Lead Data Engineer
stellic
This role is hybrid/in-office preferred in San Mateo, California, with remote flexibility considered case by case.
Posted Aug 18, 2026
- Full-time
- Hybrid
- Engineering
stellic
This role is hybrid/in-office preferred in San Mateo, California, with remote flexibility considered case by case.
Posted Aug 18, 2026
Stellic is growing! We're looking for a Lead Data Engineer to own the next phase of our data platform that will power everything from internal decision-making to customer-facing insights — and we need a technical leader who can evolve it to support increasing scale, complexity, and product integration. ABOUT US We're building a future where every student can move through their education with clarity, confidence, and purpose. Our platform transforms the student experience, giving them the tools they need to make the right decisions about their degree plans, track their journey, and build an education and career path that's truly their own. Stellic is a fast-growing startup backed by leading social impact investors, partnering with top institutions like Cornell, Columbia, UVA, and Ohio State to support over 1 million students across 7 countries. As we scale to serve more universities worldwide, we remain deeply committed to this mission, driven by our values, and committed to building a high-performance team that's here to make a lasting difference on both students' lives and higher education. STELLIC ENGINEERS Stellic engineers combine a rare blend of curiosity, creativity, and business acumen with the ability to deliver pragmatic solutions at high velocity with uncompromising quality. Our mission is to help students, and our engineers always have that in mind as they are building. THE DATA TEAM Stellic's data platform will be critical part of how we operate and deliver value, and will power everything from internal decision-making to customer-facing insights. The platform spans data ingestion, transformation, aggregation, and presentation — with much of the foundation in place, but requiring significant iteration and expansion to support new use cases and growing scale. We work with data that is highly variable across partners and regions, requiring thoughtful system design to balance standardization with flexibility. In addition to the internal platform, this role is responsible for designing, building, and maintaining customer-facing data systems that extend the core architecture directly to university partners. As a technical lead on Data, you will own the next phase of our data architecture, shaping both the platform and how data is leveraged across the product. This is a hands-on, high-impact role focused on building and operating a data platform that is scalable, adaptable, and aligned with both internal and product needs. This role will play a central part in shaping both the platform and how data is leveraged across the product. ABOUT YOU You've designed and operated data pipelines at scale before, and you understand what it means to build systems with clear guarantees around correctness and consistency. You think carefully about data models, lineage, and validation — and you're equally comfortable owning the internal platform and the customer-facing products built on top of it. AS OUR LEAD DATA ENGINEER, YOU WILL OWN - Data platform, end to end: Own the design, evolution, and operation of Stellic's data pipelines from ingestion through transformation, aggregation, and presentation. - Customer-facing data systems: Design, build, and maintain customer-facing data products built on top of the core data architecture, extending the platform's value directly to university partners. - Scalable, reliable data processing: Build and maintain systems that ensure consistent and reliable data processing at scale, with clear guarantees around correctness and behavior. - Data models across varied requirements: Design data models and pipelines that balance standardization with flexibility to support diverse regional and institutional requirements. - Compliance and partner requirements: Ensure systems meet regional and partner-specific data requirements and compliance constraints. - Platform evolution: Identify and drive improvements across the data platform to support new use cases and increased scale. Establish patterns for data correctness, consistency, and maintainability. TO BE SUCCESSFUL, YOU SHOULD HAVE - 8+ years of data engineering experience with previous technical lead experience - Deep experience designing and operating data pipelines across ingestion, transformation, and aggregation layers - Strong expertise in building scalable data processing systems with clear guarantees around correctness and consistency - Experience designing data models that balance standardization with flexibility across varied requirements - Strong understanding of data correctness, lineage, and validation in complex data systems - Familiarity with ensuring compliance with varied regional and partner-specific data requirements - Ideal candidates will also have experience building and owning customer-facing data systems or data products - Clear and effective communication skills for collaborating with product, design, and customer-facing teams - Deep curiosity, customer empathy, and commitment to engineering as a craft OUR CURRENT TECH STACK While we plan on introducing new technologies and capabilities, and potentially migrating away from current ones, here is the general shape of our current stack: - Data Pipeline: - Schema: Pydantic - Infrastructure: Terraform - Data transforms: dbt - Orchestration: MWAA / Airflow - Storage: S3 + Redshift Serverless - Catalog: Glue Data Catalog + Schema Registry - Governance: Lake Formation ABAC - Languages: Python, SQL - Frameworks: Django, Angular, React, Remix - Databases: PostgreSQL, ElasticSearch, Redis - Version control: Git (GitHub) - Cloud: AWS - Deployment: AWS CodeDeploy - Observability & Analytics: Sentry, Grafana, Prometheus, PostHog, Metabase - Both single and multi-tenant architecture WHY YOU'LL LOVE WORKING AT STELLIC - Shape the future of higher education at a company leading the transformation of student success. - Work alongside an ambitious, mission-driven leadership team building something meaningful. - Own a piece of the journey with competitive salary, meaningful equity and a culture of excellence, speed and ownership. - Thrive in a flexible, outcome-driven culture built on trust and autonomy. - Exceptional benefits, including health insurance with Stellic covering 99% of your premium and 75% for dependents. - 401(k), commuter benefits, and annual international retreats in incredible locations. STELLIC IS AN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY EMPLOYER Our company values diversity and believes diverse teams make innovation possible. We encourage all qualified applicants from any race, color, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or other characteristics to apply.