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Principal Software Engineer
Principal Software EngineerModern Classrooms Project • Washington, DC, US
Principal Software Engineer

Principal Software Engineer

Modern Classrooms Project • Washington, DC, US
30+ days ago
Job type
  • Full-time
Job description

Job Description

Job Description

Start Date : ASAP

Role Type : Full-Time, Salaried

Background : Software Development

Location : Remote, USA-based (up to 10% of travel)

Salary : $150,000-175,000 per year, plus benefits

Who We Are :

The Modern Classrooms Project is a fast-growing 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that empowers educators to build classrooms that respond to every student’s needs. Founded by two award-winning teachers, we lead a movement of educators in implementing a self-paced, mastery-based instructional model that leverages technology to foster human connection, authentic learning, and social-emotional growth.

To date, our free online course and Virtual Mentorship Program have empowered almost 100,000 educators in 150+ countries. We’ve partnered with schools and districts nationwide to train and support both teachers and administrators, and researchers from Johns Hopkins University found “overwhelming positive support” for our approach. We are an ambitious, idealistic team and we are passionate about what we do.

Who We Are :

The Modern Classrooms Project (MCP) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that empowers educators to build classrooms that respond to every student’s needs.  Founded by two award-winning teachers, we lead a movement of educators in implementing a self-paced, mastery-based instructional model that leverages technology to foster human connection, authentic learning, and social-emotional growth.

To date, we have reached over 70,000+ teachers through our free online course and 20,000+ teachers through our Virtual Mentorship Program from over 200 school, district, and state partners. We are an ambitious, idealistic team led by former classroom teachers, and we are passionate about what we do.

Job Description - Why we need you!

For the past seven years, we have empowered educators to use technology more effectively. We haven’t created tech tools of our own, but instead helped teachers make better use of the tools they already have.

Over time, however, we’ve realized the limitations of existing tools - and have developed our own ideas for easy-to-use tech products that will help teachers implement self-paced, mastery-based instruction in their own classrooms. We have now secured funding to build out a team that will develop these tools.

We need an experienced, hands-on Principal Software Engineer to transform our product vision into reality. You will be a foundational member of our new technical team, taking the lead on front-end and full stack web application development and creating the intuitive, powerful tools that will directly support educators and students every day.

In developing tech tools that solve the problems our teachers face every day, we see an opportunity to make these teachers more effective, while making our evidence-based model more accessible to any educator who wants to help all of their students succeed. And we need you to help us make that happen.

Key Responsibilities

As Principal Software Engineer, you will be the technical lead for web application development—driving architecture, quality, accessibility, and performance for classroom-ready tools. You will report to the Head of Engineering and collaborate closely with the Chief Innovation Officer to ship features that make a real difference for students and educators.

While you’ll start out as the principal software developer working mostly independently, our plan is to build a high-quality tech team over time.

You will :

  • Build new customer-facing products and features for our suite of educational technology software.
  • Develop elegant front-end user experiences and back-end APIs, with a primary focus on TypeScript and reactive web frameworks (Angular, Next.js, RxJS).
  • Collaborate with the Head of Engineering and Chief Innovation Officer to translate user needs and product requirements into technical solutions.
  • Adapt, integrate, and migrate legacy codebases into our modern unified education platform.
  • Write clean, high-quality, and elegant code, adopting, establishing, and championing best practices for the engineering team.
  • Contribute to the team's software and architecture, including application and infrastructure development, and deployment of core software platforms and tools.

It would also be helpful if :

  • You have experience working in a startup-like environment.
  • You are comfortable wearing multiple hats, communicating and collaborating with non-technical stakeholders, independently balancing and managing your own work while assuming a high degree of autonomy and personal responsibility.
  • You have strong full-stack development skills and are proficient in deploying software, SaaS tooling and infrastructure (Cloudflare, GitHub Actions, Google Cloud, Firebase, PostHog, Railway, Temporal, Vercel).
  • You have experience building tech products that effectively leverage AI.
  • You have experience integrating with education LMS and identity providers (Canvas, Clever, Google Classroom, Schoology, Moodle).
  • You have experience structuring deterministic LLM responses through programmatic prompt and context engineering.
  • You have experience implementing edtech open standards (Common Cartridge, Learning Tools Interoperability, OneRoster).
  • You have experience handling sensitive and / or confidential data, particularly in an education context (COPPA, CIPA, FERPA, PPRA, SOC 2).

    • You should apply if :

  • You're a builder. You have a track record of building amazing things. You welcome ideas but seek real solutions, creating prototypes to test your assumptions and investing the time to make sure things work well.
  • You are a front-end expert. You have deep experience in modern front-end web application development across multiple frameworks. You are passionate about crafting intuitive and responsive user interfaces.
  • You love to learn. You're actively leveraging the latest developments in AI and applying them to enhance both your and others' work. You're also motivated by MCP's mission and vision, and eager to build teacher- and student-facing products.
  • You're a team player. You have experience collaborating with vendors, contractors, and staff engineers in order to build products on time and within budget. You enjoy sharing your knowledge and helping your teammates grow.
  • You want to shape the world. You're motivated to be part of something larger than yourself. You believe that the highest value of your talent is using it to empower others. You're ready to make a real difference in educators' and young people's lives.

    • Compensation and Benefits

    We offer a competitive compensation package, as well as the opportunity to work in a fast-growing nonprofit that is on a mission to improve education worldwide.  This includes :

  • Salaried Position : $150,000-$175,000 per year
  • Employer-sponsored health insurance through CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield
  • Participation in Vanguard 403(b) deferred-compensation plan with 3% employer match
  • Paid Time Off, inclusive of : vacation / PTO (20 days), paid holidays, paid parental leave, sick and safe paid time off, "Me Days", and the ability to earn paid Comp time off
  • Annual budget for MCP-funded Continuous Learning for the program(s) you request (available after 6 months of continuous full-time employment)
  • FSA and Dependent Care FSA access
  • 1x Salary Life Insurance company-paid coverage
  • Access to Wishbone Pet Insurance Benefit
  • Ability to work remotely and to set own hours (within reason)

    • ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    STATEMENT OF NON-DISCRIMINATION : The Modern Classrooms Project is committed to equal employment opportunity. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, gender, disability, age, religion, sexual orientation, nationality, or ethnicity. We are strongly committed to hiring a diverse team and encourage applications from traditionally under-represented backgrounds.

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    Principal Software Engineer • Washington, DC, US