What expe­ri­ences have you been able to take part in that you might not have been able to with­out the schol­ar­ship?

I have been able to cre­ate a robot in my free time that I plan to con­tin­ue work­ing on throughout my col­lege career. I have also been able to join Brazil­ian Jiu Jit­su, which is a fan­tas­tic way to relax from the stress of school work. And, I have dis­cov­ered rock climb­ing as a new hob­by. I like that ISU’s cam­pus has two loca­tions for climb­ing (Lied Recre­ation Cen­ter and State Gym).

What is the most inter­est­ing thing you have done to gain expe­ri­ence in your career field?

I have been able to study embed­ded sys­tems and will be par­tic­i­pat­ing a co-op in the fall of 2023 with a focus on embed­ded sys­tems. This co-op will allow me to learn more about sys­tems and gain an in-depth under­stand­ing of how to make my per­son­al project more effi­cient. (My project is cre­at­ing an autonomous robot that will trav­el a path, iden­ti­fy trash and cre­ate pin points on a map so that peo­ple can go to clean up the garbage.)

How are you shar­ing your time and/​or tal­ents with oth­ers now? How do you hope to do so in the future?

I work as a teacher’s assis­tant in the Com­put­er Sci­ence depart­ment. Every day, I have an oppor­tu­ni­ty to help com­put­er sci­ence stu­dents with their class mate­r­i­al and pro­vide guid­ance to help them be suc­cess­ful in school and their future career paths.

What advice would you give to some­one who is con­sid­er­ing apply­ing for the Bright Scholarship/​Lois Dale Schol­ar­ship?

Just be hon­est about your life expe­ri­ences and always look for oppor­tu­ni­ties to bet­ter your­self. Be moti­vat­ed to pur­sue per­son­al projects, and help oth­ers when­ev­er an oppor­tu­ni­ty aris­es to do so.

What is your favorite class and why?

Pre­vi­ous­ly, my favorite class was 288 CPRE because we got to pro­gram a Rum­ba to run autonomous­ly. It was a very fun and inter­est­ing class that taught me a lot about embed­ded sys­tems. Cur­rent­ly, I am tak­ing 309 SE, a project-based class in which teams of stu­dents work to devel­op an app. My group is cre­at­ing an app sim­i­lar to Spo­ti­fy.

What do like most about your school?

I real­ly like the count­less oppor­tu­ni­ties that are pre­sent­ed to stu­dents, from rock climb­ing, to a whole build­ing focused on help­ing stu­dents be cre­ative (the Stu­dent Inno­va­tion Cen­ter), to all of the amaz­ing peo­ple this uni­ver­si­ty has allowed me to meet, includ­ing both stu­dents and pro­fes­sors.

What’s the best food on cam­pus?

Fri­ley Win­dows has the hands-down best food when it comes to qual­i­ty on a day-to-day basis.