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The College and Career Ready Podcast | empowering students for the careers of tomorrow
Join your host Sonia Cacique on a transformative journey preparing high school and college students for real world careers, equipping them with practical skills, professional experiences, and career guidance.
As a dedicated career guidance counselor, career coach, and education leader, Sonia has spent her entire career empowering the next generation for the future workforce. With her expertise, she helps students develop self-awareness, motivation, and career guidance, building the essential skills needed for success in both their educational and future professional journeys.
Coach Sonia is ready to shift the focus from GPA, class rank, and grades to career connections, self-identity, character development, and real-world skills. She aims to challenge the traditional narratives and provide students with a comprehensive approach to education and career readiness. Changing lives for our next gens, one student at a time.
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The College and Career Ready Podcast | empowering students for the careers of tomorrow
43. [Career Exploration] Biomedical Engineering: From NASA to School Boards with Andy Garcia
Have you ever wondered about the myriad of career opportunities within the field of Biomedical Engineering? If so, join us for an enlightening chat with our return guest, Andy Garcia. His insightful exploration into the diverse routes available to biomedical engineers may just spark your curiosity. Andy lays out the roadmap for those with a passion for math and science, excellent communication skills, and a keen interest in understanding the human body, as he discusses everything from medical school to niche fields like biomedical engineering for space exploration.
Andy's personal story is one that emphasizes the power of perseverance and the willingness to explore various paths. He shares his strategic approach to his job search, applying early and widely to internships, fellowships, and job roles. His determination landed him a role at NASA just before his graduation, proving that a dedicated approach can open doors to incredible opportunities. But his journey doesn't end there - Andy takes us through his pivot from a career in engineering to his newfound passion for education, and his daring leap into the political arena by running for his local school board.
Lastly, Andy offers some pearls of wisdom on the invaluable lessons that come from embracing failure. He candidly shares his experiences with setbacks and how they have been integral to his personal growth. Andy's story is a testament to the idea that failure is not a dead end, but rather a stepping stone to self-discovery and learning. His experiences shine a light on the importance of resilience, adaptability, and continual learning in the pursuit of one's passion. So, if you're interested in Biomedical Engineering or simply seeking inspiration from an individual's journey through life, this is one conversation you won't want to miss.
Episodes mentioned:
Journey through Columbia University: Transition, Resilience and Success with Andy Garcia
Helpful websites if interested in this career:
A Career as a Bioengineer or Biomedical Engineer
Best Jobs U.S. News Biomedical Engineer
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Welcome everybody. Welcome to the College and Career Ready podcast. Today we have Andy Garcia, and Andy Garcia has been a guest in our podcast before. We loved having him as a guest. He shared a lot of a lot of knowledge with us, but today he is going to be sharing with us his experience, his career journey as a biomedical engineer. He will be sharing with us what that career looks like and what his plans are for the future. So welcome, andy. Welcome back to the College and Career Ready podcast.
Speaker 2:Hi Sonia and hi folks. I'm happy to be back and excited to share a little bit about biomedical engineering and what this I think exciting and just very interesting career path looks like.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and to my audience, andy did share in our first episode with him his experience thinking that he wanted to pursue a career as a pediatrician medical doctor, and it wasn't until his senior year, thanks to a class that he took, that it opened his eyes to another possibility and he really considered the option of being a biomedical engineer, and that is the degree that he pursued at Columbia University. So, andy, tell us a little bit about what a career as a biomedical engineer entails.
Speaker 2:Definitely so. I think whenever I think of biomedical engineering and you know sort of the career paths that that looks like when you're studying it. Biomedical engineering is very much a STEM, heavy field like most of the other engineering, it's very multidisciplinary. You'll take courses, that sort of mix in chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, pure and hard sciences, right, chemistry, organic chemistry, that sort of stuff, and then also ties in some novelties, right, things like how the tissue interacts with materials, how the tissue or biological tissue and how that interacts with man-made materials. So a relatively new field. I would say. It's start inception 20, 30 years ago, with a lot of different possibilities, with what you can do with this degree, right. So I think before I sort of go into the path of a biomedical engineer, whenever I think of a biomedical engineering degree, right, there's a lot of things you can do with it, but the big ones right, are it's a science degree, right, and it's related to the biomedical sciences.
