• Job Type: Officer of Administration
• Bargaining Unit:
• Regular/Temporary: Regular
• End Date if Temporary:
• Hours Per Week: 35
• Standard Work Schedule:
• Building:
• Salary Range: 80,000 - 98,000

Position Summary

The Full-Stack Engineer contributes across front-end and back-end to deliver performant accessible, and scalable digital experiences. This position will work closely with a small agile technical team while collaborating with content and marketing stakeholders to support a broad range of web initiatives. Incumbent should be comfortable writing code, informing technical direction, and working with both technical and non-technical collaborators to deliver practical solutions.

 The role supports a component-driven and decoupled architecture that connects multiple content sources through a unified API, employing edge rendering and performance techniques to deliver fast, consistent experiences. Depending on experience and interests, work may focus on front-end development with React and Next.js, building edge-layer and back-end services in Node.js or Go, or customizing Drupal using modern object-oriented PHP. The engineer takes ownership of the parts of the stack where the most value can be contributed while developing skills across adjacent areas over time.

This is a hands-on role for someone who enjoys building modern web experiences and the systems that support them, from user interfaces to integrated data and service layers.  The engineer helps shape platform capabilities, contribute to automated workflows, and thoughtfully harness opportunities to integrate AI into both development processes and user-facing experiences. 

Responsibilities  

Essential Duties:   

Platform & Application Development

• Partner with content and marketing teams to deliver clear, actionable solutions.
• Build and maintain modern, component-driven user interfaces in Next.js, React and TypeScript, with opportunities to contribute to back-end services in Node.js, PHP, or Go, depending on experience and team needs.
• Design and implement a scalable API gateway that unifies content and data from Drupal and external service providers.
• Implement strategies for edge rendering, caching, and performance optimization across devices and regions.

Infrastructure & Operations

• Contribute to automated code release and deployment operations, balancing reliability and velocity.

• Monitor application health, log performance insights, and support continuous improvement efforts.

• Integrate AI tools and services into developer workflows, content systems, and user-facing features, helping shape platform capabilities and automated workflows.
• Collaborate with infrastructure and security teams to ensure compliance with CUIMC privacy and data-protection requirements.
• Assist in capacity planning and cost optimization for cloud hosting environments.

Quality, Security & Accessibility

• Uphold accessibility guidelines, web standards, and internal best practices across user experience, performance, reliability and security.
• Strengthen quality assurance through comprehensive unit, integration, and end-to-end testing, secure development practices, and maintainable, self-documenting code.

People

• Share full-stack knowledge and best practices with teammates during code reviews, architecture discussions, and sprint retrospectives.
• Offer peer-to-peer feedback and support to foster a collaborative, inclusive engineering culture.
• Partner with designers, content creators, infrastructure, and IT colleagues to align on priorities and ensure a smooth hand-off across front end, back end, and deployment workflows.
• Assist in onboarding new team members by walking them through the application architecture, API patterns, and development/deployment processes.
• Contribute to internal documentation and knowledge bases so that technical decisions, service integrations, and operational procedures are transparent and easy to reference.

Other

• Perform other duties as assigned. 

Minimum Qualifications 

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• At least three years of experience developing web applications, either as a full-stack engineer or with deep specialization in one or more of the following:
  • Modern JavaScript frameworks such as React, Next.js, and TypeScript.
  • Drupal CMS and modern object-oriented PHP.
  • Back-end services or edge-layer delivery systems using Node.js or Go.
• Proficiency in building component-based interfaces and modern styling methodologies, with experience using design systems and tools such as Storybook.
• Hands-on experience developing API-first architectures, integrating multiple data sources into a single, consistent content delivery interface.
• Familiarity with headless content management systems such as Drupal and delivering content through structured web service protocols such as JSON API, GraphQL, or REST.
• Experience building or consuming back-end services using technologies such as Node.js, PHP, or Go.
• Strong understanding of edge rendering, caching strategies, and techniques for optimizing performance across devices and networks.
• Experience with continuous integration and delivery practices, including automated testing, dependency management, and modern version control workflows (e.g., Git, Yarn).
• Comfort with command-line tooling, containerized environments (e.g., Docker, Lando), and developer operations fundamentals.
• Familiarity with observability practices including logging, monitoring, and performance tracing.
• Solid grasp of accessibility standards, secure coding practices, and established web development conventions.
• Exposure to AI-assisted development tools and enthusiasm for integrating AI into both user and developer experiences.
• Proactive and solution-oriented, focused on moving projects forward and turning challenges into actionable outcomes.
• Comfortable taking ownership of work from idea to execution, contributing to shared goals while coordinating effectively with the team.
• Collaborative mindset with the ability to communicate clearly with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Strong attention to detail, with a commitment to quality, clarity, and long-term maintainability.
• Thoughtful about user experience, accessibility, and the human impact of technical decisions.
• Adaptable and curious, comfortable navigating change while continuously learning and applying modern practices.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master’s degree in computer science, engineering, or a related field.
• Background working in higher-education, healthcare, or other complex, multi-stakeholder environments.
• Understanding of SEO fundamentals, structured data, and web analytics tools to improve discoverability and performance monitoring.
• Experience integrating modern front-end frameworks with enterprise content management systems (e.g., Drupal, WordPress, or other headless CMS platforms).

Equal Opportunity Employer / Disability / Veteran

Columbia University is committed to the hiring of qualified local residents.