drake bartolai

github ↗linkedin ↗email ↗resume →

at a glance

currently in my senior year at illinois studying computer engineering; graduating in may 2027

planning to get my masters of computer science in chicago through illinois

interned as a tech consultant at west monroe during summer of 2026

i love exploring computers, ai, and all things technology. especially trying to balance learning to take advantage of ai without losing cognitive ability for tasks like math, coding, reading, etc.

also a big fan of reading, writing, cooking, and listening to music.

Operating System - built a Unix-style kernel. i developed filesystem, virtual memory, and shell functionality. c, assembly, gdb, concurrency.

Order Book Visualizer - team lead for order book replay/viz tool. i learned so much about parsing packets, C++, WASM, WebGL, and more

minitorch - a smaller version of pytorch i developed. tensors with dynamic automatic differentiation, neural-network layers and losses, SGD optimization, data loading, and MNIST classification

fpga tetris - had to write an hdmi driver, keybord/usb drivers, and also implement all of the functionality using systemverilog and digital logic

flint - my first iOS app. it's a journal prompt generator that is aware of my calendar, reminders, and the time of day. i think that making llms aware of the time that tasks take for people is such a huge unlock, on top of adding the current time to their system prompts. as humans we are always aware of the time and it pretty much governs everything we do, and i think that would bring ai much closer to feeling human.

this - my personal website! i had a very specific vision for this page and i hope to maintain it as a living reflection of where i'm at and what i'm up to. i want this to be completely human and authentic, no question whether i've written anything on the page. it should feel like the card inside a library book which has the stamps from previous borrowers.

see all projects here ->

relevant courses

some of the more technical courses i've taken with real project-based learning

experience

west monroe - i was a tech consulting intern (summer 2026) at west monroe partners in downtown chicago. this was a super great experience. the culture here was amazing, i loved all of the people, and i got staffed on a really neat client project. most of my client work took place in salesforce but i didn't realize how much engineering actually went into this platform. each org is basically like a huge web app and i still spent a lot of time writing python and javascript. i also co-led an ai seminar for employees and interns, and helped with some product work for the library of internal tools.

id tech camps - my summer job in 2025 was the lead instructor at a location for iD Tech. it's a coding summer camp where i taught python, robotics, and c++. i also led a team of 12+ instructors and we saw around 300 campers throughout the summer. as lead instructor i organized pickup and drop off, helped the other instructors hone in on their teaching skills, and was a main leader for the overnight camps when other instructors would go home.

acannability - my first internship was for a startup called acannability. i was writing code for their wordpress site alongside their main developer. pretty much i combed through their scientific research, condensed that into bite sized information, and synthesized it into a periodic table of cannabis molecules. this is currently being used for medical advice and further research into cannabis.

tutoring - i've been tutoring longer than i've been doing most things in my life. since my sophomore year of high school i've been preparing students for standardized exams, helping with homework, and providing general education/mentorship. i've assisted with chicago high school entrance exams, ACT, SAT, AP exams, and other non-standardized schoolwork.

tech services - as a freelancer i help friends and people i know implement technology and ai into their small businesses. i've created landing pages, stripe integrations, email automations, and more. i'm working on growing this business as time goes on because i love providing the support and helping entrepreneurs.