About Me

Hello! I am Franz Alarcon, a 21-year-old Filipino American pursuing a career in the computer science field. My current interests include application/desktop programming and game development. However, I am willing to learn and explore a wide variety of fields in the industry.

Education

My first introduction to higher education was through the Running Start program, where I attended Everett Community College (EVCC) for a year. After I graduated from high school, I continued to attend EVCC for an additional year.

After completing all necessary prerequisite courses, I transferred to the University of Washington Bothell campus under the Computer Science and Software Engineering (CSSE) major. I will graduate with a CSSE bachelor's degree after the Fall 2023 quarter.

Programming Background

During my time at university, I took several CSSE courses to cover a wide variety of fields. The following is a list of some of the courses I completed:

• Data Structures and Algorithms
• Software Engineering
• Hardware and Computer Organization
• Parallel and Distributed Computing
• Introduction to Game Development
• Operating Systems
• Web Programming and Applications
• Network Architecture and Management
• Database Systems

From these courses, I completed multiple assignments and projects that helped my gain experience in various programming tasks and languages. One of my favorite class assignments was a group project to develop a video game .

Outside of school, I also work on various personal projects. Some of these include a C++ console GUI and custom addons for video games .

Why Computer Science?

I fell in love with the practice of programming when I started playing LittleBigPlanet 2 as a child. The LittleBigPlanet game series allows players to create their own levels and has its own logic system similar to block programming. I was facinated by the ability to develop complex abilities and behaviors from scratch and addicted to watching the whole system slowly come together into a complex, interwoven machine.

I eventually got into language-based programming in my freshman year of high school in an introductory computer science class. I learned how to write very simple HTML and CSS websites, along with a small amount of Javascript. It was the most fun I had in a high school course, abeit helped by my friends' company.

I wouldn't delve too deeply into developing my programming skills until I began Running Start. Everett Community College provided multiple introductory computer science courses that I knew I wanted to join from my past experiences. Since then, I have drastically improved my programming skills and knowledge.

Computer programming, to me, is the act of solving problems and developing solutions by instructing computers on what to do. Every problem is a puzzle that needs to be analyzed and solved. This process of solving complex problems and watching as a solution slowly begins to develop is an amazing feeling for me.