Job description

By joining the National Student Clearinghouse, you can be sure that the work you do now will help shape the future of education and the workforce in the U.S. As the trusted source for higher education data since 1993, the Clearinghouse is the leading provider of transcript and data exchange services, automated enrollment and degree verifications, learner insights and research, and compliance solutions for schools, businesses, and learners nationwide. As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, the Clearinghouse works with nearly 3,600 postsecondary institutions to meet their compliance needs and with thousands of high schools and districts to provide continuing collegiate enrollment, progression, and completion statistics about their alumni. In addition, the Research Center publications inform policymakers and business leaders about student educational pathways. Using our unique combination of data, analytics, and software to drive our mission, security and privacy is paramount. Join us as we continue to invest in our talent and new advanced technologies to unlock the power of data on behalf of all learners. About the Role: The Solutions Architect plays a critical role in the Clearinghouse’s major modernization initiative to re engineer and re platform mission critical applications. This position is responsible for designing application systems that support multiple lines of business, identifying technical components—including open source tools and SaaS solutions—that align with the organization’s strategy for building loosely coupled, scalable applications. The role focuses on leveraging emerging technologies and architectural best practices to improve customer experience, increase operational efficiency, and strengthen competitive advantage. Working collaboratively across the federated architecture team, application development teams, infrastructure, the PMO, business units, the Chief Data Office (CDO), and external partners, the Solutions Architect develops proofs of concept, prototypes, and technical validations to support strategic decision making. The ideal candidate brings experience operating in a transformative environment and excels at rapidly evaluating and validating complex technical concepts using a variety of approaches. Currently, this is a remote-first position, and 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 the Clearinghouse's core competencies: Customer Focus, Optimizes Work Processes, Collaborates, Communicates Effectively, and Be Open and Authentic. • Develop current and future state architectures that advance customer experience, organizational excellence, and brand growth. Make recommendations regarding strategic architectural considerations related to technology direction and standards. • Develop an understanding of the business model—including processes, application architectures, and supporting systems—to define and design solutions that work within the enterprise environment and satisfy business requirements. • Develop design artifacts that describe the structure, characteristics, behavior, workflow, and other aspects of the solution to project stakeholders. • Understand all aspects of project constraints including scope, schedule, budget, quality, cost, risk, and resources. Recommend and make technological and managerial decisions to reconcile these constraints with project goals. • Present design solutions to the Architecture Review Board (ARB) for approval. Collaborate with stakeholders, application development teams, and ARB members to develop and refine application designs prior to presenting to the ARB. • Investigate new solutions using custom-developed software, commercial software, and open source software. • Develop platform technology roadmaps, including SaaS, PaaS, custom software, third party offerings, open source components, and other technology solutions. • Define strategies and architectures for application modernization and cloud migration, including refactoring, replatforming, and adoption of cloud native patterns. • Ensure a loosely coupled, scalable architecture through effective design and governance of service interfaces and modular components, and establish standards for internal and external integrations. • Work independently or collaboratively to prototype and validate architectural approaches and reduce delivery risk. • Embed security by design principles into solution architectures and adapt designs to evolving security, risk, and compliance requirements. • Contribute to the definition and evolution of application and architecture standards and design patterns, and actively participate in architecture governance and ARB processes. 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: • Bachelors degree in Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related field. A combination of education and experience including military service will also be considered. • 10 years of software development experience in mid to large organizations, and technical leadership experience. • 5 years of experience defining architectures, including current state, future state and enterprise technology roadmaps, working with commercial, open source, and cloud solutions including developing prototypes and integration models. • Experience: • Demonstrated experience applying enterprise architecture standards and patterns, including microservices, event driven architectures, API led integration, cloud native design, and non functional architecture patterns for security, scalability, and resiliency. • Strong hands on knowledge of AWS cloud services and open source technologies, including compute, integration, data, security, DevSecOps, and observability platforms used to deliver secure, scalable, cloud native solutions. • Deep understanding of container orchestration patterns (Kubernetes/EKS, ECS/Fargate), including deployment, scaling, resiliency, and service to service communication. • Exposure to enterprise scale data processing and analytics platforms, including big data technologies (e.g., EMR), Data Lake, Lakehouse, or analytical solutions. • Experience designing high availability, disaster recovery, security, and observability in cloud environments. • Experience establishing platform standards and reference architectures for cloud and container based solutions. • Experience applying OWASP security best practices and Section 508 accessibility compliance in enterprise application and cloud solution designs. • Experience designing authentication and authorization solutions using industry standard protocols such as OAuth 2.0, SAML, and OpenID Connect (OIDC), with role based access control (RBAC) to enforce least privilege access across applications and services. • Proficiency creating logical/physical/functional views, process flow diagrams, and system integration diagrams. • Demonstrated strong negotiation, influencing, problem-solving and analytical skills. • Excellent communication and interpersonal skills. • Proficiency with the Microsoft Office Suite. • Self-motivated with the demonstrated ability to make timely decisions. • Demonstrates the Clearinghouse’s core competencies: customer focus, optimizes work processes, communicates effectively, collaborates, and is open and authentic. • 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 studentclearinghouse.org , for more details. • Must be currently authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis. We do not intend to sponsor external applicants for work visas, and may consider sponsorship only if no qualified candidates can be found who are authorized to work without sponsorship. • Must be at least 18 years old. Additional Desired Qualifications • Master’s degree preferred. • Certified as an AWS Architect (Associate or Professional). • 5–10 years of programming experience using some of the following: • JAVA, Spring Framework, Spring Boot, Python, JavaScript related technologies such as Angular, and AWS services including Amazon VPC, API Gateway, ECS (Fargate), EKS (Kubernetes), EC2, S3, DynamoDB, RDS/Aurora (PostgreSQL), IAM, Secrets Manager, KMS, CloudWatch, CloudFront, Route 53, and AWS Organizations. • Experience with various SQL and NoSQL databases. Physical Demands: • Use of a computer for 8 or more hours a day. • Use of a telephone and/or copy machine. • Frequently required to sit for 7 or more hours per day. • Occasionally required to use hands and fingers to operate, handle, and reach. • Vision abilities include close vision and the ability to adjust focus. • May be required to work during maintenance windows and after business hours, and 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 with annual employer contributions of $300 for employees and $600 for employees who are enrolled with their spouse and/or dependents, voluntary supplemental health plans for Accident and Hospital Indemnity coverage, and infertility coverage 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, up to 3 weeks of paid parental leave during a 12-month period , and up to 5 days of paid military leave per calendar year . 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 15 paid holidays per year, including company year-end close between Christmas and New Years Holidays. 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 too, including but not limited to, mental health with up to eight free therapy sessions for employees and their family members and well-being reward benefits. With the Clearinghouse being an eligible 501(3)(c) nonprofit organization, employees are eligible for service credit towards the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program (PSLF). To find out more, please request a copy of our Benefits at a Glance! Additionally, we reasonably believe that the salary range for this position is between $190,000 - $215,000. Bonus eligible. The pay range listed above represents a good faith estimate and is not a guarantee of compensation or salary. The National Student Clearinghouse considers multiple factors when determining base pay for offers, including but not limited to the responsibilities and scope of the role, as well as a candidate’s experience, education, knowledge, skills, abilities, internal equity, and alignment with market data. Internal Candidates : If you feel you meet the qualifications for the role, we strongly encourage you to apply and focus on preparing for the application process. Finalist internal candidates will receive a compensation review prior to any offer being made. In accordance with the Clearinghouse’s compensation and promotion guidelines, internal compensation practices will be applied first, which may result in pay that differs from the posted salary range. This job announcement was posted to the National Student Clearinghouse’s Careers site at www.studentclearinghouse.org/careers 4/1/2026 and the online application period will be open for at least 3 days. A completed online application is required to be considered for this opportunity. Equal Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Individuals with Disabilities: The National Student Clearinghouse is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to actual or perceived race, creed, color, religion, alienage or national origin, ancestry, citizenship status, age, disability or handicap, sex, marital status, veteran status (or known to have a spousal, family, business, social or other relationship or association with a protected veteran), sexual orientation, genetic information, arrest record, natural hairstyle, or any other characteristic protected by applicable federal, state, or local laws. Our management team is dedicated to this policy with respect to recruitment, hiring, placement, promotion, transfer, training, compensation, benefits, employee activities and general treatment during employment. Pay Transparency Notice : The National Student Clearinghouse is a federal contractor that abides by all applicable equal opportunity laws and regulations. Under these laws, companies doing business with the federal government must provide applicants and employees with certain policies, including the following information. 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)