Speaker 2:A natural step for someone and for some of my classmates I was to go to medical school right after.
Speaker 2:And then another option with this degree is that you can practice as an engineer, right, and there's so many stuff you can go into at that we can go into research, and that's its own little umbrella of so many things. Or you can work maybe in a clinical setting in a hospital, working as a technician and or engineer for the systems you can go into. Let's see into industry, right? So like medical devices, pacenakers, aeds, that sort of stuff, biomedical engineers around staff at all of those companies consulting management, consulting some biomedical engineers go into that field. And then there's also some niche fields not, yeah, they're all called them niche fields that are small fields that folks fall into by interest or they fall into, and I think that sort of where I'm at right now qualifies as that. It's biomedical engineers in outer space, that's one, and then some other things, maybe biomedical engineering, just an extreme environment, undersea, that's a thing, and even ties to perhaps animals, right, veterinary biomedical engineering. So just a lot of different places, but yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, and we'll definitely touch base on your current position. But before that, tell me a little bit of what skills, interests abilities in the students. Would you think that would be an ideal fit for a degree in biomedical engineering?
Speaker 2:Definitely so. I think the first and brother right is just engineering at large. So having a pension for math and science, of course, very important. At the same time I mean folks don't always add it in, but I think English reading I think that's very important to being able to both communicate effectively and which is paramount to be an engineer, but also to be able to to understand. You know, the issues and the problems are funny, right. Also, communication I think that's very important and overlooked upon whenever folks think of engineering.
Speaker 2:And then for the biomedical side, of bio medical engineering, right, like making a little more specific, just adding in some general interest, right, and these are. There's different reasons for this, but for me it was a fascination with the human body that I've had since I was a child and you know to whenever I decided, whenever I wanted to be a pediatrician, the fascination with the human body. For other folks that might be a fascination or a desire, a deep, strong desire to go and make the world a better place by helping people. And I think it's important to note there's plenty of biomedical engineers who went and studied BME because they wanted to help improve people's lives. But maybe they don't want to be physicians right, maybe that's not your thing. Biomedical engineering is an amazing outlet and biomedical engineers are one of the teammates that work with physicians to get a patient to feel better and definitely a career path to consider if you really want to help people in that capacity. But maybe medical school and going to medical school isn't your interest or what you want to do.
Speaker 1:For you. What were you planning to do with your degree as a biomedical engineer while you were going to school?
Speaker 2:So my first two years, while I was in school, I was planning to go to medical school and that's a good thing about biomedical engineering the vast majority of your prerequisite, the vast majority of your acquired coursework, overlaps and aligns with the prerequisite coursework to apply to medical school, which always a plus right, because you can really study anything to go to medical school. But whenever it overlaps it's perfect. It's just a good match. So that was my plan those first two years. And COVID hit and I had to change a part, just witnessing things that were going on and that was sort of where I was like, hey, being an 18-year-old and choosing to study biomedical engineering was pretty smart move on my end because I'm not scrambling for what I'm going to do after I graduate.
Speaker 2:I have a good degree, I'm very much interested in what I'm studying and I was very excited to go into those last few years studying biomedical engineering in the meat of it and I was excited to take that in some shape or form into industry and private engineering practice and yeah, that was sort of what led me, or that's what I was thinking while I was in school. So those last few years I very much had a focus on. Okay, what is the surface of biomedical engineering that interests me right? Research not reading my thing tissue engineering and I kind of like that. And I realized those last few years that I really liked working with people and talking to people and I was like, okay, that's going to be important, right, as I start my career search, my senior year at college. It has to be a job where I'm going to be interacting with people all the time. So I think that's sort of the path I went on. It was leading to medical school and then it just had this little branch into being really an engineer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, and I appreciate you sharing that, because most students I think I could say most students really think about if they're wanting to go to medical school. They think biology degree or chemistry degree, but outside of research or very limited opportunities it's kind of hard to do anything with just a biology degree or chemistry degree. But a biomedical engineering degree definitely opens a lot of doors. Should life change, your experiences change, your beliefs, your interests change, that is a backup plan.
