Chelsea O'Connor
Austin
Summary
Backend engineer experienced in high-scale data pipelines, API integrations, and cloud-native systems. Strong focus on reliability, performance, and delivering production-ready backend services.
Overview
5
5
years of professional experience
Work History
Backend Software Engineer
Edlink (Epiphany)
06.2025 - Current
- Engineered core components of Edlink’s backend data-integration platform, synchronizing complex educational data models across multiple external providers.
- Authored complete provider sync implementations, including ingestion flows, pagination, delta logic, batch processing, and robust error-handling across unreliable APIs.
- Contributed to migrating legacy SQL models to a new MikroORM-based entity architecture, helping redesign multi-schema data models and modernize provider pipelines.
- Developed an ephemeral database testing system for validating entity conversions and sync correctness, including automated DB lifecycle management and custom test harnesses.
- Designed scalable, high-throughput pipelines capable of processing millions of records across multi-tenant environments with strong data-integrity guarantees.
- Worked cross-functionally with Support, Customer Success, and Product teams to resolve onboarding issues and data discrepancies across providers.
Software Engineer, Co-Creator
Nimbus
12.2024 - 05.2025
- Co-created an open-source framework for deploying lightweight NLP models with minimal infrastructure overhead.
- Built a TypeScript/Node.js CLI that automated model packaging and cloud provisioning, reducing 35+ manual steps to a single command.
- Developed AWS CDK infrastructure for Lambda (Docker), API Gateway, S3, and ECR to enable reproducible, low-cost inference pipelines.
- Implemented a React-based testing interface and authored a public case study covering architecture, deployment patterns, and model-ops challenges.
Consultant
Data Kinetic
06.2024 - 12.2024
- Collaborated on defining user personas and workflow needs for AI workflow agents supporting medical group operations.
Software Engineer
Independent
01.2021 - 01.2024
- PostGuard AI: Built a RAG application detecting fraudulent job postings using Instructor embeddings, LangChain, pgvector, and OpenAI (React + Express).
- Basket-Case: Developed a webhook inspection tool with a live React dashboard, Express backend, WebSockets, and MongoDB/PostgreSQL.
- Timely: Created a Ruby/Sinatra scheduling application with ERB templates and PostgreSQL.
Education
B.S. - Biochemistry
UCLA
01.2013
Skills
- Backend & Data: Nodejs, TypeScript, Express, Ruby, Sinatra, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, SQL schema design, SQL migrations, multi-schema data pipelines, ETL workflows, high-volume sync pipelines, async concurrency
- Cloud & DevOps: AWS (Lambda, API Gateway, S3, ECR, ECS, EC2, CDK), DigitalOcean, Heroku, Docker, Nginx, serverless architecture, IaC
- MikroORM, logging/tracing, diagnostics, ephemeral DB testing, entity conversion workflows
- Frontend & Tools: React, TypeScript, JavaScript, HTML/CSS, Git/GitHub, WebSockets, Postman
Timeline
Backend Software Engineer
Edlink (Epiphany)
06.2025 - Current
Software Engineer, Co-Creator
Nimbus
12.2024 - 05.2025
Consultant
Data Kinetic
06.2024 - 12.2024
Software Engineer
Independent
01.2021 - 01.2024
B.S. - Biochemistry
UCLA