Defense-related and other technology-based industries, as well as national labs, seek electrical engineers with good credentials and intern experience

By Laurel McKee Ranger Contributing Editor

Spring 2001 surveys by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE, Bethlehem, PA) revealed that salary offers to new college graduates in most technical disciplines had increased over last year. Offers to electrical engineering grads rose 6.6 percent to an average $50,850.

Prospective employers included electrical equipment, computer and electronic products manufacturers, the defense and communications industry, and national labs. The hottest jobs were in hardware and software design and development and project engineering.Bill Carson, director of the Center for Career Development at Morgan State University (Baltimore, MD), noted the same thing this summer. "We have about 700 students in the school of engineering at Morgan State right now, and close to half are in electrical engineering. I haven't seen any cancellations for on-campus recruiting so far."

In addition to positions specifically designated "EE," electrical engineers from last year's class went on to become manufacturing engineers, spec writers, field engineers, consultants, network engineers and device engineers. Carson recalls that the average offer for last year's grads was about $55,000.

At New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT, Newark, NJ), Jo-Ann Raines, director of the career development service, saw much the same picture. "The career fairs last year were fully subscribed. Although nobody can be sure what's going to happen, we're pleased with the companies that have come back so far."

Raines says EE is the biggest major on NJIT's campus, too. "With an EE you can go in a lot of directions, including business and law." She notes that the school now offers a technical MBA degree.

The events of September 11 are likely to change the picture for EEs and other new grads. On one hand, the economic picture has worsened; on the other, the technical needs of companies involved in defense and security are likely to increase. But whatever develops during the next year, new-grad EEs should be in demand.

Michael Brown.

Michael Brown, director of human resources at the San Diego headquarters of BAE's information systems sector, notes that EEs get involved in the manufacture of military and civilian aircraft, as well as ships, submarines, space systems, radar, avionics, electronic systems and guided weapons. They work with technologies ranging from superconductors to radar telemetry and systems integration.

Brown prefers - but does not insist on - career-related internships or co-ops and a GPA of 3.0 and up. U.S. citizenship and a security clearance may be necessary. "In our affirmative action programs we target HBCUs, and we are industrial affiliates of NSBE, SHPE, SWE and AISES," Brown says.

BAE's Janet Yu and her team are developing a test station for the F-16 fighter jet

BAE's Janet Yu works
for the U.S. Air Force
Janet Yu, a systems engineer at BAE's San Diego, CA facility, works on hardware for test stations that her team builds for the U.S. Air Force. At the moment the team is developing a rack-mounted version of the test station for the F-16 fighter jet.

Yu got her BSEE with a concentration in control systems from the University of California at San Diego (La Jolla, CA) in 2000. Before graduation she interned at both Boeing and BAE.

"I was at Boeing in 1997. I worked on the shuttle and the international space station. I did some wirelist work and some research through NASA. I even got to go into the shuttle when they were putting it together!"

A job fair interview took her to BAE the next spring. She worked on a computer and disk drive assembly for the F-16 test station, and at the end of her stint the company offered her a permanent job.

In college, Yu was secretary of the on-campus chapter of IEEE. "One event I planned brought IEEE student members and professional members together for workshops. It was a lot of responsibility, but it gave me industry contacts as well. Networking is very important," she says.

Greg Hodges.

Teamwork at Northrop Grumman
Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems (Baltimore, MD) designs, develops and manufactures defense electronics and systems, navigation systems, precision weapons, airspace management systems, space systems, marine systems, logistics systems, and automation and information systems. EEs work in all those areas: a hot button is the development of sensors and sensor processing systems for space, airborne, ground and undersea applications.

Greg Hodges, director of recruiting and employment at Northrop Grumman, looks for highly skilled technical people who thrive in a team environment. "We give our new grads the opportunity to continue their learning experience through both hands-on work and continued formal education," he points out.

Because of its defense focus, the company is not tied to the ups and downs of the commercial market. "This provides stability in hiring and recruitment initiatives," Hodges says. "We have solid hiring plans that extend beyond the next five years. We've developed strategic relationships with several universities, colleges and community colleges."

Ron Butler.

