About Us
Accel Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE: ACEL) is a growing provider of locals-focused gaming and one of the largest terminal operators in the United States, supporting more than 27,000 electronic gaming terminals in over 4,300 third-party local and regional establishments across ten states. Through exclusive long-term contracts, Accel serves licensed non-casino locations including bars, restaurants, convenience stores, truck stops, gaming cafes, and fraternal and veteran establishments. Accel also owns and operates brick and mortar casinos and a racino venue.
Accel provides its local partners with a turnkey, full-service, capital-efficient gaming solution that encompasses manufacturing, content, payments, loyalty, 24/7 customer service, data analysis and reporting, and cash logistics. The Company’s racino, Fairmount Park Casino & Racing, opened in April 2025 and features over 270 electronic gaming machines, food and beverage amenities, a sports book, para-mutuel betting and 55 days of thoroughbred horse racing a year. For more information, please visit www.accelentertainment.com.
Job Description:
SUMMARY
We are seeking a Junior AI Engineer to support the hands-on execution of AI and data-driven projects across the organization. This role is designed for early-career engineers who are eager to learn, experiment, and build real-world AI solutions under the mentorship of senior team members. The ideal candidate has a solid academic foundation, strong curiosity, and the ability to turn guidance into working code, models, and components that contribute to our AI ecosystem.
DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
- Assist in building and testing machine learning models under direction from senior engineers
- Prepare datasets, perform feature engineering, and contribute to model evaluation
- Implement Python scripts, notebooks, and small services used in AI workflows
- Support development of RAG pipelines, embeddings, and proof-of-concept AI agents
- Document processes, experiments, and code to support team knowledge sharing
- Follow established patterns, governance rules, and coding standards
- Help troubleshoot issues in model performance, data quality, or pipeline reliability
- Support deployment tasks such as packaging code, updating configurations, and validating releases
- Collaborate with engineering and business teams to understand requirements and turn them into actionable tasks
- Assist with integration testing for APIs and systems interacting with AI components
QUALIFICATIONS
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Data Science, AI/ML, or related field
- Must reside in the greater Chicago, IL area
- 0–2 years of experience in AI engineering, machine learning, software development, or academic/portfolio projects
- Foundational Python skills with exposure to ML workflows
- Familiarity with ML frameworks such as scikit-learn, TensorFlow, PyTorch, or Hugging Face
- Understanding of basic data engineering concepts including ETL, notebooks, SQL, and data pipelines
- Strong willingness to learn, ask questions, and iterate based on feedback
- Ability to communicate technical findings clearly
- Preferred: Student projects involving vector search, RAG, or LLMs
- Preferred: Exposure to Azure or cloud environments through coursework, labs, or internships
- Preferred: Exposure to CI/CD concepts or version control workflows
PHYSICAL DEMANDS AND WORK ENVIRONMENT
- Sit for prolonged periods
- Calculate figures and amounts
- Analyze data for trends, errors and ability to transfer between systems
- Frequently required to utilize hand and finger dexterity
- Continually required to talk or hear
- Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision requirements due to computer work
- Access to reliable internet connectivity
- Maintaining and securing a company-provided laptop
The above is intended to describe the general content of, and requirements for, the performance of this job. It is not to be construed as an exhaustive statement of duties, responsibilities, or physical requirements. Nothing in this job description restricts management’s right to assign or reassign duties and responsibilities to this job at any time. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.
Base Pay Range:
80,000-90,000
This range represents the low and high end of the anticipated base salary range for this position. The base salary will depend on a number of factors such as: qualifications, experience level, and skillset.
Voluntary full-time employment benefits include medical, dental, and vision; life, AD&D, critical illness, and hospital insurance; short and long-term disability; identity/legal protection; as well as access to FSA and HSA accounts. Full and part-time employees are eligible to contribute to traditional and/or Roth 401(k) plans. Our Employee Assistance Program (EAP) offers counseling for a multitude of topics including (but not limited to) mental health, finances, adult care, disability, and grief.
Accel Entertainment is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.
Top Skills
What We Do
Accel is a leading distributed gaming operator in the United States on an Adjusted EBITDA basis, and a preferred partner for local business owners in the Illinois market. Accel’s business consists of the installation, maintenance and operation of VGTs, redemption devices that disburse winnings and contain ATM functionality, and other amusement devices in authorized non-casino locations such as restaurants, bars, taverns, convenience stores, liquor stores, truck stops, and grocery stores. Accel has been licensed by the IGB since 2012 and holds a conditional license from the PA Board. As of September 30, 2019, Accel’s VGT operations comprised 10,346 VGTs in 2,290 licensed establishments.
