Ernesto Roja
Ernesto Roja is currently a senior at the University of Florida, majoring in Computer Science while also pursuing a minor in Digital Arts and Sciences, and is expected to graduate in May 2024. Alongside his academic responsibilities, Ernesto is currently working as a part-time, back-end software engineer at Dun & Bradstreet where he learned how to design systems that are more scalable, maintainable, and adaptable to evolving business needs. Additionally, Ernesto has gained valuable experience in refactoring existing code bases and implementing functional testing using Docker and Jenkins which provided him with a deeper understanding of the importance of automated testing. Before his current role, Ernesto was a software engineering intern at Dun & Bradstreet as he worked closely with the machine learning team to integrate machine learning into production features. His internship experience paved the way for a smooth transition into his current role, equipping him with the necessary skills to immediately impact the company and its products. Beyond his academic and professional endeavors, Ernesto actively participated in various student organizations. He was a member of the Society of Software Developers, where he played a pivotal role in the development of a mobile application for attendance tracking. His contributions extended to the Association for Computing Machinery, where he organized group activities and mentored junior students in writing efficient, maintainable, and comprehensive code. All these positive experiences helped in shaping Ernesto’s technical and leadership skills, which he later applied to his professional career. Outside of his academic responsibilities, Ernesto enjoys rock climbing and playing volleyball where he gets the opportunity to meet new people.
Jason Rodriguez
Jason Rodriguez is currently a 4th year senior in the University of Florida pursuing a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering with a minor in Digital Arts and Sciences. He plans to graduate with this degree in May of 2024. Jason is currently a member of one of the Raytheon teams in the Integrated Process and Product Design program at UF, where him and his team have been tasked to work with SemGrep and Machine Learning to further improve cybersecurity as new vulnerabilities in code arise.
On top of his academics, Jason spends a good amount of his free time participating in club activities and working on personal projects. He is an active member in the Society of Software Developers, where every week he meets and networks with other students and developers, as well as participates in projects and helps others that may be new to writing code. Some of the projects he has worked on include a Chrome extension that can be used to write notes while watching videos online, and a movie recommender, which uses online movie and TV show databases and multiple data structures and search algorithms to recommend users new movies and TV shows to watch based on their input.
Jason also has a passion for video games which, with the help of his Digital Arts and Sciences minor, has led him to develop multiple video games of his own from fighting games to a 2D side-scrolling platformer. Whenever he finds spare time, he also loves to be active by playing volleyball and running.
Jacob Shirey
Jacob Shirey is currently in his 4th year of study at the University of Florida. He plans to graduate in May of 2024 with a major in Computer Science from the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering and a minor in Geography from the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences.
Jacob conducts research at the Jain Lab, and is working on a partnered research project with the Brooks Equine Genetics Lab studying livestock locomotive health using machine learning. Jacob is heavily involved with the Center for Outdoor Recreation and Education (CORE) at the University of Florida, a program area in the Department of Recreational Sports. There he guides wilderness backpacking, kayaking, and surfing trips for university students and staff, including five-day expeditions through Everglades National Park. Additionally, Jacob has served one year as the Outfitter Program Assistant, one of the three student leadership positions at CORE, where he maintained the program’s entire outdoor equipment inventory.
This past summer, Jacob was a software engineering intern at SLS Consulting, a fire protection and life-safety design firm. Jacob and his team prototyped a web application for the firm’s internal business processes, and gained valuable experience with full stack web development and automated testing.
Jacob aspires to develop technology at the crux of artificial intelligence and the natural world. He is a demonstrated leader and actively seeks responsibility in the workplace. In his free time, Jacob enjoys learning new skills and being on the move. He loves gardening and rock climbing.
Alexander Martin
Alex is a member of the Raytheon project for the Integrated Process and Product Design program at UF. He worked as research assistant for Professor Eakta Jain in the summer of 2023 with a focus on Deep Reinforcement Learning while also assisting with some research on Strabismus and Amblyopia. He started his computer science journey working as a substitute teacher who wanted to know how computers worked. When a friend mentioned having issues viewing photos on his TV, Alex wasted no time in coding an image converter with a GUI to enable his friend to view the photos.
Alex is interested in several computer science topics including game development, machine learning, and Operating Systems. He spends his time running Stable Diffusion and learning game programming.
Ethan Graff
Ethan Graff is a 5th year senior at the University of Florida majoring in Computer and Information Science and Engineering and minoring in Digital Arts and Science. He is from Tampa, and has recently returned from a study abroad semester in Munich, Germany where he attended Hochschule München (Munich University of Applied Sciences) and took courses focused on Computer Science. Before he traveled abroad, Ethan had a summer internship with the software company SAP where he worked with the Concur team.
While Ethan may not have experience with Cyber security, he does have experience using Pytorch for machine learning in some of his earlier classes. He also has a great deal of experience with programming languages like C++, C#, and Java.
One of Ethan’s hobbies is to create small video games using the video game creator tool Unity. His favorite game that he has created so far is about a small wizard that has to manage a bar. He is also an avid football fan and soccer player.