No Commute

Notice to applicants:

We have seen a rise in recruitment scams. Please note that outreach from Khan Academy recruiters will only come from the @khanacademy.org domain. Our team does not use Gmail or other personal accounts for contacting potential candidates. Khan Academy will never solicit money, equipment fees, or sensitive financial information at any stage of the hiring process. We also do not work with external recruiting agencies, so outreach from headhunters presenting opportunities on behalf of Khan Academy is illegitimate. Please always check the email domain and cross-reference the position with the official Khan Academy Careers page to confirm an opening is valid.

ABOUT KHAN ACADEMY

Khan Academy is a nonprofit with the mission to deliver a free, world-class education to anyone, anywhere. Our proven learning platform offers free, high-quality supplemental learning content and practice that cover Pre-K - 12th grade and early college core academic subjects, focusing on math and science. We have over 181 million registered learners globally and are committed to improving learning outcomes for students worldwide, focusing on learners in historically under-resourced communities.

OUR COMMUNITY 

Our students, teachers, and parents come from all walks of life, and so do we. Our team includes people from academia, traditional/non-traditional education, big tech companies, and tiny startups. We hire great people from diverse backgrounds and experiences because it makes our company stronger. We value diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging as necessary to achieve our mission and impact the communities we serve. We know that transforming education starts in-house with learning about ourselves and our colleagues. We strive to be world-class in investing in our people and commit to developing you as a professional.

THE ROLE

As a Senior AI Engineer, you’ll take responsibility for integrating AI into Khan Academy product features, collaborating with our Product Management, Design, Engineering, and Content teams to develop tools and processes that ensure the consistency and quality of AI implementations. 

You will:

• Collaborate with designers, product managers, and engineers to build AI-driven features that support education use cases
• Develop test datasets and evaluation criteria for the evaluation of AI outputs
• Measure, maintain, and improve AI output quality over time via experimentation with prompting, scaffolding, and implementation architectures

WHAT YOU BRING 

• Technical Proficiency: You have experience working in software engineering, data science, or related technical roles. Experience with python and/or go preferred.
• Applied AI experience: You understand what generative AI models are good at and how to elicit the best performance from them. You have a knack for structured, analytical thought, and you’re detail-oriented with high standards for quality. You understand techniques—including prompt chaining, RAG, tool-calling, and fine-tuning—for guiding generative AI outputs in service of a robust and performant enterprise product.
• Strong technical project management skills: our Senior Software Engineers often lead projects that involve multiple engineers.
• Testing and quality assurance: You’re committed to a careful, iterative, data-driven approach for optimization, innovation,  and continuous experimentation. You have experience developing evaluation data sets for benchmarking model fit and task-specific performance.
• Data Analysis: You know how to analyze interaction data, both programmatically and manually, to identify actionable insights to optimize the user experience. You have experience using data to inform strategic decisions.
• Research: You keep informed about developments in AI and take an active interest in emerging research and industry trends, and you understand the implications for our product’s competitiveness and performance.
• Communication: Your strong communication skills help you collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams, including educators, developers, and designers. You can explain technical concepts and create high quality documentation.
• Collaboration: You have a history of working cross-functionally to achieve shared success in organization-wide goals and projects.
• Growth mindset: You’re adaptable to a fast-paced environment, and open to learning new tools and tech.
• Ethical Considerations and Bias Mitigation: You’re aware of ethical considerations in AI and machine learning, especially in an educational context, and are familiar with strategies for mitigating bias.
• Domain understanding: You have a solid understanding of education technology, curriculum development, and learning science.

Background/experience

• 5+ years of transferrable technical experience (e.g., software engineering, ML engineering, data science)
• 2+ years applying AI, machine learning, and natural language processing concepts to real world problems.
• 1+ years experience related to education (ed tech, instructional design, learning science research, teaching, etc.)
• A high level familiarity with the architecture and operation of large language models, and a nuanced understanding of their capabilities and limitations.
• Motivated by the Khan Academy mission “to provide a free world-class education for anyone, anywhere."
• Proven cross-cultural competency skills demonstrating self-awareness, awareness of other, and the ability to adopt inclusive perspectives, attitudes, and behaviors to drive inclusion and belonging throughout the organization.

PERKS AND BENEFITS

We may be a non-profit, but we reward our talented team extremely well! We offer:

• Competitive salaries
• Ample paid time off as needed – Your well-being is a priority
• 8 pre-scheduled Wellness Days in 2026 occurring on a Monday or a Friday for a 3-day weekend boost
• Remote-first culture - that caters to your time zone, with open flexibility as needed, at times
• Generous parental leave
• An exceptional team that trusts you and gives you the freedom to do your best
• The chance to put your talents towards a deeply meaningful mission and the opportunity to work on high-impact products that are already defining the future of education
• Opportunities to connect through affinity, ally, and social groups
• And we offer all those other typical benefits as well: 401(k) + 4% matching & comprehensive insurance, including medical, dental, vision, and life

At Khan Academy we are committed to fair and equitable compensation practices, the well-being of our employees, and our Khan community. This belief is why we have built out a robust Total Rewards package that includes competitive base salaries, and extensive benefits and perks to support physical, mental, and financial well-being.

The compensation band for this role is $137,871 - $172,339 USD annually for candidates based in the United States and $186,306 - $232,883 CAD annually for candidates based in Canada. The pay range for this position is a general guideline only. The salary offered will depend on internal pay equity and the candidate’s relevant skills, experience, qualifications, and job market data. 

MORE ABOUT US

• Sal’s TED talk from 2011
• Sal’s TED talk from 2015
• Sal's TED talk from 2023
• Our team:  http://www.khanacademy.org/about/the-team

OUR COMPANY VALUES

Live & breathe learners

We deeply understand and empathize with our users. We leverage user insights, research, and experience to build content, products, services, and experiences that our users trust and love. Our success is defined by the success of our learners and educators.

Take a stand

As a company, we have conviction in our aspirational point of view of how education will evolve. The work we do is in service to moving towards that point of view. However, we also listen, learn and flex in the face of new data, and commit to evolving this point of view as the industry and our users evolve.