Available for new opportunities

Michael
Rios

Data scientist and software engineer based in New York. I build machine learning systems, extract insight from messy data, and ship full-stack applications that do something real.

3.97
GPA
M.S. Computer Science, Fordham University
4+
Years
Full-stack & data engineering experience
NYC
Based in
Open to remote and hybrid roles

What I work with

Skills & Tools

Machine Learning

Build & train ML models

Classifiers, clustering pipelines, neural networks, imbalanced-class handling, model evaluation & comparison

Sklearn NumPy Pandas SciPy Imblearn Jupyter Anaconda

Data Engineering

Build data pipelines

Automated scrapers, scheduled ingestion jobs, data cleaning & normalization, multi-source ETL into PostgreSQL

Python PostgreSQL Pandas Selenium REST APIs SQL

Full-Stack Web

Ship web applications

CRUD apps, REST APIs, relational data models, interactive frontends with state management

React Redux Node.js PostgreSQL HTML CSS JavaScript

Data Analysis & Visualization

Explain data to people

Exploratory analysis, statistical summaries, charts & dashboards, written reports for non-technical audiences

Tableau Matplotlib Seaborn Pandas LaTeX Python

Where I've worked

Experience

Sept–Dec 2025

Fordham University

Adjunct Lecturer — Database Systems

  • Taught Database Systems, combining existing curriculum with original lecture content, examples, and assessments
  • Supported student comprehension through structured coursework and direct follow-up

Sept 2024–May 2025

Fordham University

Researcher — Educational Data Mining Lab

  • Clustered college course descriptions using scikit-learn and compared results with existing academic categorizations
  • Used generative AI to synthesize new course syllabi from historical ones
  • Contributed to early-stage research on a custom grading analysis tool

Oct 2021–Present

Fordham University

Reference Librarian & Technical Support Admin

  • Delivers instruction on library research tools to students and faculty
  • Maintains computer systems — software updates, hardware upgrades
  • Cleaned and analyzed catalog data using Python/Pandas to support inventory operations

Oct 2019–Present

Self-Employed

Freelance Software Engineer

  • Built full-stack applications using React, Node.js, and PostgreSQL with custom RESTful APIs
  • Designed automated data pipelines in Python and SQL pulling from Ginnie Mae data sources, updated monthly
  • Migrated client websites across hosting platforms (Bluehost → Google Cloud)
  • Customized client e-commerce storefronts and integrated third-party services

Things I've built

Projects

Neural Networks

Multi-Layer Neural Network from Scratch

Built a fully functional multilayer neural network in plain Python — no ML libraries. Supports configurable layers, neuron counts, and neural suppression.

Classification

Book Genre Classifier

Classified books into seven genres using Sklearn. Compared SVM and Naive Bayes classifiers using confusion matrices to evaluate model accuracy.

Data Visualization

Citi Bike NYC Analysis

Explored biking patterns across New York City using Citi Bike's open data. Pre-processed raw data in Python and built the final visualization in Tableau.

NLP / Clustering

Course Description Clustering

Research project clustering university course descriptions with scikit-learn and comparing automated groupings to existing academic categorizations.

Academic background

Education

M.S. Computer Science

Fordham University — New York, NY

Graduated May 2025

GPA 3.97

M.L.S. Library Science

Queens College, CUNY — New York, NY

Graduated 2003

Certificate in Software Engineering

Fullstack Academy — New York, NY

Completed April 2021

B.A. Art

Columbia University — New York, NY

Graduated 1999

Background

About Me

My name is Michael, though most people call me Mike. I've been a public librarian for most of my adult life — NYPL, Enoch Pratt, and now Fordham University — which means I spent a long time thinking seriously about how information is organized, found, and made useful to people before I ever wrote a line of Python.

In 2021 I finished a software engineering certificate at Fullstack Academy and discovered I actually loved building things. So I kept going — earning my M.S. in Computer Science from Fordham in 2025 with a 3.97 GPA, while working full time. Along the way I built a live financial data pipeline, taught Database Systems as an adjunct lecturer, and contributed to research on NLP and course descriptions.

The librarian background shapes how I think about data problems — not just how to build the pipeline, but what question is actually worth asking, and how to explain the answer to someone who doesn't want to read a technical report. Twenty-two years of helping people find things will do that.

I studied Art at Columbia, which might seem unrelated but trained me to think carefully about how things look and feel — something that turns out to matter when you're presenting data to people who have to make decisions from it.

I'm currently looking for roles in data science, data engineering, or software engineering. Also happy to talk about freelance work of almost any kind.

Open to new
opportunities

I'm actively looking for roles in data science, machine learning, or software engineering. If you have something interesting, I'd love to hear about it.

Send me an email