In 2013, I moved to Stillwater, Oklahoma to pursue my first Bachelor’s degree in Geology and Mathematics. I enjoyed the critical thinking and research behind geology, as well as the free hikes we got to go on adventuring our way through the rocks of Oklahoma.

One night, after some long hours of studying, I fell sound asleep in my bed. A few hours later, I woke up to my body slightly shaking. As I awoke a bit more, I felt my bed and the entire floor underneath me sway back and forth with intense shaking. A few picture frames and items from my desk fell onto the floor. After a few minutes, the shaking started attenuating. I knew exactly what had happened, and I wanted to stop it.

I had felt earthquakes many times before, but not as intense as this experience. From here, I knew I wanted to specialize in seismology and geophysics. I delved into a few research projects that dealt with analyzing raw seismic data (like below). Some of the programs we used, were able to detect p-wave onsets and then I was able to validate if the software’s estimate was accurate or not. This is where my interests in seismology and computer software merged and really intrigued me. In conclusion, the intense earthquakes in Oklahoma were induced by hydraulic wastewater injects into reservoirs that were way too close to fault lines. This caused the two plates to slip and initiate the earthquakes.

After I graduated with my degree, I could not find a seismology job without moving across states. I wasn’t financially stable after years of loans, so I decided to accept a Measurement Analyst job at an oil and gas company. From here, I had about 4 analyst-type jobs where I was able to work with various software.

I wanted to learn the ins and outs across every aspect of the software. I wanted to know why everything functioned the way it did. I would spend most of my time shadowing the software engineers and developers to understand why and how they developed what they had. Additionally, I did find it a bit frustrating to have to go to the engineers to answer all of the complex questions. I wanted to answer the questions myself, and I wanted to identify, and create the solutions myself, rather than just using and working with them. This is where my interests in computer science evolved.

As I wrap up my computer science degree, I want to create products that are outside of the box, and would make this world a positive, and a more productive and efficient place. I want to be able to fuse technology into this world for the better. Right now, I am in the veterinary and dental industry, which is about 15 years behind human health. There are so many opportunities to revolutionize the industry and I am looking forward to being a part of the solution! 🙂

Until next time.

Amy Fromandi