I'm Walter, a Senior Product Engineer at beatBread. I build internal tools, customer-facing software, and the systems that support them.
I study philosophy at the University of Utah, alongside computer science and mathematics. My projects also explore AI, education, and reasoning.
Building systems. Examining assumptions. Continuing to learn.
At beatBread, my work spans product architecture, internal operations, customer-facing software, and developer infrastructure. I began programming at seven; the work I do now has grown through professional engineering, research, and building tools around people's needs.
I work across requirements, architecture, implementation, and delivery, with other engineers and the people who use the software.
I'm a philosophy major at the University of Utah, studying computer science and mathematics. After a spring 2026 semester at the Utah Asia Campus in South Korea, I'm back in Salt Lake City. Philosophy gives me room for sustained reading, writing, and questions that matter beyond preparing for a job.
I'm a product engineer and a philosophy student. I care about understanding difficult systems, making them useful, and taking responsibility for how they work.
June 19–21, 2026
Built the software system for our team's phone-based AI assistance prototype. Team: Walter Shewmake, David Ross, and Rodney Courtright; David developed the clinical decision logic.
Role: Software system builder
Outcome: Our three-person team won first place at the 2026 mission:BRAIN Global Neurosurgery Hackathon. LUCID is a hackathon prototype, not a clinically validated or deployed medical service.
RELS 3500 · Utah Asia Campus
Spring 2026 · Prepared for June 4 presentation
Completed a fieldwork and presentation project on how Buddhist monastics understand the value of their traditions for secular visitors, drawing on participation at Musangsa and an interview with Zen Master Tan Wol.
Role: Student researcher and presentation author
Outcome: Completed the fieldwork and presentation project in May 2026, connecting my study of philosophy and religion with experience in South Korea. Prepared the work for a June 4 presentation.
University of Utah · Utah Asia Campus
Spring 2026 · Completed semester abroad
Studied at the Utah Asia Campus in South Korea before returning to Salt Lake City.
Medical-humanities coursework · Unity
Fall 2025
Built a first-person educational interpretation exploring cognitive impairment and dependence on environmental cues.
Role: Developer
Outcome: An educational interpretation of cognitive impairment, rather than a clinically validated representation of living with dementia.
CalHacks 12.0
October 24–26, 2025 · Hackathon prototype
Led software and mobile-product work for a team prototype connecting wearable sensors with movement feedback.
Role: Software and mobile-product lead
Outcome: Delivered a functional team hackathon prototype. The project demonstrates wearable/mobile integration, not clinical effectiveness or a deployed medical service.
Interactive reasoning tool
Fall 2025
Built a browser editor for outlining arguments and premises with automatically updated references, local saving, and keyboard controls.
Role: Designer and developer
Outcome: A usable connection between engineering and philosophy: a focused workspace for inspecting the structure of reasoning while writing. Available directly on this site.
August 2025–Present
Own significant architecture and implementation work across internal operations, customer-facing products, and developer infrastructure, collaborating with engineers and domain experts.
Fall 2025–Present
Current study in Salt Lake City includes philosophy, computer science, and mathematics. My academic plan includes computer science and a mathematics minor; formal CS declaration depends on completing CS 2420.
March 2025 · School-level award
Received Snow Canyon High School's Computer Technology Sterling Scholar award.
U.S. Department of Education
January 2025 candidate list
Listed as a Career and Technical Education candidate in the 2025 U.S. Presidential Scholars Program, following a reported nomination in November 2024.
Door-to-door sales software
May 2024–April 2025
Built and launched a React Native/Expo sales app, with responsibility for product architecture and delivery. Stepped away in April 2025.
Role: Former Co-Founder & CTO
Outcome: Built and operated a sales product through its launch, owning the mobile application and its supporting systems. My involvement ended in April 2025.
Utah Tech University Annual Programming Contest
March 2024
Placed third in the advanced division as a team with Colby Starr.
January–August 2024
Implemented hierarchical classification using vector embeddings and similarity search, with an API, taxonomy import pipeline, and performance profiling.
Role: AI Research Intern
Outcome: The project README documents a historical peak of 49.5 requests per second using seven t3.micro application instances and text-embedding-3-large. The repository includes profiling results and classification analysis alongside the implementation.
January 2024–August 2025
Took on product engineering responsibilities across internal tools and customer-facing systems.
Genetics calculator
November 2023
Built a web calculator for genetics coursework.
Role: Developer
Outcome: An early example of turning a classroom need into a working tool.
Intern → Technology Associate / contract work
January–December 2023
Joined as an intern in January; continued in an associate/contract capacity later in 2023 before becoming Product Engineer in January 2024.
Technology Intern
January–May 2023
Technology Associate
May 2023–January 2024
November 2022
Our team placed second in the industry division of the programming competition.
During high school · Completed before fall 2025
Completed substantial concurrent-enrollment coursework while attending Snow Canyon High School, before enrolling at the University of Utah.
Graduated 2025
Completed high school alongside concurrent-enrollment study at Utah Tech University.
Biology coursework · Unity
Earlier biology coursework
Built an interactive 3D cell model for a classroom project.
Role: Developer
Outcome: Created for a classroom demonstration, applying software development to learning biology.
Selected work spanning AI systems, mobile architecture, and tools for learning
Phone-based AI assistance for low-resource settings
Software system builder
First-place hackathon prototype
June 19–21, 2026
Classifying information within flexible taxonomies using vector search
AI Research Intern
Research internship · Code and demo available
January–August 2024
Mobile software for door-to-door sales teams
Former Co-Founder & CTO
Past startup work · App launched during my tenure
May 2024–April 2025
A working editor for making the structure of an argument visible
Designer and developer
Working tool on this site
Fall 2025
The Value of Buddhist Traditions for Secular Visitors of Templestay Programs
Student researcher and presentation author
Completed fieldwork and presentation project
Spring 2026 · Prepared for June 4 presentation
Wearable sensors and software for movement feedback
Software and mobile-product lead
CalHacks prototype
October 24–26, 2025
An educational interpretation of cognitive impairment and environmental cues
Developer
Medical-humanities coursework
Fall 2025
Custom websites and platforms built around client needs
Founder and developer
Freelance portfolio
Client work from March 2022
Classroom assessment and reporting for teachers
Developer
Historical school deployment
Earlier educational software
A 3D cell model for biology coursework
Developer
Educational experiment
Earlier biology coursework
A genetics calculator built for coursework
Developer
Educational experiment
November 2023
From colleagues and mentors
"Walter's ability to advance our products using state‑of‑the‑art technology is truly distinctive."
"He led our team from ideation to execution and set a new benchmark for innovation."
"Walter's reputation reached me before I met him."
"Out of 3,000 students I've taught over 17 years, Walter ranks #1 across all STEM abilities."
"Rarely do you come across a student with so much drive and love for computer science."
"The impact of Walter's software helped our school reach the needs of hundreds of students. He simplified complex systems so they ran efficiently and displayed data teachers could act on."
Technical expertise organized by category
