My career goals are very broad, but at the same time have a general flow of direction. There are no specific dates marked and specific jobs that I want to land, but I do plan on having things done within a time frame.
In my freshman year of college, I want it to be a foundational year. I want to have a solid GPA after both semesters and even take classes over the summer. As of now, I plan on taking chemistry as a transient student, but I am open to taking more classes even some at Tech. I might join a club or two and get involved in the campus community. The two clubs I have been looking at are GTSBE and the African student association. I relate to both those clubs very well, and it would be nice to get involved with other students who share my experiences.
During my sophomore year, I plan on being more established as a student and feeling more accustomed to life at Georgia Tech. I will have a more difficult course load, but at the same time, I should have the skills to manage this load with extracurriculars due to having more experience as a tech student. I also expect my resume to have more depth than it did in my freshman year, and I will go to career fairs and apply to many internships to secure one for the summer. Besides maintaining an above 3.7 GPA this will be my biggest goal by the end of my sophomore year. I understand how crucial work experience is before actually having a job, so to secure an internship will be huge for my career.
I can already tell junior year will be a confusing time for me. If everything went as planned with the internship, will I still want to keep it during the school year? I understand how important internships are but being a student is my main priority, and I know this is when a lot of the difficult ECE courses will start to come for me. I will be at a crossroads between dedicating all my time to school or being active on campus with the many beneficial clubs and opportunities. I think this is when I will truly learn to balance my education and extracurriculars. The summer after Junior year will be spent either at another ECE based internship or taking classes that I need so that I can graduate in four years.
Senior year is something I am looking forward to. I dream about graduating from Georgia tech every night that I spend on this campus. I know that all my hard work will eventually lead up to my graduation, but I know that there is still work to be done. I have to keep my focus during senior year and not get senioritis, and keep up the grind that I have maintained throughout all of college. I want to keep my GPA high until I officially complete all requirements to graduate from the school of Electrical and computer engineering. I want to have a leadership role in a club, or a job as a volunteer as a peer leader at the IDC. When I graduate officially I will either be preparing for graduate school or on the hunt for a job, which could have potentially been offered to me by the company I had an internship with. I know that with a degree from Georgia Tech in ECE, my opportunities will be endless.
5-10 years after graduation I see myself as a leader in the world of electrical engineering and STEM. For the first couple of years after graduation, I will work hard as an engineer for a good company. I will then try to expand my success to those who don’t have the opportunities that I did. I want to help African American youth realize STEM is a place for them too, because if I can make it so can they. On an even larger scale, my dream is to open a STEM school in Ethiopia’s capital city Addis Abeba. I want to help those who think dreams are unattainable reach their dreams, and have successful futures. Education is the one tool that can eliminate segregation of the classes, and I want to play a part in that by giving unfourtante people a chance that they were never given. All my success as an engineer will mean nothing if I did not make anyone life better besides mine, and that is my goal as an ECE student at Georgia Tech!