Senior Cloud Infrastructure Engineer

Are you looking for more than just a job and want to make difference? If so, then join the National Student Clearinghouse talent community and discover your impact today!

We are a nonprofit, nongovernmental organization and the leading provider of educational reporting, data exchange, verification, and research services. Serving the education, workforce and learner communities has been at the heart of our mission for over 25 years. Our work - performed in a trusted, secure, and private environment - provides numerous time- and cost-saving benefits to students, schools, administrators, and requestors.

About the Role:

Do you enjoy being a key contributor in a digital modernization effort to reengineer and migrate applications from on premise to a hybrid cloud environment? Want to tap your technical skills and experience to implement innovative cloud computing solutions and solve technical problems? Are you interested in actively participating in the implementation of a highly available infrastructure that spans multiple regions and availability zones? Would you like to do this using the latest cloud computing technologies? If so, this is the job for you! The Senior Engineer, Cloud position works as part of a team responsible for operating and maintaining cloud infrastructure with a focus on security and reliability. Be here for the day the on-prem servers are shut down for the last time!

Currently, this position is 100% telework, however, as our company starts to return to our new normal, a hybrid work pattern, this position may be required to periodically work on-site at our office and the frequency would depend on the department/division's requirements. Therefore, candidates must either reside within a reasonable distance to commute to our office or be willing to travel to our office in Herndon, when required.

How You Contribute:

• Demonstrate NSC's competencies, which align with our corporate values. Manager will provide more detail to candidates as needed.

  • Core Competencies include: Customer Focus, Optimizes Work Processes, Collaborates, Communicates Effectively, and Be Open and Authentic.

Customer Focus:

• Actively participate in the reengineering and migration of on-premise applications to AWS.
• Support applications in an AWS environment comprised of custom-built applications, SaaS solutions, and open-source components.
• Ensure all application services are monitored and performance meets or exceeds established SLAs.
• Administer access, rights, and privileges to Clearinghouse staff in AWS.
• Configure, monitor, and manage AWS cloud management services.
• Ensure continuous operation of servers and components through effective patch management, backup and archival of data, and ensuring that monitoring/alerting needs are met.

Optimizes Work Processes:

• Create, maintain, and operate all servers and infrastructure devices including troubleshooting, patching, backups, monitoring and alerting, architectural and operational documentation, creating and managing AWS VPC, URL proxies, and Bastion Hosts.
• Develop and deploy automation infrastructure as code using the AWS Cloud Formation templates as part of the using CI/CD process. Ensure that any infrastructure deployed is correctly sized based on the environment needs and projected volume of data/transactions tools.
• Ensure all application components are monitored, performance is baselined, and actual performance meets or exceeds established SLAs.

Collaborates:

• Ensure all application components are monitored, performance is baselined, and actual performance meets or exceeds established SLAs.
• Collaborating with application support teams, architects, and others in support of IT projects.

Communicates Effectively:

• Actively participate with scrum teams in the development of new functions and features by provisioning needed services, assigning access levels, and developing cloud formation templates to deploy infrastructure as software in all environments.
• Effectively monitor cloud optimization strategies, budget planning, governance, and reporting within AWS and Azure.
• Create and maintain system documentation (e.g., network/system architecture, daily operational procedures, disaster recovery procedures, and checklists) for AWS systems.
• Monitor system components and application processing to proactively identify incidents, resolve issues, and participate in root cause analysis.
• Collaborate and share knowledge with team members.

Be Open and Authentic:

• Establish and maintain a strong working relationship with all team members.
• Demonstrate openness with positive intent for entertaining new perspectives and ideas.

Position may be required to perform other duties as required. These essential functions are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the job. Reasonable accommodations will be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform these essential functions.

