When did you decide to pursue engineering?

[Joel J]

From a young age I excelled in Math and Science courses, and was average in everything else. My family members are known to be 'accountants' and nothing less was expected of me. I, for a short period of time, toyed with the idea of becoming an accountant, but decided it was not the career for me.

Time went by and I found a new interest, flying. Flying aeroplanes (yeah, I am from a country colonized by the British), in my opinion, is one of the coolest things to do. I would daydream about becoming an airline pilot, soaring above the clouds, and not having a care in the world. Then, I joined RAGE.

To be perfectly honest, I was originally attracted to the RAGE Robotics team because it presented me with the opportunity to drive a cool-looking robot around. I always liked to drive things--Aeroplane, Go Kart, RC Cars, etc--and had no problem adding a robot to the list. I practiced driving the robot for quite some time before I was able to do it properly.

During my second season with RAGE, things began to change. I enrolled in a C++ course offered at my school, and was exposed to the programming language used to make the robot "go" for the first time. I found programming to be an excellent pass time activity and I was able to do it without extensive studying/practicing. I was hooked.

At the end of my second season with RAGE, I had to start thinking about college. I knew I liked to drive 'things'; I knew I liked to program; and I also knew that non [math/science] fields were not my forte. So which would I choose: To become a programmer, or an airline pilot? I was stumped.

My third season with RAGE began and I was still stumped as to which road I would travel. I was finally selected to be one of the robot operators for the upcoming competitions and therefore refocused my attention to the game. After the competitions were over, our robot, overall, did well. The exact competition results are inconsequential.

The summer months came. I HAD to decide then what I wanted to do with my life: fly high, or make robots go. I reflected on my third season with RAGE. I had alot of fun driving the robot during competitions, but saw it a useless career. I realized that I would rather write computer programs, and things along those lines, than to pilot an aircraft, or any other machine for that matter. The choice that at one point had me stumped became an easy one to make. I would pursue a career in 'programming.'

Next year, I will attend whichever college accepts me, and major in Computer Engineering. I will still find time to "drive stuff around," but will treat it like I would a hobby.