From EA-mail to Internship — an EA Story
EA Stories is a series of conversations with current Engineering Ambassadors representing the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering at the University of Florida. The stories are shared with the hope that they’ll spark inspiration, introspection, or a lesson that otherwise may have gone un-explored.
As many UF Engineering students’ job search continues, we present an EA Story from Jared Stone, a 4th Year Mechanical Engineering student, and his unconventional story of how he landed an internship his freshman year.
Tell me about yourself
My name is Jared Stone. I’m from Ft. Lauderdale, FL or Sunrise, FL (not a lot of people know what that is, so I say Ft. Lauderdale). I’m a fourth year mechanical engineering student here at UF, Executive Vice President of Engineering Ambassadors. I’ve been part of EA since the spring of my freshman year, so it literally has been my entire college career. It’s been super rewarding.
What is your story of your first internship experience?
My freshman year, going into showcase in the fall, I had my high school GPA on there. I had no idea what to put on a resume or how to talk to people. And then, I really didn’t go in expecting to get anything, because a lot of the same thing: “Oh we’re looking for juniors”. So I left like “Okay, it’s all good. It’s just not meant for freshman”, I didn’t know that freshman were capable of getting an internship.
I went home from showcase, just trying to survive freshman year. Going into engineering classes and the transition from high school to college in itself was pretty difficult. And not only that, but I started college with a broken ankle, so I actually had to go to Showcase on crutches, dressed up in a suit and a cast. It was actually really funny.
But during the spring semester, I joined EA, and that’s what I say really changed my life and pushed me to do things that I didn’t think were possible. I talked to Kent, a really good friend of mine and my mentor in the organization.
He had an internship after his freshman year, and so he told me “It’s possible. You can do it. You just have to go out there and search for it”.
But I was doubtful, saying “I don’t know. I don’t think that’s possible.” And he told me “No dude. Don’t even say that. Just go out there and look”.
So I said “Alright”.
So I spent spring break, staying up every day going from 10 o’clock to 3 in the morning, on the career resource websites, UF’s website, and just applying to different stuff, sending my resume to hundreds of companies.
And while I was doing this, I saw this place. It said “Engineering Internship for Aviation Company”, so I thought this looks interesting. And I looked, but the company name was something weird, like Louisiana State Center for Alcohol Abuse?
I was like “What is this?”
And I looked at the address and it was in Ft. Lauderdale. “Let me see what this is”. I copy and pasted the office address, plugged it into Google, and it was fifteen minutes away from my house! And I found out the company’s real name was Thrust Tech Aviation. Looking at their website, I found out they were a company that would take parts off of business or corporate jets, repair them, and send them back to the owner.
So I applied to them. That night at 4 in the morning, their website had the engineering manager’s email, so I emailed him my resume and just said “Hey, I’m interested”. I woke up, that morning, at 9 in the morning, with an email from them. It said “Hey, we would like you to come in for an interview today at 1”.
Did they even had an internship position for the summer?
Yeah, they did, but I didn’t go through that application. I just found the email and sent him my resume.
If I have any recommendations to people, I say do it. If it seems too forward, just do it.
But back to the story.
So Thurst-Tech said “Alright, we’re going to interview you today at one.” So I better get ready, so I hurried up, got ready, went there, and I thought I did terrible in that interview. I’m a freshman, I didn’t really have anything to talk about other than the little bit of stuff I had done (joining EA, etc.). And they called me back 3 months later and told me I got it.
3 months?
3 months later. I got home in May, and they contacted me 4 days before I started, and they told me I got it.
So 3 months after your interview, you got the job. What was the internship like?
My title was Engineering Intern. It was a smaller company, 50 employees in total. But because of that, it was such a hands-on experience.
What I did was I would design the tools necessary for the technicians to repair any aircraft component. An aircraft component would come in, and a technician can’t just take a hammer to something to fix it, because these are aircraft part. So I would design very specific tools that a technician can use to repair and take apart the aircraft component without damaging it.
My first step was I would go through the OEM manual, read the entire thing, understanding how to repair it and what the thing does on the aircraft. Then I would sketch it out, make in it AutoCAD, get all the exact measurements with calipers and other tools, and based on those dimensions, design my tool around it.
And we had an in-house machinist, so I would take my engineering drawings, go down to the machinist, and just hand it off to him. I would watch him make the tool, so I gained lots of machining experience in the process. It was an incredible hands-on experience because I got to work directly with machinists and technicians, learning so much about mechanical design.
This was your freshman summer though. How much past experience did you come in with?
My freshman year, I took a SolidWorks class, so I understood the basics of AutoCAD. At Thrust-Tech, I had to use a new program (AutoCAD Inventor), so on the job, I had to learn how to use that specific program.
I had not done engineering design sketches other than the little ones you do in the SolidWorks class. But on the job, I learned how to make the perfect engineering drawing. Because when you have an in-house machinist, he’ll tell you, if you’re giving a drawing to a machinist, here’s how you should make your drawing with the product actually being made. And in MAE, we’re required to take DML (Design Manufacturing Lab) and I took it my junior fall. So I went into the class, and I lead my group, practicing what I learned on the job designing for actual parts, and all our reports were great. So it really helped me in school too.
