Harshil Hari

Hi, I'm Harshil Hari and I came to Mass Academy from Hopkinton High School. I work at CodeWiz, where I teach kids how to code basic applications in various coding languages. I also enjoy volunteering at a local warehouse where I organize foodstuffs and clothing. I am a member of the FRC 190 Team, where I make most of my contributions on the electrical subteam. My hobbies include hanging out with friends, mountain biking, tweaking with speakers and listening to music, and coding in my spare time. Below, you'll find a further description of some of my extracurriculars and hobbies and why I enjoy them so much. Thank you for looking at my website!

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Extracurriculars

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I started working with robots since 6th grade, on the VEX IQ competitive robotics program. Entering highschool, I transitioned over to the VEX VRC program, and I lead a team to high position in the NE district competition, involved in roles such as building and autonomous programming. Now, I'm a part of the FIRST Robotics 190 Team, where I work with peers to build a robot with industry-grade design. Specifically, I work on the electrical subteam, and we plan and implement communication between different motors, sensors and mechanisms on the robot. Alongside my role on the team, I have also hosted demo events at public places with our robot to educate others about robotics and engineering as a whole. The experiences I gained from my robotics journey so far taught me not only how to design and engineer a robot, but also built collaborative skills and helped me develop a passion for engineering and problem-solving.

At Codewiz.pngCoding is something I like do in my free time. I've made programs in Python, such as a calculator and a simple snake game. I've done a lot of work with C# and Unity, and I've made a "Floor is Lava" type game and a 2D platformer with Unity. Outside of just coding in my free time, I work at CodeWiz, where I teach students how to build games and simple programs in Lua, C#, and Python, and it's always been a fun time there. Working with the students and solving problems alongside them not only builds the skills of the kids, but also mine as a coder.

At Codewiz.pngI have been volunteering at Project Just Because for nearly two years now. Project Just Because is an organization that offers food and clothing for needy families. My work there involves restocking food and clothing, preparing cardboard for recycling in the warehouse, and cleaning the warehouse at shift ends. Volunteering here is a great experience; you give back to the community in a meaningful way and have fun doing it.

At Codewiz.pngCyberpatriot is a competition based on securing a virtual device by tweaking its software vulnerabilities. I competed in both junior and senior years, and secured Windows, Linux, and Server OS’s alongside my team. In the process, I learned a lot about the inner workings of various OS processes, security features, and system hardening throughout the competition. My team and I won first place in the state, which proved to us that spending a lot of time with any skill can ensure success.

More About Me And My Hobbies

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Music has been a hobby of mine since middle school. I've played in a concert band as a baritone saxophone player, playing at football games, minor league baseball games, and I met lots of great people through it. I've also picked up the drumkit recently and have been jamming to some of my favorite songs on it. I also listen to a lot of music, and some of my favorite artists are Tim Hecker, Nujabes, Boris, Aphex Twin, LCD Soundsystem, and Phil Elverum.

Taking dual enrollment courses at WPI, I took a course for electrical AC and DC circuit analysis. After learning about these, here are some of the circuits that I made, including an LED with modifiable frequency, and a sound amplifier:

At Codewiz.pngBiking is an activity I love doing whenever I have free time. Sometimes I head down to the state park to bike the mountain trails there, and I like to bike on local trails with my friends. I do it for the thrill of the ride, and to challenge myself with tough trails to ride down. I’ve been riding trails since 6th grade, and still do them whenever I can.

At Codewiz.pngI participated in Karate when I was a kid throughout my elementary and middle school years. I did it for 7 years, and I received my black belt through lots of training and learning. What I gained most out of my experience was how much it improved my memory and discipline. It takes a lot of time and persistence to learn all of the forms, variations, and moves, and doing Karate at a young age helped me with those.

At Codewiz.pngI attended classes at Milton Academy when I was in middle school, and taking courses related to robotics, math, and science experiments, this propelled my interest for the STEM field and was what helped me build my love for engineering. The classes had cool demonstrations and fun projects, and they taught me about the makerspace, math for engineering, and much more that would come in handy for STEM.