How I got here?

I started dabbling with computers and software(mostly hardware) when I was younger in elementary school. One of my older cousins was in college and was considering pursuing a computer science degree prior to the dotcom bubble burst. While his passion died mine persisted for years until I got to highschool and college where I chose to major in chemical engineering due to falling in love with chemistry in high school. I graduated and started/continue currently a career as a process engineer in the pharmaceutical industry. And after about 6 years in industry I had reached a point where after analyzing my career I realized I wanted a more technical and math involved career. I did some soul searching and realized that my favorite classes in college were all coding and algorithm based. By far my most favorite classes were mathematical methods , simulations , and algorithms. Thus , I did a lot of research and ended up finding oregon state for a post-bacc degree to determine if computer science is something I would enjoy doing as a career and I have enjoyed every minute of the classes at oregon state. Being able to pursue a career in this industry has been a dream come true, and while it’s taken me awhile to find this path I am glad that life is not only a road but filled with crosses, roundabouts, and intersections that allow us to reach different endings.

Currently, I’m still working as a process engineer now but I am working to transition to a computer science role full time as I finish up my degree. I’ve been applying to a lot of semiconductor companies as I try to transition into the industry. I have significant interest in machine learning and artificial intelligence and am also considering a masters degree in the future if I am unable to secure a full time position in industry post graduation. I am hoping to get onto one of the machine learning or artificial intelligence projects in this course that will allow me to gain hands on experience with the technologies.