Caltech Club for Computer Science

Full Name: Alex Roper

Hometown: Ann Arbor, MI

High School: Ann Arbor Huron High School

Academic and research interests: With all the amazing things being developed in CS today it’s so hard to say. My favorites in my time at Caltech have been in compilers and language theory, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. Last summer, I worked as an undergraduate researcher at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, working with a mentor on some new algorithms for multiple instance regression using support-vector machines. In high school, I worked with the SOAR group at the University of Michigan, helping develop and test course curriculum, writing and proofreading documentation and research, and designing AIs and simulations for them using the SOAR framework. My favorite class here at Caltech had to be CS 136, a year-long class on language design, type theory, and a project, for which I wrote a compiler from stripped-down Java to pure lambda calculus.

Other activities: Health Advocates, Undergraduate Academic Standards and Honors Committee, Undergraduate Computer Science Cluster, Dabney Garden, SPECTRE Speculative Fiction library

Interests: Gardening, cooking, biking, hiking, mycology, reading, exploring new places, urban exploration

Future plans: I’m applying to CS grad schools this Fall, and hope to go somewhere I can study languages, AI, compilers, ML, and a smattering of all of CS to finally narrow down on a specific topic. I’m also interested in applying what I have learned here and elsewhere to improve the world, but isn’t everybody at this age?