Aspiring Systems Programmer with Low-Level Focus

Ian J Sawyer

North Vernon, IN, *****

********@****-******.***

812-***-****

Computer Science Student Eager to Apply Knowledge in Low-Level Programming to Secure a Full-Time Position as a Systems Programmer

Education

Bachelor of Science, Computer Science May 2026

Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, Terre Haute, IN GPA: 2.76 Major GPA: 3.03 Jennings County High School, North Vernon, IN May 2022 Honors: National Honor Society GPA: 3.9

Skills

Programming Languages: C, Java, Javascript, Python, Go, SQL Tools & Technologies: Git, Systems Programming, network socket programming, MS Office Suite Operating Systems: Linux, Windows

Work Experience

Montrow Group, North Vernon, IN Summer 2025

CNC Wire Operator

Key Transferable Skills:

• Communication: Collaborated and communicated with my supervisor and members of other departments to ensure that operations were completed by the deadline

• Problem-solving skills: troubleshooting machine issues, efficient part set-ups in machine

• Attention to detail: quality assurance, minimizing production errors. Projects

Capstone Project: Puzzle Hunt Management Platform August 2025 – Present

• Developed full-stack features for a puzzle hunt platform using MySQL, a JavaScript REST API, and Svelte, enabling teams to securely access and solve puzzles during live events.

• Designed and implemented server-side puzzle validation logic to prevent answer leakage and enforce game integrity, and built admin-facing CRUD workflows for puzzle management.

• Collaborated with a four-person engineering team and coordinated directly with the client to refine requirements and adjust implementations based on feedback. Microkernel Operating System Research Project December 2025 - Present

• Researched microkernel and monolithic kernel architectures to inform the design of a custom microkernel operating system, with emphasis on process isolation, interprocess communication

(IPC), and kernel responsibility boundaries.

• Performed in-depth analysis of process control block (PCB) designs in exisitng production-level operating systems to evaluate real-world tradeoffs in scheduling, fault handling, and capability management.

• Modernized the project’s build infrastructure by migrating from a Make-based system to Meson, improving maintainability and iteration speed for development. Personal Project: Network Stack for the Xv6 OS Summer 2025

• Designed and implemented a custom network driver and UDP network stack for the Xv6 operating system, enabling inter-machine packet transmission.

• Built support for Ethernet, ARP, and UDP, including address resolution, packet construction/parsing, and port-based demultiplexing.

• Integrated a socket-like API into Xv6, modeled after Linux sockets, supporting socket, bind, recvfrom, and sendto .

• Gained hands-on experience debugging low-level networking in QEMU and with Wireshark, developing a deeper understanding of protocol interactions and driver/OS boundaries.

• Strengthened expertise in network protocol design (ARP, UDP, TCP basics), concurrency control in device drivers, and the internals of Linux socket abstractions. Activities

Rose-Hulman

• Competitive Programming Team 2024 – 2025

• Intramural Sports 2022 – Present

High-School

• Soccer – 2 years captain 2018 – 2022

• Baseball – 4 years varsity 2018 – 2022

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