Senior Software Engineer, AI Experience

Remote Senior AI Software Engineer

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Skills & Technologies

AnthropicAzureClaudeOpenaiTypescript

About This Role

AI job market dashboard showing open roles by category

Position Summary:

As a Senior Software Engineer, AI Experience at Penn Foster Group, you will build AI\-native products end\-to\-end — owning features that shape how millions of learners discover, enroll in, and progress through our programs. This is a hands\-on full\-stack role for an engineer who treats LLMs as core product infrastructure, designing retrieval pipelines, building agentic workflows, writing evals, and pushing features from prototype to production.

You will collaborate closely with product, platform, and other engineering teams, mentor peers on agentic development practices, and help set the bar for what good looks like in an AI\-first engineering org. This position is fully remote.

Essential Job Functions:

  • Design, build, and ship full\-stack features end\-to\-end using TypeScript, Vue.js, and Node, deployed on Azure.
  • Write evals and observability for LLM features.
  • Use agentic coding tools (Claude Code, Cursor, or equivalent) as your primary development environment for planning, executing, and reviewing AI\-generated work to ship faster while maintaining clean code that is ready for change.
  • Take ownership of AI\-powered content authoring and management features.
  • Integrate model APIs (Anthropic, OpenAI, others) with attention to tokenization, latency, cost control, prompt\-injection risk, and graceful degradation when models fail.
  • Collaborate closely with product, platform, and sibling engineering teams to translate ambiguous problems into shippable systems.
  • Lead code reviews, set technical standards for AI\-assisted development, and mentor engineers on prompting, context engineering, eval design, and agentic workflows.
  • Ensure scalability, security, observability, and unit economics of the systems you own.

Knowledge, Skills, Abilities:

  • 5\+ years of experience building customer\-facing products at a high\-quality software company.
  • Strong UI and TypeScript fundamentals, with experience across the full stack (Browser technologies, Node, PostgreSQL).
  • Track record of driving complex, end\-to\-end features (not just incremental improvements and refactors) with visible impact on the product.
  • Product sensibility: you care about UX, speed, and polish, and you push back when something doesn't feel right.
  • Comfortable working without heavy PM overhead; you can help to shape the problem, not just implement a solution.
  • High ownership mentality: self\-directed, full\-lifecycle builder who takes a feature from idea to shipped.
  • Thrives in a remote, async\-first environment with a lean, high\-output team.
  • Experience at a startup or a company with a genuinely high engineering bar.

Working Conditions \& Hiring Process:

  • U.S. Work Location Requirement: All employees must reside in and perform work within the United States. We do not support international remote work arrangements for this role.
  • Travel Expectations: While this is a remote position, occasional travel may be required for team meetings, company events, conferences, summits, etc. Candidates must be willing and able to travel as needed.
  • On\-Camera Work Environment: We operate in a highly collaborative, remote, on\-camera culture. Employees are expected to be on camera during meetings unless extenuating circumstances apply.
  • Recorded Video Interviews: All video interviews conducted during the hiring process will be recorded to support internal hiring consistency and process improvement.
  • Background Checks: Employment with Penn Foster Group is contingent upon successfully completing applicable pre\-employment screening requirements, which may include verification of employment history, education, and criminal background, where permitted by law.
  • Identity Verification (Form I\-9\): As part of our onboarding process, all hires must complete employment eligibility verification in compliance with federal law. This includes remote Form I\-9 verification, which may require an in\-person identity verification step with an authorized representative.

About Us: At Penn Foster Group, we are transforming online learning to help learners by uniting Penn Foster, CareerStep, Ashworth College, James Madison High School, the New York Institute of Photography, the New York Institute of Art and Design, and other education platforms. Together, we create an accelerated path to greater economic mobility through real\-world skills and knowledge that enable them to achieve long\-term success in the workplaces of the future. Our history dates back to 1890 when our founder, Thomas Foster, pioneered distance education by offering training by mail for coal miners to get the necessary skills for safer jobs. Today, with the partners who use our education and training programs, we continue that mission of providing accessible training and education for in\-demand skills and are building a workforce that’s prepared for the future job market.

