Meet Shawn, the PhD Building and Improving the Stride App on Android

Shawn is celebrating his 2 year anniversary at Stride—here’s a bit about his journey as Stride’s Android Developer.

Shawn, you’re an Android Developer here at Stride—tell us a bit about what you do.

I work on our mileage and expense tracking Android app. Specifically, I write the code that makes it work. I rewrote our mileage tracking feature over a year ago to make it more maintainable and improve the integrity of the drive data. I wrote half of the code for our “working hours” feature, and I’m always trying to improve app stability under the hood.

Where are you from originally?

I’m originally from Grand Rapids, Michigan — home of Founders beer.

What were you doing before you joined Stride?

Before Stride, I got my PhD in mathematics from UC Davis. I wrote my dissertation in computational knot theory. While I was finishing my degree, I worked on an Android app for tracking canonical Star Wars media as a personal side project, which spurred my interest in Android development.

What’s the most rewarding part about working at Stride?

I like that the app I work on is actually helping people in some way. Come tax time, our app is saving money for 1099 workers.

What’s your favorite memory at Stride (so far)?

Meeting everyone in person at the (first) retreat. It was great to meet and interact with people who I don’t work directly with and also to see the people I work with daily in “real life.”

What are some of your hobbies and interests?

I run a weekly Dungeons and Dragons game as a Dungeon Master. Also, I try to follow the extended Star Wars universe (Rebels is criminally underrated, and the Claudia Gray novels are all worth reading).

What opportunities are you most excited for within the next year at Stride?

Continuing to improve the mobile app, inside and out. One specific thing will be trying out some potential improvements to the drive reminders (forgot-to-start and forgot-to-stop notifications).

What’s on your Spotify playlist these days?

I have a tendency towards a little bit of everything. Recently I’ve been enjoying some nostalgic trips to the time from the mid-90’s to the early 2010’s. My new music tends to strongly correlate to what is played on NPR All Songs Considered. I’ve been cataloging my listening habits since 2007 here.

What’s a fun fact about yourself that the team would be surprised to know?

Apparently nothing. We had a “guess whose fun fact this is” game at our last company retreat, and I fooled absolutely no one.

Want to work with Shawn and help everyone save time and money on their taxes? We’re hiring!