Playlab is hiring a Staff Backend Engineer (Python)

About Our Organization We are a technology-focused non-profit organization committed to empowering educators and students in critically understanding and developing AI technologies. Our mission centers on an open-source, community-driven strategy for leveraging AI's potential in educational settings. We provide communities with advanced AI tools and immersive professional development, enabling educators and students to construct customized AI applications for unique contexts. More than 60,000 educators have successfully published applications through our platform, with our collective impact continuously expanding. We view AI as an innovative design medium - one that should be collaboratively shaped to manifest transformative learning experiences. If you're enthusiastic about creating inclusive, forward-thinking futures for educational communities, we invite you to join our mission. The Role We are seeking a Senior Backend Engineer to enhance our Engineering team. In this position, you'll be integrating sophisticated AI technologies with production systems - transforming emerging capabilities into dependable, high-performance services that drive authentic educational experiences. Examples of the Work - Design and construct agent runtime frameworks powering goal-oriented educational applications - Develop services utilizing fine-tuned models for automatic app scaffolding from premium examples - Create systems for dynamic interface generation across communication platforms - Implement advanced knowledge retrieval and graph integration for curriculum development - Construct scalable services for processing and analyzing educational interactions Expectations - Design, develop, and sustain production Python services with exceptional reliability - Monitor emerging frameworks and Python ecosystem innovations - Collaborate cross-functionally to ensure service alignment with organizational objectives - Balance innovative prototyping with production stability - Generate comprehensive documentation and testing protocols - Guide team members in Python development methodologies Qualifications - 7+ years developing production web applications using Python - 3+ years constructing Python services at enterprise scale - Demonstrated expertise in API and microservices architecture - Proficiency with modern Python frameworks - Experience managing data processing pipelines and database interactions - Comfortable interfacing with AI/ML engineering teams - Thrives in collaborative, high-autonomy environments - Exceptional remote communication capabilities Bonus Considerations - Advanced understanding of large language model production integration - Background in agent framework development - Expertise with retrieval augmented generation systems - Educational technology experience - Mission-driven organizational background - Creative platform design skills Technologies Python, FastAPI, OpenAI/Anthropic/Bedrock APIs, PostgreSQL, Neo4J, Vector Databases, AWS, Docker, Kubernetes Compensation Range: $170K - $200K