Requirements

Must-haves

Demonstrate the Clearinghouse's core competencies: Customer Focus, Optimizes Work Processes, Collaborates, Communicates Effectively, and Be Open and Authentic.
Develop design artifacts that describe the structure, characteristics, behavior, workflow, and other aspects of the solution to project stakeholders.
Investigate new solutions using custom-developed software, commercial software, and open source software.
Develop platform technology roadmaps, including SaaS, PaaS, custom software, third party offerings, open source components, and other technology solutions.
Define strategies and architectures for application modernization and cloud migration, including refactoring, replatforming, and adoption of cloud native patterns.
Ensure a loosely coupled, scalable architecture through effective design and governance of service interfaces and modular components, and establish standards for internal and external integrations.
Work independently or collaboratively to prototype and validate architectural approaches and reduce delivery risk.
Embed security by design principles into solution architectures and adapt designs to evolving security, risk, and compliance requirements.
Contribute to the definition and evolution of application and architecture standards and design patterns, and actively participate in architecture governance and ARB processes.
Bachelors degree in Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related field. A combination of education and experience including military service will also be considered.
10 years of software development experience in mid to large organizations, and technical leadership experience.
Deep understanding of container orchestration patterns (Kubernetes/EKS, ECS/Fargate), including deployment, scaling, resiliency, and service to service communication.
Exposure to enterprise scale data processing and analytics platforms, including big data technologies (e.g., EMR), Data Lake, Lakehouse, or analytical solutions.
Experience designing high availability, disaster recovery, security, and observability in cloud environments.
Experience establishing platform standards and reference architectures for cloud and container based solutions.
Experience applying OWASP security best practices and Section 508 accessibility compliance in enterprise application and cloud solution designs.
Proficiency creating logical/physical/functional views, process flow diagrams, and system integration diagrams.
Demonstrated strong negotiation, influencing, problem-solving and analytical skills.
Excellent communication and interpersonal skills.
Proficiency with the Microsoft Office Suite.
Self-motivated with the demonstrated ability to make timely decisions.
Demonstrates the Clearinghouse’s core competencies: customer focus, optimizes work processes, communicates effectively, collaborates, and is open and authentic.
Must be at least 18 years old.

Nice-to-haves

Master’s degree preferred.

Application prep

Use the role’s language and application details while tailoring your materials.

Keywords to mirror

apiawskubernetesaccessibilityjavapythonjavascriptangularsql

Platform: clearcompany
Effort: medium

Benefits

Benefits detected in the listing.

Dental

Vision

401k

Parental Leave

Professional Development