Patrick Melan
Student, Founder, and Engineer
Software engineering student at Drexel, building full-stack web apps and machine learning tools with TypeScript, Python, and AWS.
About
Hello! My name is Patrick Melan, and I'm a sophomore at Drexel University in the process of obtaining my B.S. in Software Engineering with a minor in Finance. I enjoy building full-stack web apps and useful data tools & dashboards, mostly in TypeScript and Python. My stack usually involves Next.js, Python, and some combination of AWS services, but I'm always pushing myself to learn new technologies.
Outside of code, basketball takes up a lot of my time. I'm a PIAA basketball official, officiating varsity games throughout the Lehigh Valley and Philadelphia, and a student manager for the Drexel Women's Basketball team.
Over the last few months, I've been spending most of my coding time on building GovToKnow, a government technology platform, learning the fundamentals of building RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) applications, and exploring the world of AI and LLMs at a deeper level. I've also been working on a larger personal project, RefChat (unreleased), which is another RAG application, built on NBA and NCAA basketball rulebooks, allowing users, such as fans and officials, to interact with the rules in a simpler, more readable way.
Experience
May 2026 - Present
Founding AI Engineer · GovToKnow
Rebuilt the company’s landing site in Next.js with a cleaner UI and better SEO, which increased active users and engagement by 69.7% and 46.4%, respectively. Built an in-chat records request payment system with FastAPI, SQLModel, and a custom React widget, using Stripe manual-capture holds, ID upload verification, and an admin approval/denial portal, gating sensitive data behind a human layer. Built the admin and client-portal UIs in React and TypeScript using shadcn/ui, set up CI/CD for the Dockerized app on AWS EC2, and led incident response when we had a production outage.
- Next.js
- React
- TypeScript
- FastAPI
- SQLModel
- Stripe
- Docker
- AWS EC2
- nginx
- GitHub Actions
May 2025 - May 2026
Software Engineer · POLITY Inc.
Built a full-stack government data platform used by nine municipalities, with a Clerk-authenticated React dashboard for field mapping and record validation. Set up an AWS Express API on EC2 that combined S3, DynamoDB, and Athena to store and query parcel data, and used Fuse.js to fuzzy match MAT/GIS discrepancies across thousands of records. Rebuilt the company’s site using Next.js and TailwindCSS with static generation, dynamic OG images, and full SEO metadata.
- React
- Next.js
- TypeScript
- Tailwind CSS
- Clerk
- Node.js
- AWS
- Fuse.js
June - August 2024
IT Software Development Intern · St. Luke's University Health Network
Built a Power BI dashboard that tracks physician stats from Azure to automate reports and reduce manual HR work. Set up a Power Automate workflow to run the Azure query weekly and refresh the dashboard on its own.
- Microsoft Power BI
- Power Automate
- Azure
June - August 2023
IT Security Intern · St. Luke's University Health Network
Rotated through the Identity Access Management, Disaster Recovery, and Cybersecurity teams. Wrote KQL queries in Microsoft Sentinel for security monitoring and shadowed senior engineers on security architecture and incident response.
- KQL
- Microsoft Sentinel
- Azure AD
Projects
GovToKnow
Next.js landing site and React admin/client portals built for GovToKnow, along with FastAPI backend, Stripe integration, and custom, embeddable chat widget for municipal websites.
- Next.js
- React
- TypeScript
- FastAPI
- SQLModel
- Stripe
- Docker
- AWS EC2
- nginx
- GitHub Actions
POLITY Website
Next.js website for POLITY Inc., including full SEO implementation, scroll animations, and static generation.
- Next.js
- React
- TypeScript
- Tailwind CSS
- Node.js
- Nodemailer
- reCAPTCHA
- AWS Amplify
Easton Flipped Website + Dashboard
Full-stack (containerized) real estate platform for a local house-flipping business. Client-facing frontend is built using Next.js and Tailwind, pulling live property data, inputted on the admin dashboard, from the PostgreSQL DB through the custom API.
- Next.js
- React
- TypeScript
- Tailwind CSS
- Drizzle ORM
- PostgreSQL
- AWS S3
- Recharts
Parent Compass Coaching Website
Next.js website for a local parent coaching business with SMTP configured using Resend.
- Next.js
- Resend
- TailwindCSS
POLITY Data Request Form
Full-stack multi-municipality data review platform built for POLITY Inc. Custom Express API fuzzy-matches MAT and GIS parcel records, allowing users to resolve discrepancies in the multi-step React wizard.
- React
- Tailwind CSS
- Clerk
- Node.js
- Express
- AWS S3
- AWS DynamoDB
- AWS Athena
- AWS EC2
- Fuse.js
- PapaParse