Ron Butler supports radar systems
at Northrop Grumman
EE Ron Butler works in Northrop Grumman's system engineering department.

"We deal with the global picture of radar systems. We're responsible for coordinating the planning, development and engineering of a system, including hardware and software components."

Right now, he's working with the subassembly groups to develop a software tool to calculate development cost, production cost, and life cycle cost.

In 2001, Butler graduated from the University of the District of Columbia (Washington, DC) with a BSEE. He had interned at Hughes Space and Communications Ground Systems (El Segundo, CA) where he learned about satellite systems. He found both his internship and his Northrop Grumman job at NSBE conventions.

At Northrop Grumman, Butler says, "I come to work with a smile on my face every day because I am working in the area that I love."

Supporting research at Fermi
At Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Batavia, IL), research is done in the field of high-energy physics. "Physicists come from all over the world to use our facility," says Shelly Krivich, human resources specialist.

The staff of engineers is there to support the scientists. EEs, for example, may work in such varied areas as computer control circuits and systems, microprocessor-based systems, radio frequency detectors and systems, analog and digital instrumentation, high-power energy conversion systems and IC design.

Krivich explains that the equipment at Fermi is mostly one-of-a-kind, the result of the collaborative efforts of physicists and engineers. "It takes quite a while for engineers to get up to speed on this equipment. They have to manipulate it to meet the needs of the experimental programs. It's a very different engineering environment."

Krivich notes that the lab makes a concerted effort to identify new BS and MSEEs and groom them for work at Fermi. The lab has participated in the National Consortium for Graduate Degrees for Minorities in Engineering and Science, Inc (GEM) for twenty years, as well as summer programs for minority high school and college students.

Fermi is a not-for-profit teaching institution operated by University Research Association Inc, a consortium of eighty-seven universities, under a contract from the U.S. Department of Energy. But engineers at Fermi are not government employees. Krivich emphasizes that the environment is more like a university setting. And although it's only forty miles west of Chicago, the lab has nearly 7,000 acres of natural forest and prairie serving as a nature preserve - complete with a herd of buffalo munching the wildflowers.

Double-PhD Emanuela Barzi helps make and maintain superconducting magnets for the high-energy Tevetron accelerator at Fermi Lab.

Fermi is a great place for people who enjoy experimentation, Krivich concludes. "You're doing unique designs at a very sophisticated level here."

Fermi's Emanuela Barzi:
the nucleus of the atom
Emanuela Barzi, an engineer II at Fermi, was born and raised in Italy. She received PhD-level degrees from the University of Pisa (Pisa, Italy) in nuclear engineering in 1993, and in particle physics in 1997.

Although her background is not EE, Barzi does the work of an electrical engineer at Fermi - "with some material science thrown in." She is part of the technical division that makes and maintains superconducting magnets for the lab's Tevetron accelerator, a proton/antiproton collider. "It's the largest accelerator in the world with the highest energy," she says with pride.

Barzi's work involves R&D to increase the magnetic fields of superconducting magnets. "My specific task is to research the superconducting material itself. We measure a variety of conducting characteristics, such as critical current and magnetization cycles," she explains.

While Barzi was still a student, she received a fellowship from the Italian foreign ministry to pursue her thesis on particle physics at Fermi. She was there from 1994 to 1996, working with the physicists who discovered the Top Quark. In 1997 she joined the staff on a formal basis.

Barzi puts a new spin on the engineering environment at Fermi. "In America only a small percentage of engineers and physicists are women. In Italy I think it's much higher. Considering that Italy is such a macho country, I find this surprising," Barzi says. "More women would give the field balance."

Space exploration at JPL
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL, Pasadena, CA) is another not-for-profit research lab with openings for EEs. JPL is an operating division of the California Institute of Technology (Pasadena, CA) and a federally funded R&D center with over 5,100 employees.

Toby Solorzano.

JPL research is focused on exploring the solar system using automated spacecraft. The lab designs and builds the craft in partnership with a number of manufacturers. After launch it tracks and retrieves data, then analyzes and distributes its findings to the worldwide scientific community.

"We're seeing an increasing need for new EEs and may be looking for about fifty of them over the next six months to a year," says Toby Solorzano, who is with the diversity program office at JPL.