Speaker 2:Definitely. And I think two things are very important. Like you mentioned, most folks think scientific or biology or chemistry and, like you, have to do that because you're going to go to medical school. Before I came across biomedical engineering, I went to study chemistry. But I loved chemistry I still do but then I sort of the calculus came in and I wanted to keep on taking calculus and math courses. But I think it's important to note that you know, depending on how certain you are you want to go to medical school and also your other interests, it's very doable to go and study something. Not there's folks that study, you know dance and we'll take the prerequisites to go to medical school and get in Right, and they have this background as a dancer, with the knowledge that you need to go into medical school and they'll go to medical school. And that's one avenue for folks. Another is to just make yourself a more rounded is what I'll say.
Speaker 2:Individual right to give yourself different opportunities postgraduate, like you said, if you're interested, change and that's sort of what I did, sort of just having a plan B if medical school wasn't going to have. Medical school is very much my focus those first two years, but I wanted to have a plan B. I was like I knew that medical school was, you know, it was pretty an eight to 12 year commitment after college and all that until, and so I just went to my doors open. The one caveat I will say to considering studying engineering or or something that you know is a little more non-traditional, to going into medical school, is just understand that there's majors that are built that are just more rigorous, and other majors, right, the courses you take are going to be more difficult for most folks.
Speaker 2:Physics is, you know, it's one of the hardest subjects out there. If you're in a studying engineering, you're going to be taking at least two, at least a quarter of physics, possibly more, and that's possibly going to affect your GPA because it's a difficult course and that's going to have ramifications for your medical school application, right. So there's trade offs there, right. You know you're in and you have that. But I think it's something worth considering and I definitely overlooked that whenever I was thinking about that in high school. But again, like it is what you value and what you want to get out of that experience, I think it's super important and something to go with yeah.
Speaker 1:Great point. Great point I'm mentioning about the rigor of it and okay, so during the four years that you were at Columbia did you have any experiences, any shadowing internships that allowed you to see what branch of biomedical engineering you can go into? It was during COVID years, so I'm sure the last two years were a little difficult.
Speaker 2:Definitely so it was definitely that threw me off a little bit. But another thing whenever I was, you know, starting whenever I was in school studying BME, I was very much inundated with the science system and coursework, and by inundated I mean like I felt like I was drinking out of a fire hose. So I was like you know, I want to explore things outside of outside of engineering and outside of the sciences in terms of internships. Biomedical engineering I mean as we go forward into the future is very heavily related to bioinformatics and the intersection of computer science and biomedical engineering. And what large amounts of data that we've never had access to because we haven't had the resources to manage it, what that means right For being able to look and analyze the body of the human genome. So I guess that was one unexpected blessing of COVID, right, we really got to dive into that technical side, the computerized side of biomedical engineering, and what, yeah, having access to so much data does to the field. So that's, you know, one thing that I also got to sort of shadow.
Speaker 2:And then another thing in between my, the summer after I graduated high school, I did a rotation program with MD Anderson for high school students, and it's really for students who just graduated high school. I got to go on rotations and participate, taking a little bit of research at MD Anderson School of Health Professions. That was a little bit more of clinical facing and all the students say they were no engineers, they're planning to study engineering, but they were all studying, planning to study hard science with the intention to work in the medical field. That was interesting there Just because I went to school and the folks I was interacting with I got exposed to through my classes, to those different sub-fields, just differently.
