Software Engineer Intern (Summer 2027)

As a Software Engineering Intern, you’ll join our engineering team in Washington, DC and ship real features to real users, not side projects. You’ll work across the full stack: React/Next.js interfaces, Node APIs, and Postgres data models that keep up with petabyte-scale content. One sprint you might help prototype a semantic-search UI backed by vector embeddings. The next, you might build part of a real-time collaboration layer that lets policy analysts co-author annotations and compare version histories without refreshing the page. ## As a Software Engineering Intern, you will: - Ship vertical product slices with your mentor and team: Figma wireframe, React component, Node handler, SQL/Mongo query, deployed on AWS via Docker and GitHub Actions. - Help build fast, delightful data workflows such as instant search, real-time diffing and collaborative annotation, with sub-200 ms interactions over large datasets. - Work with design and product on thin-slice scoping, experiment flags and measuring customer outcomes. - Instrument and improve your work with dashboards, structured logs and feature-flag rollouts, and join our blameless post-mortems. - Practice product craftsmanship through Storybook-driven UI, shared design tokens, and code reviews that coach rather than gatekeep. - Use AI coding tools (Claude Code, Cursor, Codex) every day to speed up coding and debugging. ## Essential Qualifications - Currently pursuing a bachelor’s or graduate degree in computer science, computer engineering or a related field. - Expected graduation in December 2027 or May 2028. - Experience building web applications through coursework, internships, research, hackathons or personal projects. - Familiarity with React or a similar frontend framework and Node.js or another backend language. - Working knowledge of SQL and relational database design, such as Postgres. - Ability to break an open-ended problem into concrete milestones and to communicate progress clearly. - Must be authorized to work in the United States without current or future employer sponsorship. ## Preferred qualifications - Experience with Next.js, TypeScript or MongoDB. - Exposure to Docker, CI/CD such as GitHub Actions, or a cloud platform, with AWS preferred. - Interest in or exposure to search, vector databases, RAG or other AI/ML-driven features. - Projects using data visualization such as D3 or Recharts, or rich-text editors such as Slate or TipTap. - Prior internship, startup or significant open-source experience. - Experience using LLM coding tools in your own projects.This is an onsite work opportunity and our teams operate from the Washington, DC office, located at L and 15th St. NW. State Affairs offers a competitive salary and a comprehensive benefits package to employees. The salary for this role as it is posted is $9,000 - $10,000 per month for candidates working from a State Affairs office. The final job level and annual salary will be determined based on the education, qualification, knowledge, skills, ability, and experience of the final candidate(s), and calibrated against relevant market data and internal team equity. Benefits listed in this posting may vary depending on the nature of your employment with State Affairs. Candidates must be authorized to work in the United States without the need for current or future company sponsorship.