Scale AI

Software Engineer, Public Sector - New Grad

Scale AI • $124K — $162K *
Education, Government & Non-Profit
Less than 5 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • Graduating Fall 2026 or Spring 2027 in Computer Science, EECS, Computer Engineering, or Statistics.
  • Experience in product engineering, focusing on full-stack web applications and user interactions.
  • Previous experience in Product/Software Engineering internships.
  • Proven ability to deliver high-quality products and features at scale.
  • Expertise in handling large data processing systems.
  • Familiarity with Python, Typescript, React, and/or MongoDB is essential.
  • Strong communication skills to articulate technical concepts to non-technical audiences.

Responsibilities

  • Own and ship mission-critical features from day one.
  • Design safety guardrails for agents operating in high-stakes environments.
  • Optimize data retrieval processes utilizing large federal datasets.
  • Create orchestration systems for asynchronous agent fleets managing long-duration tasks.
  • Develop alert systems for data deviations and anomalies.
  • Build user-friendly interfaces for decision traceability and auditing purposes.
  • Create data pipelines and infrastructure to integrate siloed government data sources.

Benefits

  • Comprehensive health, dental, and vision coverage.
  • Retirement benefits with company matching.
  • Learning and development stipend for continued education.
  • Generous paid time off (PTO).
  • Potential commuter stipend for work-related travel.
Full Job Description
Public Sector engineers build the core product including the systems required to ingest and process federal datasets that support real-time decision-making in contested environments. As a New Grad Software Engineer on this team, you will own meaningful, mission-facing work from day one: shipping features, sitting with the government stakeholders who use them, and iterating fast.
Example Projects
  • Build multi-layered guardrails that keep agents safe and predictable in high-stakes federal environments
  • Optimize data retrieval for agents, including RAG pipelines over large, heterogeneous federal datasets
  • Build orchestration for fleets of asynchronous agents running long-horizon tasks
  • Develop systems that automatically alert users to deviations and anomalies in incoming data
  • Create interfaces that illustrate how an agent reached a decision, so operators can audit and trust its output
  • Develop data pipelines and ML infrastructure that make previously siloed government data sources accessible to agents
  • Build evaluation infrastructure that measures model reliability against mission requirements
  • Ship full-stack tooling that lets analysts query, visualize, and explore mission data
  • Deploy and harden applications into secure, air-gapped, and cloud-native government environments
Requirements
  • A graduation date in Fall 2026 or Spring 2027 with a Bachelor's degree (or equivalent) in a relevant field (Computer Science, EECS, Computer Engineering, Statistics)
  • Product engineering experience such as building web apps full-stack, integrating with relevant APIs and services, talking to users, figuring out 'what' to build and then iterating
  • Previous Product/Software Engineering internship experience
  • Track record of shipping high-quality products and features at scale
  • Experience building systems that process large volumes of data
  • Experience with Python, Typescript, React, and/or MongoDB
  • Strong written and verbal communication - you will work directly with government stakeholders and must be able to explain technical concepts to non-technical audiences
  • Comfort with ambiguity and evolving requirements, and a willingness to learn new domains quickly
Nice to Have
  • Hands-on experience with LLMs, evaluations, or agentic systems - whether from internships, research, or personal projects
  • Familiarity with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP), containerization (Docker), and orchestration (Kubernetes)
  • Exposure to ETL, data modeling, data warehousing, or data governance
  • Prior experience with, or demonstrated interest in, national security, defense, or civil government technology
  • Open source contributions or a portfolio of shipped side projects
How We Work

Our credos shape how we make decisions and work as a team:
  • Earn Customer Love - trust is earned with every interaction, every delivery, and every problem we solve
  • Team Flow - ideas, energy, and support move freely across teams; optimize for the whole
  • Quality is Our Cheat Code - the systems that deliver quality consistently are a structural advantage
  • Find the 20% - find the inputs that drive the outcomes and execute them completely
  • Write the Market - our research puts us at the frontier, and we bring our partners there first
  • Three Moves Ahead - consider the consequences of consequences, and plan accordingly


Compensation packages at Scale for eligible roles include base salary, equity, and benefits. The range displayed on each job posting reflects the minimum and maximum target for new hire salaries for the position and may be inclusive of several career levels at Scale; it will be determined during the interview process based on work location and additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, qualifications, interview performance, and relevant education or training. Scale employees in eligible roles are also granted equity based compensation, subject to Board of Director approval. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for your preferred location during the hiring process, and confirm whether the hired role will be eligible for equity grant. You'll also receive benefits including, but not limited to: comprehensive health, dental and vision coverage, retirement benefits, a learning and development stipend, and generous PTO. Additionally, this role may be eligible for additional benefits such as a commuter stipend.

The base salary range for this full-time position in the location of San Francisco is:

$124,000-$162,000 USD

PLEASE NOTE: Our policy requires a 90-day waiting period before reconsidering candidates for the same role. This allows us to ensure a fair and thorough evaluation of all applicants.

About Scale AI

Scale AI is an artificial intelligence company that provides data annotation services to improve machine learning algorithms. The company's platform offers a range of services including image annotation, text annotation, and 3D annotation. Scale AI was founded in 2016 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
Learn more about Scale AI
Size
500 employees
Industry
Founded
2017

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