Speaker 2:One of the courses Introduction to Biomedical Engineering 1 and 2, each semester has broken up into three mini-measures, as I'll call them, and we dove deep into different sides of biomedical engineering Biomechanics, tissue Engineering and there was six of these I really got to. They brought in it was a guest professor who was an expert in their field and they would teach us all about the sub-field of BME and how it relates to engineering. I got those unique experiences and ultimately I was just ensuring that you get those experiences because they're important whenever you go into your career search.
Speaker 1:Yes, absolutely. Currently you work for Space Center Houston. Tell us how that happened. You graduated when did you start applying for jobs?
Speaker 2:Lulax National Educational Service Center in Houston. Through a scholarship I got my senior year of high school. I made a connection there. I kept in touch with this connection and I think she reached out to me as my freshman year of college approach and she's like what are you going to do for the summer? I was like I'm going to rest. It's in a difficult year. Then she offered me a position as a mentor and a tutor with an Upward Down Math and Science program that she runs. This was underserved students from the Royal University School for Success here in Houston who will get to spend one and a half to two months of their summer taking college level courses at HCC. They needed guides, folks who have been in college and who know the material and can guide them in that direction. I did that very much in education-based role where I got to different capacities, like as I got my last year with them. I taught a course related to STEM and exploration of high and intensive level at but it was just funny because my parents were there. You are educators. I was studying engineering here. I was spending my summers as an engineering student really partaking in education experiences and being in the field of education Because of the anxieties I had about applying to things and not getting accepted.
Speaker 2:I started early. It must have been senior year, like this year of high school for me. I was relatively a breeze. I got to experience different things. The classes I thought subjectively were easier. Immediately after things have been break I was already on the job search. I wasn't necessarily applying yet, but I was looking. I had a being around students who they would stress out in my classmates about applying to internships. A year before they were I was like, okay, I want to get on the ball, because now this is an internship, this is for life I want to do after I graduate. I started sending in applications around December.
Speaker 2:What drew informed my application process was wanting to come back home but also wanting to continue the education sector stuff, which is interesting because I ended up home but not in education. The mindset I had at the time is what I'll say. I saw two avenues for me to work in Houston as a BME. I was either going to somehow work in the hospitals right at the Texas Medical Center and a clinical facing role, or and this was just me going off on a leg I was like maybe, just maybe there's like something related to biomedical engineering with the space program at NASA. That's where I started just using LinkedIn NASA, human health, nasa, biomedical engineering. I came across some folks that worked there as well, with biomedical engineering backgrounds. There's biomedical flight controllers and project managers and integrators, and that's how I came across that small but very present subfield that I ended up working in but that would inform my job experience. I was sort of like I want to come back home, I miss being in my family, and I did that At the same time, though, because I was very on top of still having, like a sense of a desire for adventure, but also having this deep connection to education.
Speaker 2:Right because of those experiences, I applied to a fellowship with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute in DC. It was a year long fellowship, would have been for the first year postgraduate of college and it would have been working as a congressional fellow, and I got to sort of pick my area of focus, and in that application, my area of focus was access to STEM education, because of what I had done those summers and because of just growing up with my family and their educators not, they don't teach, neither of them teaches them but just seeing that and being able to continue that, and that was important to me. So I applied to those two things, hoping that someone would give you an offer, because I was not confident, like. The reason why I started so early, by the way, was because not because I was going to have so many offers, it was because I was worried that I was going to end up fun employed. That's what I said. I was like, if I end up without anything, I'm going to be fun employed, I will be applying to jobs full time. Someone will hire me, but I'm going to be fun employed graduating.
Speaker 2:And I ended up getting so I that job experience was rough, but I was also not I had very much grown right. So it was. It was rough in terms of the outcomes of them. I must have applied in between 15 and 100 jobs, and these jobs are all separate from the CHCI fellowship. That fellowship was a six to seven month long application. Yeah, it was just interviews and essays and all that stuff, but so 50 to 100 jobs, which is a wide margin, but it was a huge amount of jobs that I sent applications to. I heard back from roughly five interviews with two of them and I got offered one of them.
