A Little Bit About Me
I was born in Kauai, Hawaii when my family stayed with an older family member in their final months. When they passed, my family moved back to the mainland and decided to stay in Lebanon, Oregon, where I have since then grown up. It's a small town where everybody knows everybody, although it has grown quite a bit since we moved here. I joined a local Cub Scout Pack after seeing an ad for it at school in third grade. I am now a Boy Scout and recently passed my Board of Review for the rank of Eagle, pending approval from the national level. My Eagle Project doubled as a senior project, as I made it for the Lebanon High School band that I had been a part of for all four years. I built a storage system for the percussion equipment, which fixed the long-standing issue of storage space.
Why I Chose Oregon Tech and My Major
My educational end goal is a degree in game programming. However, Professor Breedlove told me that people with these degrees with no experience get "coding monkey" positions, in which companies will treat you as disposable when you burnout or a certain project finishes. I chose to major in Software Engineering to have a degree that applies to many areas instead of one, which will allow me to get varied experiences.
My Greatest Learning Experience At Oregon Tech
When COVID-19 forced everyone into distanced learning, I did okay for the remainder of freshman year, but things were much rougher my sophomore year. The lack of in-person interaction made me disengage and go into a depression, causing my grades to fall. I learned that staying engaged in your classes makes your workload much lighter, especially when compared to making up all of your work right at the end.
My Plans After Graduation
I plan on getting a decent paying job that will use the skills I learned from earning my degree. With a few years of experience, I plan on going back to school to get my Master's Degree in Software Engineering and assess if I am ready for a job in the gaming industry. I may even start my own game company to make my own games.