Charles Koutcheme

I’m a doctoral researcher in the Computer Science department at Aalto University. My Ph.D. dissertation contributes methods to automate programming feedback using open-source language models, with a focus on supporting novice programmers in large-scale learning environments where individual feedback is hard to scale.

The broader goal of my research is to move beyond systems that rely on large language models and instead build lightweight, locally deployable learning tools powered by small models. My work blends reinforcement learning and source code modelling approaches with knowledge from programming education to effectively support students.