Equal Employment Opportunity: We strive toward Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at Penn Foster Group by intentionally building teams that are diverse – in identities, lived experiences, and ideas to create a culture where people feel connected to each other and have a sense of belonging. We value diversity, equity, and inclusion because it is the foundation that enables us to achieve what we set out to do as an organization – from maximizing the number of learners who can reach their goals while giving them the kinds of experiences we want them to have, to becoming the type of company we want to work in.

What We Offer: We offer a robust benefits package that includes medical, dental, vision, flexible spending, generous paid time off, sponsored volunteer opportunities, a 401K with a company match, plus free access to all of our online programs.

Role Details

Title Senior Software Engineer, AI Experience
Location Remote, US
Category AI Software Engineer
Experience Senior
Salary Not disclosed
Remote Yes

About This Role

AI Software Engineers build the applications and systems that AI models run inside. They own the API layers, data pipelines, frontend integrations, and infrastructure that turn a model into a product users interact with. Every AI company needs engineers who can build the software around the AI.

The challenge is building reliable systems around inherently unreliable components. Models are probabilistic. They'll give different answers to the same question. They hallucinate. They're slow. They're expensive. Your job is to build an application layer that handles all of this gracefully while delivering a product that users trust and enjoy.

Across the 3,708 AI roles we're tracking, AI Software Engineer positions make up 7% of the market. At Penn Foster Group, this role fits into their broader AI and engineering organization.

AI Software Engineer roles are among the most numerous in the AI job market. Every company deploying AI needs software engineers who understand AI integration patterns. The demand is broad, spanning startups to enterprises, across every industry adopting AI capabilities.

What the Work Looks Like

A typical week includes: building API endpoints that serve model inference with caching and fallback logic, designing the data pipeline that feeds context to a RAG system, implementing streaming responses in the frontend, debugging a race condition in the async inference pipeline, and optimizing database queries for the vector search layer. It's full-stack engineering with AI at the center.

AI Software Engineer roles are among the most numerous in the AI job market. Every company deploying AI needs software engineers who understand AI integration patterns. The demand is broad, spanning startups to enterprises, across every industry adopting AI capabilities.

Skills Required

Anthropic (6% of roles) Azure (24% of roles) Claude (13% of roles) Openai (11% of roles) Typescript (7% of roles)

Full-stack engineering skills with AI integration experience. Python and TypeScript are the most common requirements. You'll need to understand API design, database architecture, and how to build reliable systems around probabilistic outputs. Experience with streaming, async processing, and caching patterns is increasingly important as real-time AI applications proliferate.

Knowledge of vector databases, embedding APIs, and LLM integration patterns (function calling, structured outputs, retry logic) differentiates AI software engineers from general software engineers. Understanding cost optimization (caching strategies, model routing, batched inference) is valuable since inference costs can dominate application economics.

Strong postings describe the product you'll be building, the AI integration patterns you'll work with, and the scale requirements. Look for companies that have existing AI features and need engineers to improve and expand them, not companies that are 'planning to add AI' someday.

Compensation Benchmarks

AI Software Engineer roles pay a median of $219,250 based on 424 positions with disclosed compensation. Senior-level AI roles across all categories have a median of $230,000.

Across all AI roles, the market median is $217,500. Top-quartile compensation starts at $272,100. The 90th percentile reaches $325,000. For comparison, the highest-paying categories include AI Safety ($300,000) and Research Engineer ($280,000). By seniority level: Entry: $120,000; Mid: $200,000; Senior: $230,000; Director: $272,150; VP: $250,000.

Penn Foster Group AI Hiring

Penn Foster Group has 1 open AI role right now. They're hiring across AI Software Engineer. Based in Remote, US.

Remote Work Context

Remote AI roles pay a median of $185,334 across 717 positions. About 14% of all AI roles offer remote work.

Career Path

Common paths into AI Software Engineer roles include Software Engineer, Full-Stack Developer, Backend Engineer.

From here, career progression typically leads toward Staff Engineer, AI Architect, Engineering Manager.

If you're a software engineer, you're already 80% there. Learn the AI integration patterns: RAG, streaming inference, function calling, structured outputs. Build a project that demonstrates you can wrap an AI model in a production-quality application with proper error handling, caching, and user experience. That's the portfolio piece that gets you hired.

