2026 Associate Software Digital Engineer - Rolling Meadows IL - Rolling Meadows IL at Northrop Grumman
Rolling Meadows, IL
$77,700–$116,500from the description
Jun 28, 2026
Rolling Meadows, IL
Jul 21, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
An entry-level digital engineering role focused on designing, simulating, implementing, and verifying programmable logic (FPGA) for defense navigation, targeting, and self-protection systems. Day-to-day work involves digital logic development in HDL languages, debugging on real hardware, and collaborating with experienced engineers through the full design lifecycle. Suited to recent graduates in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or Computer Science who hold or can obtain a DoD Secret clearance.
Junior level · Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN-WI · Bachelor's required · Secret clearance · Full-time
“or” means any one of them counts — you don't need all of them.
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
Why we read it this way (6)
This is an entry-level / campus-hire role explicitly framed as 'Entry Level' and tagged '#campusjobs'. The advertised salary range ($77,700–$116,500/year) spans Bachelor's-level new-grad compensation.
The core hard requirements are degree completion in CS, Computer Engineering, or Electrical Engineering, plus a final DoD Secret clearance at start — no specific technology skills are gated in the required section.
All named technologies (VHDL, Verilog, SystemVerilog, Vivado, Quartus, FPGA workflow, MATLAB, Python, C/C++) appear exclusively under 'Preferred Qualifications' and are explicitly described as 'helpful, though not required' coursework exposure.
The role centers on digital/programmable logic (FPGA design, HDL) rather than traditional software development; 15-1299 (Computer Occupations, All Other) is noted as a plausible alternative given the hardware-adjacent nature of the work, but 15-1252 is used as the primary code since the JD frames the position as SW/DT engineering with a software design-and-development focus.
A Secret clearance is required to start; the ability to obtain Special Access Program (SAP) access is also listed as a hard requirement.
Requires a Secret clearance — the cleared population is a small fraction of this occupation, so the real candidate pool is materially smaller than the estimate below, which does not model clearance.
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