Voices of Baskin

David Patmore: Alumnus

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Degree Program: Computer Engineering, Ph.D.
Graduate Institution: San Jose State and UC Santa Cruz
Undergraduate Institution: UCLA
Department: Computer Science and Engineering
Hometown: Los Altos, CA

“The Ph.D. experience allowed me to mature as a person. I learned to function in an environment where I had to figure out the parameters myself. I came out of UCSC with self confidence and the ability to figure out a solution and explain it to an audience.”

Evan Peterson: Alumnus

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Degree Program: Master of Science, Electrical Engineering (2016)
Undergraduate Institution: UC Santa Cruz
Department: Electrical Engineering
Hometown: Sebastopol, California

“If you had talked to me three years ago, I doubt I would’ve expected I’d end up where I am, but I’d wager most people would say the same about where their career takes them.”

Kateryna Voitiuk: Alumna and Graduate Student

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Degree Program: Network and Digital Technology B.A.
Graduate Institution: UC Santa Cruz
Undergraduate Institution: UC Santa Cruz
Department: Computer Science and Engineering

“Being a computer engineer you can have a lot of choices, whether it’s directly related to computers and making them better and programming applications that do necessary things or whether it’s doing biology, chemistry, physics.”

George Leece: Alumnus

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George Leece: Alumnus

Degree Program: Electrical Engineering, B.S.
Undergraduate Institution: UC Santa Cruz
Department: Electrical Engineering
Hometown: Chico, CA

“[Being in the Army] definitely was an experience that opened my eyes to a lot of different opportunities and experiences that you can’t find anywhere else, I would say. In addition to that, finishing my time there, I was able to go back to UC Santa Cruz, to finish something that I had wanted to do.”

Mark McDonald: Alumnus

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Mark McDonald: Alumnus

Degree Program: Ph.D., Electrical Engineering
Graduate Institution: UC Santa Cruz
Undergraduate Institution: BSE Duke University, MSEE North Carolina State University
Department: Electrical Engineering

“The most important thing a student needs to learn in their education is not to memorize this or that formula, or do certain calculations at this speed, but really to develop an intuitive understanding and knowledge of what they are learning about.”

Francisco Beltran: Alumnus

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Francisco Beltran: Alumnus

Degree Program: P.h.D., Statistics
Graduate Institution: UC Santa Cruz
Undergraduate Institution: Cal-State Bakersfield
Department: Applied Mathematics and Statistics (2014)
Hometown: Buttonwillow, California

“The skills and lessons I learned at UC Santa Cruz have largely influenced the manner in which I approach my current research on a daily basis. The high standards for rigorous statistical analysis have carried forth into all aspects of my work.”

Angela Ramirez: Graduate Student

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Angela Ramirez: Graduate Student

Degree Program: Natural Language Processing M.S.
Undergraduate Institution: University of California, Santa Cruz
Department: Natural Language Processing
Hometown: Atwater, California

“We’re getting real experts who work in the industry to show us how they use the technology and what they do with it. Getting that perspective is really cool.”

David Lee: Faculty

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David Lee

Degree Program: Assistant Professor, Technology Management
Graduate Institution: Stanford University
Undergraduate Institution: California Institute of Technology
Department: Computational Media

“I wanted to find a way to organize large numbers of people to support nonprofits. I knew that my research in crowd-sourcing, and in bringing people together to accomplish tasks, could help.”

Robert Lund: Faculty

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Robert Lund: Faculty

Graduate Institution: University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Undergraduate Institution: Auburn University
Department: Professor and Department Chair, Statistics

“What I do as a statistician is crunch the numbers. We take data, compare it to what a climatologist’s model predicts, and give them our conclusions and how sure we are of those conclusions.”

Kenneth Caluya: Graduate Student

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Kenneth Caluya: Graduate Student

Degree Program: Ph.D., Applied Mathematics
Graduate Institution: UC Santa Cruz
Undergraduate Institution: UC Riverside
Department: Applied Mathematics
Hometown: Phillipines

“I’m mentoring an undergrad right now and what I realized over the course of working with him is the importance of giving students support. My professors and older grad students always gave me that support so it feels good for me to pay that forward.”