Bo Anderson

Why I Chose Duke Engineering

I chose Duke because I wanted to expand my engineering skill sets, and with robotics being a rapidly-growing industry, Duke was one of the few schools to offer a degree program that pushed my technical knowledge as well as developed my business management fundamentals. I was also fortunate enough to having a teaching assistantship the first time, and being able to teach my knowledge to someone else reinforced my understanding of the material.

Before Duke Engineering

I was a student athlete in undergrad, and while I took a wide range of courses, I always felt like I wanted to soak up more knowledge in artificial intelligence, machine learning and hardware. I believe Duke’s Mechanical Engineering master’s program was a great way to combine my career interests. It gave me an appreciation for research’s rapid influence on the robotics industry, and by working through technical problems within a business management framework, my perspective on working in industry deepened.

After Duke Engineering

After working at a research startup as a Radar Digital Signal Processing Engineer, I am excited to join GrayMatter Robotics as a Robotics Engineer. Technology is changing at the speed of light, so having foundational skills from my master’s program allow me to adapt quickly and trust the process.

5 Ways to Maximize Your Time at Duke

1. Use career services and seek opportunities early, especially in this job market.
2. Find research or side projects to work on. These are how you can differentiate yourself from the pack. If you show genuine interest in the field by working on it in your free time, recruiters and interviewers will realize your dedication and respect your work ethic.
3. Have a plan and reevaluate it constantly as you go. Go into your program with confidence, but allow the professors you meet and projects you run into to guide you towards the path you want to go down.
4. Your professors are there for you. Have a coffee chat, spend time after class with them and pick their brain when you can. If they don’t have the answers, they will find someone that does.
5. Seek out internships. Taking classes will develop your foundations, but the real problem-solving comes from your work experience. Recruiters nowadays want to see that, so take advantage of local or remote startups as well as research labs on-campus that will allow you to build up your project portfolio.