MEET OUR TEAM
EXECUTIVE LEADERSHIP
Cayden Tu
Advisory Board
Program Co-Director
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Cayden is a freshman at Duke University in the Pratt School of Engineering. Cayden continues the legacy of Junior Robotics and its mission to provide free STEM education to underrepresented students in the San Francisco Bay Area and throughout the Carolinas. He serves on the JR Robotics Advisory Board and continues to provide advice to the current executive team. Cayden continues to expand his vision of accessible programming instruction by providing educational opportunities to students in rural and under-resourced communities. Cayden is very passionate about computer science, data science, and engineering. He enjoys teaching coding to young students through this program. His hobbies include writing for the school newspaper, playing tennis, coding, and STEM research. Cayden hopes to continue following these passions into a career in data science and engineering.
Chris Voon
Program Co-Director
Lead Instructor
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Chris is a senior at St. Ignatius College Preparatory in San Francisco, CA. He is the lead instructor and co-developed the curriculum at Junior Robotics. He loves to teach and spark others' interest in STEM. Chris is the lead programmer for FIRST Robotics Team 5924, Golden Gate Robotics. He also develops various open-source personal projects.
CURRICULUM INSTRUCTORS
Elliot Chu
Programming Instructor
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Elliot is a sophomore at The King’s Academy in Sunnyvale, California. Elliot is very eager about computer science and robotics, but he also enjoys using these talents to teach younger students. He has been learning programming starting from Scratch since 4th grade and has programmed with Python for 3 years. He really enjoys using Python to make AI projects. During his spare time, he also enjoys playing a variety of sports including tennis, golf, and basketball.
Ronald Wen
Community Outreach
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Ronald is a senior at St. Ignatius College Preparatory in San Francisco, CA. He is the new community outreach board member and is excited to promote its fun and educational programs. He loves anything technology related, constantly learning about the ways it impacts our world. Ronald also likes to play volleyball and soccer, sports he really finds fun to do in his free time. He also likes to play the drums for the school orchestra and volunteer for the Millbrae Leos Club, for which he is the current president/ soon to be past president. Ronald is excited to be able to work with other passionate students in JR Robotics, helping out in any way he can.
Michael Cole
Programming Instructor
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Michael is a sophomore at St. Ignatius College Prep. He is a programmer for FRC Team 5924 and an avid swimmer/water polo player. Michael joined his grammar school’s robotics club in 3rd grade and has enjoyed it ever since. During his free time he works on building apps that access AI powered APIs to transcribe audio, generate images, and write text.
Joshua Arent
Mechanical Instructor
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Joshua Arent is a senior at Saint Ignatius College Preparatory in San Francisco, California. Joshua has been pursuing robotics since sixth grade, with a concentration on Mechanical Engineering and design. He specializes in a few CAD softwares, including Solidworks and Onshape. He is also interested in studying biomedical engineering. In his leisure time, Joshua enjoys pursuing his entrepreneurial ambition by starting businesses and participating in water sports such as surfing, swimming, and hydrofoiling.
Daniel Gao
Advisory Board
Curriculum Development
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Daniel is a junior at the University of Southern California studying Computer Science. He serves on the JR Robotics Advisory Board and continues to provide advice to the executive team. His hobbies include photography, music, and robotics. He has a strong interest in the STEM field - mainly tech and computer science. Daniel helps out in Junior Robotics by teaching Python–a programming language.
EMERITUS INSTRUCTORS
Maanit Sharma
Founder & President, Lead
Instructor
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Maanit is a senior at UC Berkeley studying Computer Science. He developed Junior Robotics in the summer of 2020 to provide online coding education to students who had lost access to in-person learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In his free time, Maanit enjoys producing music, playing guitar, and exploring autonomy in robotics.
Kalel Gadduang
Co-Director (Finance & Operations) & Social Media Coordinator
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Kalel is a senior at CalPoly, San Luis Obispo. Kalel was responsible for managing finance and operations and enjoys working for Junior Robotics. Kalel enjoys playing and watching football (go 'niners!), hanging out with his friends, and watching good comedy TV shows.
Reilly Derrick
Programming Instructor​
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Reilly is a junior at UCLA. She was one of the original lead programming instructors for Junior Robotics. Reilly is very passionate about computer science and was lucky enough to be introduced to programming at a young age. She hopes to give other young students the opportunities she had by working with Junior Robotics to introduce and teach kids about coding.
Gabriele Scotto di Vettimo
Website Designer & Instructor​
Gabriele is a junior at the University of Illinois studying Computer Science. He joined Junior Robotics at the start of his junior year in high school while a student at St. Ignatius in San Francisco. He led the website development team of students in designing this site and is an instructor for Junior Robotics.
Masha Vtorushina
Social Media Coordinator​
Masha is a junior in college. Masha loves to code and enjoys teaching others new things to inspire them. Outside of academics, she is a competitive dancer who has won many regional competitions and currently holds a US national champion title. Masha is also fluent in Russian.