Senior/Staff Software Engineer, Frontend (ACF)
About The Position
At Skylight, software engineers design, implement, and maintain software systems that improve government services for users. Frontend engineers go further by shaping how those systems are experienced — creating intuitive, accessible, and reliable interfaces that help people navigate complex information and complete critical tasks with confidence. The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) is expanding its Digital Services team during an exciting period of growth, focused on delivering modern, user-centered digital products, exploring AI-enablement opportunities, and building long-term technical capacity. In this role, you'll hit the ground running in a fast-moving, cross-functional environment — coordinating immediately with researchers, designers, engineers, and government stakeholders to deliver against an ambitious vision from day one. This role sits at the intersection of product strategy, change management, enablement, and service delivery, and demands someone who can orient quickly, build trust across teams, and ensure new digital capabilities are not only built, but understood, usable, and sustained.
Requirements
- Ability to write clean, reusable, and maintainable code with strong attention to testing and reliability
- Experience building modern web applications using React (or equivalent single-page frameworks) and component-driven design
- Strong understanding of frontend architecture, state management, asynchronous data fetching, and API integration patterns
- Experience collaborating with backend teams (especially Python-based) to deliver cohesive user experiences
- Familiarity with building secure, compliant software and mitigating common vulnerabilities
- Experience designing and implementing interactive, data-rich UIs (e.g., filters, tagging, dashboards)
- Familiarity with integrating AI- or ML-driven features such as search, tagging, or summarization
- Experience contributing to build and deployment pipelines (e.g., CI/CD, AWS Amplify, or similar)
- Understanding how to design performant, reliable, and user-centered systems
- Ability to work successfully within a professional services environment (e.g., can communicate effectively with clients)
- Passionate about creating better public outcomes through great government services
- A mindset and work approach that aligns with our core values
- Ability to travel for work from time to time
Nice To Haves
- Experience using AWS hosting and build services such as CloudFront, S3, Amplify, or Cognito
- Familiarity with data visualization frameworks (e.g., D3.js, Plotly, Chart.js)
- Experience designing natural language interfaces (e.g., search, tagging, annotation tools)
- Experience with design systems such as Storybook, Figma, USWDS, or GOV.UK Design System
- Experience contributing to accessibility-first or government digital service projects
- Understanding of frontend performance optimization and observability tooling
- Experience collaborating effectively within remote teams
- Prior experience working in the civic tech space
- Experience working in a remote-team environment
Responsibilities
- Build and maintain modern, user-centered web applications that support ACF’s digital transformation
- Collaborate with designers, researchers, product managers, and backend engineers to deliver cohesive, accessible, and performant experiences
- Implement responsive, data-rich interfaces that help users make sense of complex information
- Integrate APIs, state management, and asynchronous data flows to create seamless interactions
- Contribute to the design and evolution of ACF’s frontend architecture and component libraries
- Apply lean-agile engineering practices such as API-first design, version control, automated testing, and continuous integration
- Identify and address technical debt, performance issues, and opportunities for improvement
- Evaluate and incorporate emerging technologies, including AI-enabled features, where they enhance user experience
- Promote maintainability and long-term scalability through clear documentation and knowledge sharing
Benefits
- Medical insurance, dental insurance, vision insurance
- Short-term and long-term disability insurance
- Life and AD&D insurance
- Dependent care FSA, healthcare FSA, health savings account
- Dollar-for-dollar 401(k) match up to 10% of your salary with no vesting period
- Flexible paid time-off-policy (generally around 25 days per year), plus 11 paid federal holidays
- Up to 12 weeks paid-time-off for all eligible new birth, adoption, or foster parents
- Performance rewards, including annual salary increase, annual performance bonus, spot bonuses, and stock options
- Business development / sales bonuses
- Referral bonuses
- Annual $2,000 allowance for professional development
- Annual $750 allowance for tech-related purchases
- Annual swag budget of $100 to display your Skylight pride with some merchandise (hoodies, hats, and more)
- Dollar-for-dollar charity donation matching, up to $500 per year
- Flexible, remote-friendly work environment
- An environment that empowers you to unleash your superpowers for public good
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Mid Level
Education Level
No Education Listed
Number of Employees
11-50 employees