Like many other employers, JPL prizes experience. "We're more likely to take a graduate with a 3.2 GPA and work experience in an engineering environment than a graduate with a 4.0 and no good experience.

"Before they graduate, students should make sure to get some career-related work experience," Solorzano stresses. Either classroom or internship experience in DSP, RF or antenna design is particularly valuable, he adds.
EEs at JPL may work in systems, avionics, telecom, observation, mission assurance and QC, mechanical systems, or even IT. They may start out as designers, programmers, test engineers, systems analysts or controls engineers.

OSHA: working in the field
The Occupational Safety and Health Agency (OSHA, Washington, DC) is a U.S. government agency and part of the Department of Labor. Floria Jones, chief of employment for the office of personnel programs, says that most new grad hires are sent into the field as inspectors. "OSHA needs many kinds of engineers, and opportunities specifically for EEs do arise," she says.

OSHA field engineers work out of regional offices around the country. They begin at the OSHA training institute, where they learn about specific health and safety concerns in the region and industries they will be involved with.

Diversity efforts at the agency include recruiting at HBCUs and Hispanic-serving schools. OSHA hires interns through the National Association for Equal Opportunity (NAFEO), the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) and the Washington Internships for Native American Students (WINS) program.

Miguel Alanis of Texas Instruments:
CAD support for ASIC
The demand for EEs continues in the private sector as well. Texas Instruments (TI, Dallas, TX) is a major player in digital signal processing (DSP) and analog semiconductor technologies.

Miguel A. Alanis of TI: "Digital is driving the future."

"Digital is driving the future. Most new innovations include DSP as their engines," says TI's Miguel A. Alanis. Alanis works as a design support engineer in a group that provides CAD support for ASICs for worldwide customers in Internet infrastructure and telecom. The group also consults on best practices in CAD design, and works with CAD developers to improve the tools and design flow.

Alanis received his BSEE from the University of Texas Pan-American (Edinburg, TX) in 2000. He feels he was well prepared by the digital design and microprocessor programming work he did there. "We even designed arithmetic logic units and decoders. My partner and I designed a TV remote digital control using field programmable gate arrays. The senior design project was a car alarm system with an LCD text pager."

In college, Alanis did two very worthwhile internships, which he found through a career fair at the Hispanic Engineer National Achievement Awards Conference (HENAAC). One summer he wrote Unix shell scripts for an Intel automation group, and the next he programmed DSPs for TI.

Last year Alanis was back at HENAAC. This time he was coaching a TI team in the national student competition, and his team went on to win first place.

Design and sales at Tektronix
Tektronix, Inc (Beaverton, OR) creates test equipment for the electronics, telecom and computer industries. Sandra Dunne, university relations manager, and Marti Bunyard, director of staffing and employee relations, expect to hire a significant number of new EE and CS grads. Most of them will come from seven western schools: Oregon State, the University of Oregon, Portland State, Washington State, the University of Washington, Arizona State and Montana State.

Most of the EEs, Dunne notes, will go into hardware, including ASIC design, tool support for microelectronics, modeling and tool evaluation. But there are also opportunities in marketing and sales. "Our sales and marketing people need a technical background," Dunne points out, and Bunyard adds that the company favors candidates with classes in analog and digital design and DSP, and familiarity with CMOS technology.

Gwyn Everly of Lexmark: "I don't think anything can actually prepare you for the real working world."

Gwyn Everly: testing ASICs
at Lexmark
Lexmark International, Inc (Lexington, KY) develops, manufactures and supplies laser and inkjet printers for offices and homes. The company develops all its own technology, which makes good EEs very important hires. "We have a high reliance on people with those skills," says Jeri Stromquist, VP of worldwide compensation and resource programs.

Gwyn Everly, an ASIC test engineer at Lexmark, spent fifteen years in the mortgage business before she went back to school to prepare for an EE career.

She had always liked math and her brother was an EE, so it seemed like a good fit. But with a fifteen-year-old daughter, going to school full time and working part-time was not an easy hitch. She stuck with it, and in May 1998 she received her BSEE from the University of Kentucky-Lexington.

