Ever since the age of six, Elijah Lopez (12) has dedicated his time to learning programming and computer coding. His father, Eric Lopez, worked in the computing industry when he was growing up, and took interest in coding. So far in high school he’s taken Computer Programming, Exploring Computer Science, and AP Computer Science. But most of what he’s learned has been from doing research on his own, watching videos, and completing programming exercises.
His first major project was a website he made for a politician running for school board in his county. One of his latest ventures has been DiyHub, a project that he started this year with Heritage alumni Ben Phillips.
“DiyHub is a search engine for DIY projects where users can input the materials they already have and pull from a database of projects that utilize those parts,” said Lopez. “Ben Phillips had the idea to make the application and he wanted me to help him out in terms of the frontend side of the website.”
This website was not formed without some roadblocks, however. He had to learn new development framework to be able to make the web application function as intended. The biggest lesson he learned was to be patient in terms of development and marketing, as it can sometimes take a long time before an idea can become reality and be discovered by people.
More recently, he started on a solo project that he calls TvachaCare.
“I got the idea for TvachaCare when I was tasked by a consultant of a non-profit with building a medical application for a hospital in India,” stated Lopez. “I got the name TvachaCare because tvacha is the Hindi word for ‘skin’ and it originally started out as an application for dermatologists at the hospital.”
He plans on growing TvachaCare by getting Resurge, a medical company in Silicon Valley, to use the software and recommend it to other companies looking for an alternative to their current software.
“I plan on continuing to grow in the field of programming and learning everything there is to know. I want to continue building projects not only for business purposes, but also for fun!” told Lopez. “I would love to have the opportunity to make a career out of computer programming and contribute to solving the problems we face. I hope to build my skills in computer science and help those in need.”
He plans on attending MIT in the future, so he can further increase his knowledge in computer programming. He would love to have the opportunity to make a career out of computer programming and contribute to solving the problems we face everyday.