Discovering Materials
“My freshman ceramics research experience at Purdue made me appreciate the diverse applicability and potential of ceramics. I was fascinated by how seemingly minor differences in the way a ceramic part was prepared could dramatically affect its final properties, making ceramics useful in applications ranging from medicine to aerospace.”
— Valerie Wiesner, NASA Glenn Research Center
Career test drive
“I did my first internship freshman year and it led me to change my major, and I never looked back. It’s hard to choose a career before getting a chance to try it on for size. What I didn’t realize then is that the contacts you make will often be as important to your career as the internship experience itself.”
— Christopher Dosch, GE Global Research
Scholarship
“Thanks to a scholarship when I was a new graduate student, I
was able to spend one and a half great years at a French university
where I studied materials science with students from all over
Europe. My first experience abroad inspired me, and now, years
later, I am still enjoying the exciting world of nanoceramics.”
— Eva Hemmer, INRS–Centre EMT, Canada
Internship
“I never worked with glass before I started my internship at Kopp Glass. But after working there for a couple months I found glasses to be so interesting that I knew that was the material I wanted to work with for the rest of my life.”
-Eric Teller, Alfred University
Valuable Mentoring
“On top of the valuable educational opportunities my internship offered, the time spent working side by side with NIST research scientist, Winnie Wong-Ng, showed me that the set of technical skills I’m acquiring can be applied to find solutions to real world problems. I found this profoundly motivating.”
— Kevin Talley, Boise State University
International Network
“My experience working in Professor Ikuhara’s lab at the University of Tokyo for a summer showed me the value of building my international network early in my career.”
— Jesse Angle, University of California, Irvine