What to Expect in Interviews

Technical screens look like standard software engineering interviews with an AI twist. Expect system design questions about building reliable applications around probabilistic models: handling streaming responses, implementing retry logic for API failures, and designing caching strategies for LLM outputs. Coding rounds test standard algorithms plus practical integration patterns like async processing and rate limiting.

When evaluating opportunities: Strong postings describe the product you'll be building, the AI integration patterns you'll work with, and the scale requirements. Look for companies that have existing AI features and need engineers to improve and expand them, not companies that are 'planning to add AI' someday.

AI Hiring Overview

The AI job market has 3,708 open positions tracked in our dataset. By seniority: 102 entry-level, 1,705 mid-level, 1,469 senior, and 432 leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level). Remote roles make up 14% of the market (508 positions). The remaining 3,180 roles require on-site or hybrid attendance.

The market median for AI roles is $217,500. Top-quartile compensation starts at $272,100. The 90th percentile reaches $325,000. Highest-paying categories: AI Safety ($300,000 median, 21 roles); Research Engineer ($280,000 median, 147 roles); AI Architect ($254,798 median, 67 roles).

AI Software Engineer roles are among the most numerous in the AI job market. Every company deploying AI needs software engineers who understand AI integration patterns. The demand is broad, spanning startups to enterprises, across every industry adopting AI capabilities.

The AI Job Market Today

The AI job market spans 3,708 open positions across 16 role categories. The largest categories by volume: AI/ML Engineer (2,605), Data Scientist (310), AI Software Engineer (259). These three account for the majority of open positions, though smaller categories often have higher per-role compensation because of specialized skill requirements.

The seniority mix tells a story about where AI teams are in their maturity. Entry-level roles (102) are outnumbered by mid-level (1,705) and senior (1,469) positions, reflecting that most companies are past the 'build a team from scratch' phase and need experienced engineers who can ship production systems. Leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level) total 432 positions, representing the bottleneck between technical execution and organizational strategy.

Remote work availability sits at 14% of all AI roles (508 positions), with 3,180 requiring on-site or hybrid attendance. The remote share has stabilized after the post-pandemic correction. Senior and specialized roles (Research Scientist, ML Architect) are more likely to be remote-eligible than entry-level positions, partly because experienced hires have more negotiating power and partly because these roles require less hands-on mentorship.

AI compensation is structured in clear tiers. The market median sits at $217,500. Top-quartile roles start at $272,100, and the 90th percentile reaches $325,000. These figures include base salary with disclosed compensation. Total compensation (including equity, bonuses, and sign-on) runs 20-40% higher at companies that offer those components.

Category matters for compensation. AI Safety roles lead at $300,000 median, while Prompt Engineer roles sit at $140,000. The spread between highest and lowest-paying categories reflects the premium on specialized technical skills versus broader analytical roles.

The most in-demand skills across all AI postings: Python (1,890 postings), Aws (1,103 postings), Azure (877 postings), Rag (855 postings), Gcp (631 postings), Prompt Engineering (560 postings), Pytorch (545 postings), Claude (498 postings). Python dominates, appearing in the vast majority of role descriptions regardless of category. Cloud platform experience (AWS, GCP, Azure) is the second most common requirement. The newer entrants to the top skills list (RAG, vector databases, LLM APIs) reflect the shift from traditional ML toward generative AI applications.

Frequently Asked Questions

Based on 424 roles with disclosed compensation, the median salary for AI Software Engineer positions is $219,250. Actual compensation varies by seniority, location, and company stage.
Full-stack engineering skills with AI integration experience. Python and TypeScript are the most common requirements. You'll need to understand API design, database architecture, and how to build reliable systems around probabilistic outputs. Experience with streaming, async processing, and caching patterns is increasingly important as real-time AI applications proliferate.
About 14% of the 3,708 AI roles we track offer remote work. Remote availability varies by company and seniority level, with senior and leadership roles more likely to offer location flexibility.
Penn Foster Group is among the companies actively hiring for AI and ML talent. Check our company profiles for detailed breakdowns of open roles, salary ranges, and hiring trends.
Common next steps from AI Software Engineer positions include Staff Engineer, AI Architect, Engineering Manager. Progression depends on whether you lean toward technical depth, people management, or product strategy.

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