Speaker 2:I got offered that job like two weeks before my graduation date. And then the CHCI thing. Right. So the other thing was CHCI. I love that fellowship, I love everything that they stand for. The pay was a very low pay, but I was passionate about it. So I was like it's okay, I'm gonna make do. But they sort of said from the beginning that their timeline was as I graduated. So I wouldn't know whether or not they accepted me until we performed my graduation, or actually it was the week of my graduation.
Speaker 2:So I was like that's crazy, right For me to not apply to anything else and throw, like you mentioned, right, putting all your eggs in one basket when you're in college is same idea, same idea. I was like I can't put all my eggs in this one basket, not get it. Then what am I gonna do? I'm gonna like I'm not okay with that, so I need to have redundancy. So that's why I sort of applied to jobs concurrently with that.
Speaker 2:So two weeks before I graduated I found out that I got an offer here with NASA and I put a pin on it. I hadn't yet heard from CHCI. I mean excited that. I was like, okay, I have an opportunity to go back home and I have a job right. And then, like two or three days before the university commencement, I got a call. I got offered to CHCI. So then I was like, okay, this is funny because for once in my college experience I have the balls in my court, I get to pick I don't have the option and to give myself like a week to balance some merits and what I wanted out of, you know, postgraduate life.
Speaker 2:And I ended up choosing the position here in Houston as a contractor at NASA.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love it. Okay, so you got the position at the Johnson Space Center. Wow, I'm pretty excited because we went from like thinking medical and now working at Johnson Space Center. Tell us about your job there, your career.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So when I was applying to jobs at NASA I was, I mean, I think, one of the best pieces of advice whenever you apply to things, that is, cast a wide net even if your qualifications don't line up, like, don't count yourself out, let the folks who pick count you out if they so want to. I mean, that was the mentality I had when applying. So I sent in many applications to positions at Johnson Space Center and I very much went in blindly. I have no family that works with human health and performance at Johnson Space Center and these jobs is biomedical, play controller and crew health checks. System management integrator.
Speaker 2:I was like that's an acronym, I have no idea what it means Like what is an engineering integrator? I was just applying and ensuring sort of just seeing that I thought I had what it took to do the job and for the most part I was just like, okay, I can learn this. I saw I sent in many applications. I ended up getting hired as a Czech system management integrator, which is an engineering integrator. Technical integrator for the crew health care system on the International Space Station.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow.
Speaker 2:Well, nasa loves acronyms. We love, yeah, like acronyms or everything. So I guess from here on out, crew health care system checks Awesome. And in that role essentially I worked with the Czech system manager who is in charge of making all of the calls for Czech hardware from an engineering perspective. So do whenever things break. What are you going to do Whenever things need to be resupplied? A lot of the stuff that we have air quality monitors, we have medicines that we fly, medical kits all of those things expire and need resupply and it falls on the team that I'm on to track when things expire. And then the logistics of there's. We don't have buses or trains that lead to the space station. There's certain launches that involve a lot of coordination with other engineers. So you know we look at the calendar that's preset and what flight can we launch this on and what if the flight slips? And so it's sort of a very dynamic role that deals with the data operations of the International Space Station and all of its moving parts.
Speaker 1:Yeah, super, super. And I'm so glad you brought the job interview process conversation here, because we have students in high school and in college that are listening to us and you know, even though they might not have graduated from college yet, this can definitely help them when their job interviewing is the fact that you don't know what they're looking for and sometimes you Putting a strike through your own Opportunity. Without even trying, it's already a no. So if you don't apply, obviously it's an automatic no, and if you apply, you never know what it is they're specifically looking for or that they might see in your experience that might be something that that they want to bring on board to their team.