It was so hands-on, and not only that, but I got to do really cool projects. I was given thousands of dollars to create and build my own test stand that tested an actuator that controlled the rudder.
That project was awesome. It took two months out of my internship. Freakin’ cool. Really, really hands-on too. Not only did I get to design it, but when the parts were all done, I put it all together too and show the head technician how to use it and how it works.
What was your story after this summer?
Well, last summer 2017, it was going to be five years that I was with my girlfriend, so I knew I wanted to pop the question eventually.
So my goal was to be in Michigan for an internship.
Again, I didn’t go through Career Showcase for it. So what I did was I went online on Indeed and I literally applied to over 100 places in Michigan.
I cold-called places too. I would apply, and if they had their number on their site, I would call them up and say “Hey, I just applied online. Could I talk with someone about it?” And then because of that, I was able to get up to Michigan.
“Hey, I just applied online. Could I talk with someone about it?” And then because of that, I was able to get up to Michigan.
So I got up there. I was hired at the job that I thought I was going to work at; it was a hydraulic company.
And I got there… and I thought I was going to like it. In the first week, the person that hired me was fired, and they completely restructured the company before I got there, and I didn’t know this. And so when I got up there, my position really wasn’t needed anymore, but they were nice and they kept me on anyways and were having me do other grunt work. And I was like no, I can’t do this.
Thankfully, that same week…because as I said I applied to over 100 companies…another company, Guardian Industries, called me. They said, “Hey, we just saw your application. Would you like to have a phone interview and then an on-site interview?”
And I said, “Sure.”
I was already at Michigan at that point too, but they didn’t know that. And they asked for the phone interview, so I told them “Yeah, I’ll have the phone interview. And I’m actually in Michigan. If you want me to come in, I can.”
They said “Okay, okay. We’ll see how the phone interview goes first, but after that, you can come in.”
I did my phone interview on Tuesday, my full day interview on Friday, got the job on Sunday, passed all the screenings by Friday, submitted my resignation that afternoon, and started work on Monday.
I just loved the company, the people, and the culture. They’re owned by Koch Industries and also they’re the world’s largest glass manufacturer. So not only are we, by ourselves, one of the largest private companies in the world, but we’re owned by the second largest private company in the world. So it was a very dramatic switch from such a small company to know this large corporate entity. But I loved the company culture. I loved the people. And I like the fact that, even though it was a big company, it was private too. All their goals weren’t for the short-term, they don’t focus on quarterly goals. They focus on what’s going to benefit us 10 years from now. Not only that, but a thing that surprised me when I went into the interview was that they take 90% of their revenue they put back into the company and into their own resources. I thought what other company does this. What company focuses so much on itself, trying to provide for the customer and being better. So I loved it.
What was your role?
My role for this summer was a Design Engineer.
So what I did was, I used AutoCAD Inventor, so that software that I used for my first internship I used for this one (that’s what actually helped me get the job). What I would do was..I was designing a lot of new processes for new products that were coming out, and I would work with their designers and project engineers.
The project engineers would come to us and say “3 years from now, we’re building this plant in Poland, and a new glass product is coming out of that plan, so we have an area where workers need to go into the furnace area where the glass is melted. So we need a new automated design so the workers don’t need to go into such a dangerous environment where it’s 3000°.” So it was all about designing things for manufacturing purposes.
It was… beyond cool. Because all the things I designed were going into places like London, Poland, or Mexico; it was a global position, so it was getting to work with the global team, getting to travel to different plants across the US, and getting to meet other engineers who came in from countries like Germany. It was awesome.
With all of that experience in both your internships, what did you learned from each internship and how did it influence who you are today?
I think it’s great for freshman to get an internship early on. I know it’s difficult, but if they could get it early on, the better. Because, your classes can get really draining. They really can. Going into Calc 2 can become super boring. But while those classes were boring, I could understand the theory of why I needed to learn it. Now that I had the practical experience, I was like “Yeah, I might not use this on the job, but you know what? I can see why I’m learning it. I can see why I’m doing it because on the job, it’s important for engineers to understand practical mathematics and scientific knowledge.” I understood why it was important.
It benefited me from being in a professional environment. What it’s like waking up at 6, going into work for 8 hours, working maybe over 40 hour weeks, and then going home. It kinda transitions you from school life into real life, teaching you what the difference are between the two. I really liked getting that experience early on.
Finally, a lesson I learned beyond all the normal engineering stuff is to find a company where you actually enjoy the company culture. Always keep your options open because you never know what new opportunity will allow you to grow as a person.
Thank you for reading our second EA story! EA Stories are created to recorded and publish the personal stories of the Gator Engineer, so that other students might find a spark of inspiration, introspection, or a lesson that otherwise may have gone unexplored.
This series is just getting started and ever evolving, so any feedback would be greatly appreciated: claps, comments, criticism; all of it is greatly appreciated!
