David Shan
David ShanAbout Me
Thinker Toronto, CanadaYEARS OLD
Who Am I
It is challenging to characterize oneself in a mere website, yet ironically, many's perceptions of me will be based on the next few lines that I spent just a couple hours of my life writing.
"He who has a why to live can bear almost any how." - Friedrich Nietzsche
Throughout my life, my search for meaning changes along with my view of the world. In turn, my answer of who I am changes.
Nowadays, what I choose to devote my energy to is a combination of meeting interesting people, making an impact, and broadening my perspectives.
Paul Graham, in his essay How To Do Great Work, wrote," Don't let 'work' mean something other people tell you to do. If you do manage to do great work one day, it will probably be on a project of your own or something you'll be driving."
This path has led me to develop my own interests and build for a better world. Where fleet drivers can drive safely and efficiently. Where students can have unlimited study material. Where villages can have early warning of wildfires through satellite data, and finally wheremarine capture can be improved with algae.
My work
Portfolio
- ○ Founding Engineer at Linkd, building people search backed by Y Combinator (X25) and Cory Levy
- ○ Heading First Robotic Competition Team 610's programming department
- ○ Leading Crescent School's Data Science Club, Math Club, and Computer Science Club
- ○ Guiding 10+ members to build equipment signout and monitoring tool for Crescent School's Media Department to positively impact the school community
- ○ Working on a real estate appraisal algorithm and platform for real estate agents (revenue generating)
- ○ Cofounded a startup in the video editing industry, funded for 25,000 dollars by Telora
- ○ Interned at Geotab, the biggest commercial telematics platform in the world, to work on their driver app
- ○ Core Engineer building MANTIS, an AI-powered data-science cognitive cartography workbench, with Dr. Manolis Kellis at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab. Worked on the agentic workflow sector and a part of the leadership team.
- ○ Researched, designed, and programmed printed circuit board to track elderly's vitals funded for 3,000 dollars
- ○ Led backend development for Aceflow, an edtech startup advised by Stanford University's Director of Digital Learning Solutions with over 2,000 signups, a revenue generating beta, and funded by Emergent Ventures, Microsoft, and Ingenious+ innovation award
- ○ Developed Rigid Ramp Walker and Ruler Trick Simulation using Mujoco and 4th-Degree Runge Kutta's method, helping Crescent School win Canadian Youth Physics Tournament gold medal
- ○ Ideated biomarine carbon capture startup to 10x carbon sequestration in the ocean, winning best overall in that hackathon
- ○ Published big data research paper on using semantic segmentation to detect wildfires, winning 1,000 dollars
- ○ Wrote manuscript on using data science to investigate the negative connotations of subsidized housing and another on weighting country-based factors that affect youth mortality rates
- ○ Built toys for students with developmental disability to enhance their artistic talent and socialization skills
- ○ Consulted alongside Google and Microsoft to solve their biggest problems in data centers and customer support
- ○ Built 10+ hackathon projects, winning hundreds of dollars worth of awards
- ○ Two time AIME Qualifier and Honor Roll on 15+ Math and Programming Competitions
- ○ Played for the Ontario Provincial Table Tennis Team and was ranked 6th in Ontario.
- ○ Compete in the USACO Gold Division
- ○ Instruct Skiing with CSIA Level I Skiing License
- ○ Completed the Haliburton 50km Race