Speaker 2:Exactly and that it's so true. I I'm built, you know, close relationships with the folks I work with and I have not yet worked up the confidence has them. So I do pick me, not anyone else. But we have had conversations and I'm sure at some point I will, just because I'm curious. But they, you know we've talked about you. You know, whenever they see my performance and whenever they see what I've done for the team and that I've been told, you know, just a pass, like, oh, like and like that's exactly. We picked you because you could get along, because you had this aspect that would mean you could work well with so and so who we work with, and you know that's gonna make our lives easier. So, like you mentioned, you have no idea what they're looking for and what the needs of the team are. Right, the description of the crowd is very generic and it doesn't cover. It doesn't say this is what we need and so just shoot your shot.
Speaker 1:We're gonna make a little transition now, because I know you have an interest and love and a passion for education. So tell us about your, your recent experience in education and and let us know what your goal is moving forward definitely so.
Speaker 2:Earlier this year, I decided to run for the school board here in Pasadena and I was very passionate about being able to provide opportunities for students here and I Guess, in a nutshell, like what we mentioned in the first conversation we had Ensure that students aren't making the same mistakes. I think that's so important. I have friends here and we all have the same mistakes and I'm like this is insanity, right like there's no need for for folks to be having these same mistakes over and over and, you know, holding themselves back that little bit just because we're not communicating with each other. So I sort of went in with that, with that mindset I wanted to be able to provide a new perspective on the school board and be able to help our students not commit the mistakes I made, which I was like there are plenty of them, right like they, not even just academically, but just like certain things, right like there's. Everyone has these universal experiences. I think that you know social anxiety and and stress, and I think that there's so much that could be learned from that if we just talk About it and share. And so I ran for the school board with that and I didn't end up winning, unfortunately, but, like you mentioned, the first conversation to opens up other doors.
Speaker 2:So my passion for education just continued from from my experiences as a college student. I didn't pursue that postgraduate, ended up taking a job in engineering field, but my personal philosophies that the way to make the world better is by by impacting those are going to inherit it. Right, yes, students in public at our leases, straight right, because it's how we touch all of our, that's how we educate our Electorate, our citizens. Folks are going to go on and inherit the world that we leave them. I didn't win that school board election but I was able to. People think very different value, but for me, my mind is, for the most part, was going a hundred miles an hour, which is why running and exercising is super important because it slows it down. But about two months into my job I had so much to learn like I still I didn't learn everything I needed to learn until probably a few months ago, but I was still very much learning stuff.
Speaker 2:But I saw this like vision for my future and I said I was like, okay, I'm gonna learn things for this job within this next year and I see where I could end up and Then my immediate next up. That was I want to have more impact. And I was like well, what does that mean to me? I like more impact. You might want to management. Do you want to have make decisions that impact a lot more people? Right, and the ultimate death it was from.
Speaker 2:I was like I think that I want to be able to make decisions. I'm gonna touch a lot of people that they're gonna improve the lives, and then the, the way that we do things for Just a large group of people, and I was like that's law school. And again, and I say that's law school, that could be an MBA to and there's different ways to go about it. But for me, I wanted to get an understanding of this order system of order that we have in the United States. They're in law. The week before I was gonna take the LSAT. I had been studying for months, lsat being the law school admissions test.
Speaker 2:Yes, I went to an LSAT law school admissions council forum where they have, you know, they invite law schools from across the country and they send representatives all under one roof and you get to interact with them and talk to them. And that was an interesting experience for me because I was very self-aware of the schools I was going to talk to and that's rotations I set for myself and ultimately as expectations were to only apply to Houston schools, and the reason behind that was because I thought that that those were the only schools that were gonna accept me. I didn't know that. That was like the root of my thinking at the time. It wasn't until after I talked all those schools. Before I left, I stopped by the DEI table diversity, equity and inclusion. I was just like I'm gonna make some friends. These people work with the law school admissions council, maybe they can give me some advice. That sit by sat down with them and that conversation stretched for an hour.
