SEAN BLONIEN

Patrick Blonien Website

Full-Stack Developer

October 2025 - Personal Project

Challenge

My brother Patrick is an Assistant Professor of Finance at Carnegie Mellon University's Tepper School of Business—one of the world's top programs in Quantitative and Computational Finance. His existing Google Sites page was visually dated, difficult to navigate, and failed to reflect his credentials of five published working papers. He needed a modern, professional academic website to serve as a hub for his research, CV, and professional identity.

Solution

I designed and built a bespoke academic website from scratch using Next.js, React, and Tailwind CSS. The site features a clean, professional design aligned with CMU's branding, a dynamic research papers section with expandable abstracts and co-author links, downloadable CV, responsive navigation, and data visualization graphics for each paper. I implemented comprehensive SEO with JSON-LD structured data (Person, WebSite, ScholarlyArticle schemas), Open Graph tags, and semantic HTML to maximize discoverability for academic search.

Key Impact

• Transformed his online presence from a basic Google Site to a polished, professional academic portfolio
• Achieved 100% Google Lighthouse score across performance, accessibility, SEO, and best practices
• Generated 450 page views in the first month with 50% engagement rate

Learnings

Building a website for my brother brought a unique mix of personal investment and professional rigor. I learned how to translate academic conventions—paper citations, co-author attributions, abstract formatting, and CV structure—into intuitive web design. Collaborating with Patrick to understand his goals reinforced the importance of discovery and iteration even on smaller projects. The project also deepened my understanding of academic SEO and structured data for scholarly content.

Forever Fest Website

Full-Stack Developer

August 2025 - Personal Project

Challenge

I was engaged and needed a wedding website. I met the love of my life, Eva, at the Lights All Night (LAN) EDM festival in 2022 and proposed at LAN 2024. Since a music festival is central to our story, we created “Forever Fest 2026” as our wedding theme—our own festival brand. The site had to match the vibe: playful, vibrant, and totally us.

Solution

Eva designed a colorful disco-inspired pink and purple theme, and I brought her vision to life. With her design background and my dev chops, we built the wedding website of our dreams from scratch. Using Next.js, React, and Tailwind CSS, we created a unique, non-cookie-cutter site that stands out from the all-too-common templates. Those work fine, but as a web developer I wanted something custom and polished for the biggest day of my life.

Key Impact

• Mobile-first responsive design that works across all devices
• Optimized for a 100% Google Chrome Lighthouse score

Learnings

I loved collaborating with Eva co-creating an idea and turning it into something real. It was a fun, creative project that pushed me to make deliberate design and UX decisions while keeping everything functional and easy to use.

myLexia Platform Modernization

Senior Software Engineer at Lexia Learning

July 2025 - Present - Remote

Challenge

Lexia is a 40-year-old language learning company focused on improving K-12 English literacy for students. Serving 1 in 3 public school districts, Lexia serves 7+ million students and 300k educators helping to address the national literacy crisis. I joined the myLexia team, which is the educator-facing product that teachers and school admins use to manage students, monitor progress, and manage their classrooms. I was brought in to help modernize the frontend migrating from AngularJs to Angular.

Solution

This being my 2nd large codebase migration from AngularJs to a modern web dev framework, it was not my first rodeo. I joined as an individual contributor, but quickly have become an integral part of the team bringing my expertise in modern component-based frontend development, agile process improvement, and product thinking to the team.

Key Impact

Learnings

Learnings to come! Still very new to the role.

Portfolio Website

Full-Stack Developer

April 2025 - Personal Project

Challenge

Creating a personal portfolio website that stands out in a sea of templates while showcasing my skills and personality in a unique way.

Solution

This website! I designed this portfolio website with an Outrun, synthwave, and retro aesthetic. Built with Next.js, React, and Tailwind CSS featuring custom animations and responsive design. The initial mockup was done with v0.dev and then built out from there.

