About

Hi! I’m Nathan. Thank you for checking out my site. The majority of the content I publish here is technical, so this page is your chance to learn a little more about me.

Education

I graduated from the University of Arizona in May 2026 with a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science. Before Arizona, I grew up in Washington, where I earned my associate’s degree alongside my high school diploma through the state’s Running Start1 program.

During Spring 2025 I worked as a Teaching Assistant for CSc 346: Cloud Computing2 at the University of Arizona.

High School Robotics

Egypt Expedition

For 4 years I was part of ORF 4450, an FRC robotics3 team. I joined as a freshman when the roster was small. 4 of us became the dedicated core that season, and by the time I graduated the team had grown to nearly 50 members. In my third year, one of our mentors connected us with a mother in Egypt whose son attended a STEM school in Cairo doing Lego-based robotics, and we set out to raise the funds to bring metal-based robotics there. Over the next 10 months we raised more than $60,000 through local community outreach, and in the summer before my senior year we took 17 students to Cairo with several FTC kits, plus a custom curriculum and culminating game I co-designed as one of the team’s most senior members. The following season, the team also made it to the FRC World Championships in Houston to compete for the Impact Award.

Myself and the teams co-captain at the Cairo STEM school working on FTC robotics kits with our group
Myself and the teams co-captain at the Cairo STEM school working on FTC robotics kits with our group.

Other Experiences

During the last 2 years I spent on the team I served as Safety Captain, which put me in charge of all shop, robot, and event safety. Additionally, in my final year I led the robot build team into the FRC World Championship.

Our team's pit at the FRC World Championships in Houston
Our pit at the FRC World Championships.

My experience in FRC shaped me as a person, engineer, problem solver, teammate, and leader. I knew I wanted to pursue a Computer Science degree before joining; after leaving high school, I knew more than ever that I wanted a career as technical and challenging as FRC had been.

Etymology

vetr0s (/ˈvɛt.ri/) comes from the Italian vetri, plural of vetro, meaning “glass” or “windowpane.” The 0 is leet, because hackers have cool nicknames with numbers in them. The plural reflects my appreciation for open-source software, which is why I created this site: to offer a few separate views into my work.

  1. Running Start lets Washington high schoolers take community college classes for joint credit, tuition-free. ↩
  2. CSc 346 covers cloud computing fundamentals: IaaS, PaaS, SaaS, and hands-on work with major providers. ↩
  3. FRC is the FIRST Robotics Competition, the high-school-level league where teams build 120-pound robots in 6 weeks. ↩