With the semester coming to a close, we reached out to seniors at The Grainger College of Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign to ask them about their next steps, advice for new students and everything in between.  Read or watch our Q&A to learn what being a Grainger engineer is all about!  

What are your plans after graduation?

Julia, Civil Engineering: I am going to move to New York City to be a cost advisory consultant at Arup, which is an engineering architecture consultancy.  

Elisa, Computer Science: After I graduate, I will be a software engineer at Snapchat in LA, California.  

Benidel, Civil Engineering: After graduation I will be a civil analyst at Kimley-Horn, a civil and environmental engineering consulting firm.  

Luis, Civil Engineering: After I graduate, I will actually be coming back to the U. of I. to do my master's. I will be doing my master's under the program of global leaders and construction management.  

Brendan, Bioengineering: After graduating, I am going to pursue my master's and Ph.D. at Northwestern University.  

Grant, Civil Engineering: I am going to be a highway civil engineer at Gannett Fleming transit system in August.  

Nandi, Aerospace Engineering: After I graduate, I will be coming back here to do my master's in aerospace. 

What are you going to miss the most about being on campus? 

Elisa, Computer Science: Something I am going to miss about being at Illinois is just the opportunity to learn. I could learn anything I wanted while I was here, and just the opportunity to meet world-class professors and really engage with them in research, engage with them outside of class, I think was really special. Specifically, I had a professor named Mariana Silva who really took me under her wing throughout college and developed my engineering skills — both interpersonal skills and technical skills.  

Benidel, Civil Engineering: One thing I know I will miss is the community. Every single semester I have met someone new, and every single one of these people has impacted my life in so many ways. Words cannot describe the impact that these people have left in my life, so I will deeply miss every single one of these guys.

What is your favorite memory from your time here? 

Elisa, Computer Science: My favorite memories on campus have involved spending time with my community. I was the president of B[U]ILT — Black, Indigenous, Latinos in Tech — while I was on campus. And just spending time getting to know the freshmen and getting to know all the students I get to interact with I think was really special and really developed my sense of engineering and sense of belonging.  

Luis, Civil Engineering: One of my favorite memories here is just the community, I like that we are very close and there is a lot of stuff we can do, so just all of the random messing around with your friends and checking out things around campus is a really nice thing to do as breaks between studying and classes.   

Brendan, Bioengineering: My favorite memory has been traveling across the country for various conferences and mentoring underclassmen during my time here at university.  

What advice would you give to incoming students? 

Julia, Civil Engineering: Go to your professor’s office hours. They are so passionate about their research and are super involved in industry and super plugged in, so going to them gives you a lot of good advice and helps you get your foot in the door face-to-face.  

Benidel, Civil Engineering: I would say that don't let anyone tell you what you cannot do, especially for any Black women in STEM. You might be the only Black woman in the classroom, but understand that you are helping other Black women when you are that person. So please continue to be you, continue to be powerful, speak your mind and don't let anyone shut you down! 

Nandi, Aerospace Engineering: Some advice I'd give to incoming students is to do a bunch of things outside of engineering. Do things that decrease your stress. Engineering is hard, and if you have something outside of engineering that, you know, makes it easier, then definitely do those things.  

Grant, Civil Engineering: Some advice to prospective students would be just to try everything. During my freshman and sophomore years, I was kind of an introvert; I stayed inside a lot and didn't do a lot, you know what I'm saying. So I would recommend just going outside, trying everything, trying new things. Because you never know what you might like, or you might find a new passion that you are really into.