Key Impact

• Brushed up on modern Next.js best practice patterns and practices
• Created responsive design that works across all devices
• Optimized for a 100% Google Chrome Lighthouse score

Learnings

This project was a fun way to keep my front-end web development skills up-to-date when building a Next.js/React web app from scratch for this website. since I had been working on a mobile app for the previous year. optimized, and reinforced my skills in modern front-end development while allowing me to express my creativity through design. I learned valuable lessons about balancing aesthetics with performance and accessibility.

FlyFit Mobile App & Platform

Director of Engineering at Fly Bodies

May 2024 - July 2025 - Remote/Los Angeles, CA

Challenge

Fly Bodies is a health and wellness startup that helps schools and small organizations keep their communities active in a simple, motivating way. Our users are teachers, staff, and small teams who want to move more but struggle with consistency and accountability. Many do not have time for complex tools or the budget for enterprise wellness platforms. They need something that feels fun and social, works on the phones and wearables they already use, and respects privacy. The core problem to solve was making daily activity feel rewarding and shared through challenges, streaks, and personal goals. The platform needed to be easy to onboard, reliable across iOS and Android, and securely sync activity from Apple Health, Health Connect, and Fitbit in real time so people could see progress and cheer each other on without friction.

Solution

I joined as the 1st engineer and took the product from 0 to 1. I led discovery, planning, design, architecture, development, testing, and releases to ship the FlyFit mobile app and supporting backend. At a high level, I built a modern, cross-platform app using React Native and TypeScript, paired with a serverless Node.js backend on GCP and Firebase. The system delivers real time updates for leaderboards, feeds, and shared workouts so the app feels instant and never needs a manual refresh. I integrated Apple Health, Health Connect, and Fitbit for seamless activity sync, and set up a solid CI/CD pipeline with GitHub Actions and Expo EAS to support weekly releases and fast iteration based on user feedback.

Key Impact

• Product and delivery: Shipped the MVP in 3 months, sustained weekly releases, and earned a 5-star App Store rating.
• Growth and outcomes: Achieved 1,500+ organic downloads and $30K+ in first-year revenue with zero marketing spend.
• Architecture and scale: Designed a real time, serverless platform on GCP/Firebase that supported 300+ MAUs with autoscaling and a local-first, zero-refresh UX.
• Engagement: Implemented gamification features including streaks, quizzes, and goals that increased engagement by 210%.
• Cost efficiency: Reduced initial cloud costs by 40% through architecture and data model optimizations.
• Leadership and communication: Owned the full lifecycle from roadmap and technical design to integrations, security, testing, and App Store releases while aligning stakeholders and communicating progress clearly with nontechnical partners and customers.

Learnings

This role sharpened my product engineering skills. I translated user needs into a focused roadmap, kept scope tight, and iterated quickly based on what we heard from schools and teams using the app. In a true startup environment, I wore multiple hats and enjoyed it. I acted as an IC, architect, product partner, and delivery lead while building modern, scalable infrastructure that I designed end to end. It reinforced how to make pragmatic, cost-aware technical decisions, work on the cutting edge with real time systems and serverless tech, and lead early stage product development and technical strategy under tight budget constraints.

UnitedHealthcare Platform Migration

Technical Lead at Pariveda Solutions for UnitedHealthcare

Jan. 2024 - May 2024 - Dallas, TX

Challenge

UnitedHealthcare needed to migrate their $200M+ DTC eCommerce platform from AngularJS to React while maintaining business continuity and improving performance for millions of users.

Solution

Led the front-end migration as Technical Lead, delivering a 5× faster UI with responsive design and modern component architecture. Coordinated with cross-functional teams to ensure seamless transition.

Key Impact

• Led a team of 6 developers through complete platform migration
• Achieved 5× performance improvement in UI responsiveness
• Delivered modern component architecture serving millions of users
• Maintained zero downtime during critical business operations

Learnings

Leading a large-scale migration taught me the importance of incremental delivery, stakeholder communication, and balancing technical excellence with business continuity. The experience reinforced my expertise in React architecture and team leadership.

Southwest Airlines Data Pipeline

Senior Software Consultant at Pariveda Solutions for Southwest Airlines

Aug. 2022 - May 2024 - Dallas, TX

Challenge

Southwest Airlines needed a scalable, event-driven data pipeline to process information for 90,000+ employees while integrating with legacy enterprise applications and ensuring high availability.