She concentrated on digital design, but it was her work in VHDL that especially appealed to Lexmark. "I secured a position with Lexmark even before my final semester," Everly reports.

Everly is in the business printer division, working with the chip on the printer controller card. Using VHDL code, she develops test benches that verify chip performance.

School gave her many of the skills and tools she uses on her job, but, "I don't think there is anything that can actually prepare you for the real working world," Everly says. "For example, I didn't realize we'd have to read specifications and figure them out. You just have to get in and do it."

Therese Miclot.

Automated processes at Rockwell
"Automating processes is what we do," says Therese Miclot, manager of staffing and university relations for Rockwell Automation (Milwaukee, WI). "You can go to any plant floor in any company and we probably have equipment there."

The company provides power, control and information solutions to a wide variety of clients, from pharmaceuticals to theme parks. Software control has become the largest part of Rockwell's business, and EEs are the primary hiring focus.

While good grades are important for job candidates, Rockwell is also interested in campus leadership roles, intern or co-op experience, and communication skills.

The company offers a number of career tracks and training programs for new hires. "Our sales trainee and field support programs are well recognized in our industry. New grads spend up to a year learning about our products and processes. We also offer leadership development programs focused on operations and manufacturing," says Miclot.

Other new hires go directly to work as associate engineers in areas like software and IT development and hardware engineering. They get their training on the job.

Sherri Allen.

Applied Materials: semi fabs
"Our demand has been affected by the economic downturn, but we're still hiring for our new college grad and intern programs," says Sherri Allen, college programs manager at Applied Materials Inc (Santa Clara, CA). The company makes semiconductor wafer fabrication systems. Applied Materials started a new college graduate training program in engineering in 1993; it has just expanded the program to several other areas, including manufacturing.

The program features training plus three rotations over a period of six months. EEs may work in electric power, control systems, electronic component design, or in manufacturing the fab systems. MSEEs and PhDs may also go into R&D.

Allen looks for familiarity with semiconductors, and likes to see some internship or co-op experience in a high-tech industry. Also helpful: membership in student engineering societies, good communication skills and a 3.0 GPA.

Nancy Burford.

Telecom at Sprint
Sprint (Overland Park, KS) is a telecom provider with some 23 million residential and business customers in seventy countries. The company is the largest nongovernmental employer in Kansas and is developing a new campus.

"We anticipate increasing our hiring over last year," says Nancy Burford, program manager for staffing. She looks for leadership ability, affiliations with technical organizations, and - especially - internship experience in telecom or networking. "Internship experience is very important. We bring in over 200 summer interns ourselves," she says.

Carla Bayha: cool toys at Sprint
Carla Bayha, a network design engineer at Sprint, has a 1998 BSEE with an emphasis in signal processing as well as a BA in music performance (percussion) from Kansas State University (Manhattan, KS). She expects to complete her MBA in 2002.

Bayha does end-to-end design for the implementation of new products for Sprint's long-distance network. "We work in just about every telecommunications technology there is," she says, listing modeling, reliability analysis, ATM, IP and voice. "We also do lab design. We do a lot of fire fighting in our group - projects that need to be done quickly. But we have a lot of resources to make that happen."

Carla Bayha of Sprint: "I like to see the big picture and make sure it makes sense."

An important aspect of the job is spotting potential integration problems. "The problems I identify aren't usually easy to fix. By the time I get them, the two halves of a project are well into the design phase and need to be integrated," she says.

She began her career in the Sprint Technical Applications Resource Training (START) engineering program, which takes college grads through three eight-month rotations. Bayha started in ATM and frame relay, then went on to transport technologies, and finally into IP work. The program was perfect for her: "I like to see the big picture and make sure it makes sense," she says.

Hard-core engineering is only part of the job. "The rest is communicating, writing requirement documents, going to meetings, explaining and discussing designs with co-workers.

She likes the job but hopes to take her anticipated MBA into management some day. In the meantime, she says, "We've got cool toys to play with.

"When you're doing all that theory in school it seems so abstract. You start to doubt whether you'll ever enjoy a job as an electrical engineer. But the work environment is much more concrete. It's definitely worth it in the end."

D/C

Laurel McKee Ranger is a freelance business writer headquartered in Randolph, NJ.