What You Bring to the Table:

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Information Systems, Computer Science or other related technical field or some equivalent combination of education and experience. including through military service will also be considered.
• Possession of an AWS SysOPS Administrator Associate certification is highly desirable.
• 10+ years of overall IT experience and 5 years of experience in roles supporting IT infrastructure.
• 3 - 5 years of related AWS cloud-based IT infrastructure experience.
• Experience with:
  • Managing and monitoring AWS SysOps using tools such as Cloud Watch, Cloud Trail, and X-Ray, etc.
  • Experience in traditional infrastructure migration to AWS cloud environment
  • Working knowledge of SVN, GIT, AWS Code Commit.
  • Cloud security using Guard Duty, Security Hub, WAF Rules, Service Policies, Guard Rail, AWS Control Tower IAM Roles and Policies.
  • Working knowledge of Networking Elastic Load Balancers (ELB), VPN, Transit Gateway, Direct Connect and VPC Peering.
  • Windows and/or Linux operating system experience in administration and troubleshooting.
  • System installation of high availability/fault tolerance IT environments, including cloud, networking, and back- end data systems.
  • Collaborating with application support teams, architects, and others in support of IT projects.
  • Disaster Recovery planning and execution.
• Demonstrated ability to provide backup system operation.
• Familiarity with the ITIL service delivery, including system processes and documentation (architectural, logical, functional drawings and creation and maintenance of standard operating procedures).
• Strong organizational skills (must be detail-oriented), and the ability to resolve problems quickly and successfully.
• Excellent communication skills with the ability to communicate technical and nontechnical messages to all levels of staff.
• Demonstrates ability to work independently with little supervision and be a team player.
• Must live within a commutable distance to Herndon, VA or in one of the Clearinghouse's approved States for hiring purposes. Refer to our HR Policies Page, located on our Careers site at https://www.studentclearinghouse.org/careers/human-resource-policies/, for more details.

Physical Demands:

• Use of a computer for 8 or more hours a day.
• Use of a copy machine and telephone.
• Frequently required to sit for 7 or more hours per day in close proximity to others in an open office environment.
• Vision abilities include close vision and the ability to adjust focus.
• Must be flexible to do out-of-town assignments and travel occasionally when needed.
• Must be able to work during maintenance windows, after business hours, and may be required to provide on-call remote, or 24/7 technical support

Benefits and Related Information:

The National Student Clearinghouse provides a robust benefit program designed to help meet the needs of each employee and their family, both now and in the future. We offer comprehensive medical, dental, and vision insurance, as well as life and disability insurance benefits, for employees and their qualified dependents. Health care, dependent care, and limited purpose flexible spending accounts, as well as a health savings account, are options available for employees to set aside pre-taxed dollars for certain qualifying expenses. We offer a very generous 401k matching contribution program with the opportunity to defer pre-tax and Roth contributions, as well as catch-up contributions for those who are eligible! We are proud to offer a competitive paid leave program consisting of vacation, sick, and personal time, as well as paid holidays. Vacation time will accrue based on length of service, and new full-time hires can accrue up to 13 days of vacation and up to 10 days of sick time per year. On an annual basis, new employees may use up to 32 hours of accrued sick time as personal time. Additionally, the Clearinghouse observes at least 11 paid holidays per year.

Another perk is that employees have the option to get reimbursed for basic wholesale company and roadside assistance memberships (e.g., Costco and AAA) and to request a buy back on portions of unused accrued vacation based on tenure and certain other qualifications. Employees can further their education and professional development by using our Employee Education Assistance Program, which establishes reimbursement for qualified education expenses upon successful completion of the program, and leveraging the enterprise-wide LinkedIn Learning subscription. There are additional employee benefits, to find out more, please request a copy of our complete benefit package!

We reasonably believe that the salary range for this position is between $120,000 to $155,000 annually.

The requisition will be open for a minimum of three days, and applications will be accepted on an ongoing basis until the position if filled.

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Equal Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Individuals with Disabilities

The contractor will not discharge or in any other manner discriminate against employees or applicants because they have inquired about, discussed, or disclosed their own pay or the pay of another employee or applicant. However, employees who have access to the compensation information of other employees or applicants as a part of their essential job functions cannot disclose the pay of other employees or applicants to individuals who do not otherwise have access to compensation information, unless the disclosure is (a) in response to a formal complaint or charge, (b) in furtherance of an investigation, proceeding, hearing, or action, including an investigation conducted by the employer, or (c) consistent with the contractor's legal duty to furnish information. 41 CFR 60-1.35(c)