collaborate with Client project managers, UX designers, content strategists, and agency stakeholders.
• Produce technical documentation, code comments, and operational runbooks.
• Provide Tier 3 production support and participate in deployment activities, including occasional after‑hours work.

• Strong command of semantic HTML5: sectioning elements, heading hierarchy, lists, tables, and forms.
• Solid grasp of web accessibility (WCAG 2.1 AA): ARIA roles and attributes, keyboard navigation, focus management, alt text, and accessible form labeling.
• Familiarity with structured data and SEO markup: meta tags, Open Graph, Twitter cards, and Schema.org/JSON‑LD.
• Understanding of how Drupal renders markup through Twig, and the ability to produce clean, valid output via template overrides.

• Deep working knowledge of modern CSS layout:
  Flexbox and CSS Grid, with sound judgment about when to use each.
• Proficiency with responsive design: media queries, fluid typography, container queries, and mobile‑first methodology.
• Command of the cascade, specificity, and inheritance, with the ability to debug specificity conflicts rather than using "!important".
• Comfort with CSS custom properties (variables), modern color/spacing tokens, and maintainable theming patterns.
• Awareness of cross‑browser compatibility, vendor prefixing strategy, and progressive enhancement.

• Strong SCSS/SASS skills: nesting, mixins, functions, partials, and a disciplined file architecture.
• A consistent CSS methodology such as BEM, and an understanding of how it maps onto Drupal's class conventions.
• Familiarity with CSS transitions, transforms, and animations, used with attention to performance and reduced‑motion preferences.

• Solid command of modern JavaScript (ES6+): arrow functions, destructuring, modules, promises, and async/await.
• Strong DOM manipulation and event‑handling skills, including event delegation and performance‑conscious listeners.
• Fluency with the Fetch API and asynchronous data handling, including JSON parsing and error handling.
• Working knowledge of Drupal's JavaScript layer:
  Drupal.behaviors, once(), drupal
  
  Settings, and the AJAX framework.
• Understanding of how to attach and scope JS correctly through the Libraries API rather than inline scripts.
• Familiarity with debugging via browser Dev Tools: breakpoints, the network panel, performance profiling, and the console.

• Awareness of frontend performance: deferring/async loading, minimizing reflows, debouncing/throttling, and avoiding render‑blocking scripts.
• Experience with a build/tooling pipeline (Webpack, Vite, or Gulp) and with linting/formatting (ESLint, Prettier, Stylelint).
• Exposure to a modern framework (React/Vue) is a plus, particularly for decoupled or partially decoupled Drupal frontends.