Speaker 2:I left the forum, which was in downtown Houston. I live in Pasadena, 30 minutes away. Two hours later I drove back just to speak to those ladies and I realized that I wasn't taking my own advice, that I was selling my closing doors to myself because of my securities. And you know I they were asking me questions, like you know, and you know you're doing this. You know that you tell students not to do this. And here you are and I was like what this means to me. I was like it means that I'm pulling everything out right now, that I'm not doing this the right way for me and I'm gonna stop applying right now. I'm gonna reevaluate stuff and figure out how to do this the right way for me and I'll possibly be back in a year. Right, if I so, if I so believe that this is the path I need to go on, but I'm gonna make sure that I'm not setting myself short, regardless.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I stopped doing that. The school board had been on my radar since I wasn't in high school and it got to interact with the school board members here and I was in my head. I was like I'm gonna go to you. I put a pin on. It is what I did, right? I was like I'll circle back with this later. I didn't think I would run for the school board until I was in my 30s because I didn't think I'd have the opportunity, and so, whenever that, the law school. That first bout went out. I'm not gonna rush it like if it's meant for me. It's meant for me and I'm gonna go to it regardless.
Speaker 2:I trust that, that I'm such, I have such a passion for learning. That's what's gonna be for me if it is right. I was like but right now there's a dislike. There's an opportunity right in Pasadena, in my local community, to go and make a difference at the schools, and I think I can pull it off, and so that's sort of what led me to run for the school board.
Speaker 2:And then, upon my loss, tying back full circle to the start of this question and, yeah, forward upon my loss, part of me going into that right was like I'm not going to allow myself to stag me. I'm going to have goals for myself and if it's a school board, great. That just means any goals I have for myself regarding loss or regarding more school, they're going to be pushed out five, six, maybe eight years, cause my priorities are going to be not even my job, cause I can put it on the back burner and still do great there. I am going to prioritize the school board and making this area, this community, the school district you have better in as much as we can with my capacities as school board trustee. Right. Well, I didn't get to do that, cause I didn't win, but I made new connections. I met new folks and sort of got to experience the world in a new light a political lie, a law oriented light while also keeping my footing on the engineering world. So I was in the middle of my campaigning I was like I don't know what's going to happen, but at some point I'm going to go to law school. And whenever I didn't win right, I did take a break because I had really been going since I started. I didn't mention this earlier, but I started working at NASA a week after I got back home from New York.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow.
Speaker 2:It was about a month that I caught my breath, relaxed on the thing that's running for office. I think it's pretty in conversation with folks, it's pretty universal, but it comes to a screeching halt, right. Either win and then, like it's, the craziness continues but the campaigning comes to a screeching halt, or you lose and then you sort of get to stay on your own terms of relationships. You keep, but like it comes to a screeching halt. So that was nice and I got to very much take advantage of it and rested a bit. And then I was and again, like a month later, I was like you know what. It's time.
Speaker 2:I think I'm a much stronger person. I'm a much stronger applicant. Absolutely, take that forward into my future. I know that law school is the next step for me and I'm continuing down that path. And you know I should be applying. I'm going to be applying in a few months, but it's so where it's going to take me career-wise. I think it's still an open book, right. I like to keep my doors open, and even more so after the world, the roller coaster ride that my career path has been from when I first started thinking about what I wanted to do to now and to the future.
Speaker 2:So I sort of I have avenues, but very much an open mind.
Speaker 1:I love your story. Okay, so I don't love the experiences that you had to go through, but this is really an opportunity for us to talk to our students and especially our parents as well Our, at least the generation of our parents. They were under the mindset of you're going to start here, you're going to get yourself a job, a career, you're going to stay in that same path for the next 20, 30 years, retire, and it was just from point A to point Z, and I think your generation, you all, want more than that. You want something that fulfills you, inspires you and motivates you, but you won't know what it is unless you go through these experiences. And these experiences are growing opportunities. You would have never gotten the opportunity to know what's next for Andy If you don't go through the steps that you had to go through.