Solution

Architected and implemented a cloud-native data processing system using Kafka, GraphQL, and Java/Python microservices to integrate Workday with internal enterprise applications.

Key Impact

• Built scalable pipeline processing data for 90,000+ employees
• Implemented event-driven architecture with Kafka for real-time processing
• Integrated legacy systems with modern cloud-native solutions
• Delivered high-availability system with enterprise-grade reliability

Learnings

This project deepened my understanding of enterprise-scale data architecture and the complexities of integrating modern solutions with legacy systems. I gained valuable experience in event-driven design and microservices architecture.

Toyota Financial Services Optimization

Senior Software Consultant at Pariveda Solutions for Toyota Financial Services

Aug. 2022 - May 2024 - Dallas, TX

Challenge

Toyota FS needed to analyze and optimize their technical architecture to support 1,500 dealerships and handle 300K+ daily quotes while identifying performance bottlenecks and scalability issues.

Solution

Conducted comprehensive technical architecture assessment, identifying key bottlenecks and recommending enhancements to support massive scale and improve system efficiency.

Key Impact

• Analyzed architecture supporting 1,500+ dealerships
• Identified optimizations for 300K+ daily quote processing
• Delivered actionable recommendations for scalability improvements
• Provided technical roadmap for enhanced system performance

Learnings

This assessment project taught me how to quickly understand complex enterprise architectures and identify optimization opportunities. I developed skills in technical analysis, stakeholder communication, and strategic technical planning.

Optum ETL Platform Development

Senior Software Consultant at Pariveda Solutions for Optum

Aug. 2022 - May 2024 - Dallas, TX

Challenge

Optum required a robust ETL platform to handle complex healthcare data transformations with strict compliance requirements and high data integrity standards for their enterprise operations.

Solution

Led development and delivery of a Medicare compliance ETL platform using Azure Data Factory, Azure Data Pipelines, and Terraform for infrastructure as code, ensuring scalable and compliant data processing.

Key Impact

• Delivered Medicare-compliant ETL platform for healthcare data
• Implemented infrastructure as code using Terraform
• Built scalable data processing with Azure Data Factory
• Ensured strict compliance with healthcare data regulations

Learnings

Working in healthcare taught me the critical importance of data compliance and security. I gained deep experience with Azure cloud services and infrastructure automation while navigating complex regulatory requirements.

Girl Scouts Progress Library

Senior Software Consultant at Pariveda Solutions for Girl Scouts

Aug. 2022 - May 2024 - Dallas, TX

Challenge

Girl Scouts needed to centralize and automate 150+ business workflows via a SharePoint-based Process Library, requiring significant process improvement and workflow optimization.

Solution

Managed and mentored a team of 6 interns to centralize business processes, implementing automated workflows and creating a comprehensive digital process library with improved efficiency.

Key Impact

• Centralized and automated 150+ business workflows
• Led and mentored team of 6 interns through complex project
• Significantly improved organizational process efficiency
• Delivered comprehensive SharePoint-based solution

Learnings

This project taught me valuable lessons in process optimization, team mentorship, and working with non-profit organizations. I developed skills in workflow automation and learned how to guide junior team members through complex business challenges.

Girl Scouts AI Learning Platform

Software Consultant at Pariveda Solutions for Girl Scouts

May 2019 - Aug. 2019 - Dallas, TX

Challenge

Girl Scouts wanted to create an innovative AI learning platform to teach 2,200+ STEM camp participants about machine learning concepts through interactive, gamified experiences using computer vision.

Solution

Developed and mentored an interactive AI learning web app using Angular, .NET Core, and OpenCV, incorporating image detection, facial recognition, and reinforcement learning in a gamified experience.

Key Impact

• Built interactive platform serving 2,200+ STEM camp participants
• Implemented cutting-edge ML concepts in accessible format
• Created gamified learning experience with computer vision
• Successfully taught complex AI concepts to young learners

Learnings

This early project sparked my passion for making complex technology accessible and educational. I learned how to translate advanced technical concepts into engaging, understandable experiences while working with emerging AI technologies.