Speaker 2:Exactly, yeah, it's so nice to hear, like your perspective on that because you, I imagine you get a unique perspective getting to talk to folks on your podcast, so that's like a little nugget I'm pretty sure going to write down and tape with me because that's awesome about younger folks chasing after things, right yeah, and following the passion relentlessly without fear. This is an interesting observation that I think is amazing. And then the other thing that you mentioned, point A to point B. I think another important topic related to that is point A to point B. Even in school, right.
Speaker 2:So whenever my parents thought I was going to go to medical school, they were like you need to go undergrad straight to medical school, right, no break in between.
Speaker 2:I mean, even now, whenever I took that, whenever I was like, oh, I'm going to take a break, like deciding how long loss was going to take between when I graduated college and law school, there's like that anxiety about maybe they're not going to return to school and I sort of had to push back there with them and so I'm like, well, I sort of gave them the rationale as to why I was going to law school and why I was so confident that that fire wasn't just going to burn out this view of education and your role in the world. Right, that it's supposed to be linear? Yeah, and that's narrative is. I agree with you it's starting to shift quite a lot because some of the folks I look up to and that I hear from very you know just interesting paths. That they did this and then they worked here for like two years is nothing. Some of them, some folks work 10, 20 years.
Speaker 2:Yes, then they go to medical school or go to law school and they're stronger, stronger doctors, stronger attorneys. Because of it right, Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. And listen, andy, you and I are making really big changes here because I hear a lot of people from my generation especially. You know they're changing their careers in their thirties and forties or fifties, like literally changing their career, and us being here in the forefront with our youth is really opening the doors for them to say this is the time to explore, and you will never know what's on the other side If you don't build that community, build those connections, get to talk to people. Those experiences build up and it makes you to who you are today, because if you would have not followed these experiences, you would have not had the opportunity to find that passion, that that little spark that's within you, that's going to take you to the next level.
Speaker 1:And I think and this is I'm putting on my parents hat hat perspective here is it's our own fear as a parent for our child not to be successful, but. But you have the ambition, you have the determination and that's definitely something that's within you and that's gonna take you to whatever it is that you want to do next. Are you sharing this experience? I think it's very enlightening for students because sometimes we're so afraid of and I'll use this word very lightly, but felling. But felling is nothing but an opportunity to learn and an opportunity for you to discover more about yourself. If you don't have that opportunity, you can't continue to grow, and if you're struggling with something, it just means that you're learning more and that's taking you to whatever it is next in your life.
Speaker 2:I agree. Felling, you fell forward. Right, that's all that happens. You fell forward, you fell, and then you move on to the next. And maybe it's the same thing. Maybe you learn something that closes that door because it wasn't for you, so you go to another one, but if it was right, you fell forward. There are very few things that are truly dead ends in life.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I always have this analogy of a baby. When a baby's starting to walk, it falls and what does the baby do? Gets back up and tries again, and I don't know why the way we grow up with that fear of getting ourselves back up, but we did it since we were a child.
Speaker 2:Exactly, and being comfortable with felling. I think being comfortable with felling in and of itself opens up so many doors right. It's like you're no longer you're not afraid of you're obviously not afraid of succeeding, and if you're not afraid of felling, it's a win-win either way, right. And so realizing that and going with that mindset into things is powerful.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for sharing your experience with us. We are very excited that you have such a passion for education and I understand right now this is your career path that you think, but obviously go with an open door. I think you're gonna be doing amazing things. Continue to discover yourself and who you are as a person. You, being here with us today, you have shared a wealth of knowledge and we really appreciate it, and hopefully you'll be back soon maybe after law school or whatever's next and continue us with your journey.
Speaker 2:Definitely. I really appreciate you having me and I hope for the folks listening that this was helpful and that you folks can take negative advice and not make the same mistakes. I go make new mistakes, Because that's inevitable and that's awesome. Right, You've learned and I hope that it's all helpful.
Speaker 1:Yes, absolutely. Thank you, Andy.
