As the school year drew to a close, QUEST Social planned a variety of events to celebrate the hard work of all the QUEST students and welcome the new students in Cohort 43 and Cohort 44 who were recently accepted to the program in March.
A QUEST Social member, Anna Fulton, gave her own take on how these events panned out, ranging from everything from the spring formal to the senior send-off and end-of-the-year picnic. First off, Fulton discussed the formal, which was on Thursday, April 18th.
On March 27th, QUESTech, one of QUEST’s student organizations, held their annual Tech Fair in Van Munching Hall. Since it was the week students came back from spring break, it was a fun event full of things to see and learn about, complete with some popcorn and cotton candy to snack on!
Students got to walk around and listen to presentations on different types of technology. Here are some interesting highlights of the presentations I had the opportunity to listen to!
Daniel Danko (Cohort 41) displayed some of his incredible 3D-printed projects, from chainmail to a light saber to a 3D-printed printer! He also showcased a mechanical set of eyes that is programmed to blink and swivel when it detects motion.
Danko (Cohort 41) showcasing his 3D builds.
Kaushal Janga (Cohort 42) presented on computer vision, extracting information from images and videos, and image processing. Janga talked about recent advancements in this field, such as deep learning and the incorporation of AI, as well as future challenges such as ethical and privacy concerns. There are many applications of this technology, such as augmented reality, medical imaging, and Google Translate’s photo function.
Melvin Rajendran (Cohort 40) taught about prompt engineering, which is how to frame prompts to an AI such as ChatGPT. He discussed how to word prompts so the AI gives a more efficient task performance, such as providing context to input data, separating the input text, and specifying what it should output. He then ran an activity allowing us to practice coming up with our own prompts.
Rajendran’s (Cohort 40) presentation on prompt engineering.
Meilin Yuan (Cohort 42) talked about internationalization, or i18n, as a frame of thinking. Yuan described how significant the barriers are for coding across cultures and making software adaptable to different languages, as well as cultural implications.
QUESTech also invited the Leatherbacks Combat Robotics club, who displayed a few combat robots that have competed nationally! These robots are built, designed, and machined by the club in Terrapin Works. While they did not have a live demonstration with the robots due to safety concerns, they showed us competition clips and told us to look forward to their 1lb bot competition later this month on Maryland Day.
Leatherbacks Club’s 3lb robots on display.
Overall, the event was a great success, and I learned a lot! Congratulations to the entire QUESTech team!
QSocial is one of QUEST’s exciting and community-driven clubs. They take on the task of planning and hosting all of our social events to bring our close-knit community together. From tailgates to happy hours, QSocial knows how to show our QUESTees a fun time. I talked to the current QSocial lead Abby Bond to reflect on QSocial’s events this semester and what we can look forward to next semester.
Abby Bond is a senior Bioengineering major in Cohort 37 and has been the QSocial lead since her sophomore year. She finds her favorite part of being lead is a tie between all the connections she’s made with QUESTees and members of other QUEST organizations and seeing QSocial events bond others together. She said, “It’s extremely rewarding to give back to the QUEST community and help others foster those friendships and memories that have made me love QUEST so much.” She has found the most challenging part of being lead is getting students involved during the post-COVID slump and trying to rebuild that togetherness pre-COVID students experienced. Abby has brought a lot of great changes to QSocial including revitalizing the Big/Little program and growing the organization to be three times bigger than when she started.
QSocial has had a busy semester putting on so many fun events including Big/Little Kickoff, Welcome Back Mocktails, the Homecoming Tailgate, and Friendsgiving. They don’t plan to slow down next semester either! Classic events like QUEST Formal will be back in the spring along with some new mystery events like the Welcome Back Event. There will also be an alumni dinner and an end-of-the-year picnic. While Bond has a love for all of the events, she found the tailgate to be her favorite because “it’s a wonderful combination of current students, the Quality Guild, alumni, and great times. Plus you can’t really beat fresh caramel apples!” She’s looking forward to passing on her legacy to new co-leads Rohan Gudwani, Cohort 42, and Anna Fulton, Cohort 42. She’s also excited for QUEST Formal to come back.
QSocial is integral to the close community and network we value as part of the QUEST program. Bond has put so much time and energy into making it an amazing organization, and we are looking forward to the work the new co-leads will do. Thanks QSocial!
The candy bowls may be empty and jack-o’-lanterns may have flickered out, but the echoes of Halloween’s mischief and merriment linger on. As we all pack up our costumes for another year, it’s time to look back on some of the fun QUEST students had, both through class competitions and giving back to the community.
BMGT 190H students on Halloween!
QUESTech, one of our seven student organizations, hosted a successful Alumni Panel on November 9th, 2023, featuring alumni from multiple technology specialties – Software Engineering (SWE), Product Management (PM), Data, and Engineering. Around twenty five students attended this hybrid event, which took place over multiple rooms, both in person and through Zoom, so students could move from room to room and explore several fields.
In the SWE room, there were four alumni. John McGahagan (Cohort 16), Ilan Gold (Cohort 22), Sophia Khezri (Cohort 32), and Ben Lin (Cohort 33) gave advice to current QUESTees on searching for internships and full-time positions at major software companies. Some advice included not putting too much pressure on your first job as it is only a small part of your career journey. Also, a quick fun fact: Ilan Gold shared that he was a founding member of QUEST Corporate!
In the PM room, alumni Andrew Lee (Cohort 23), Adam Sarsony (Cohort 29), Jacqueline Deprey (Cohort 30), and Kartik Krishnan (Cohort 31) shared their experiences in the industry. Krishnan mentioned the wide variety of work he does as a product manager at Microsoft. Currently, he is working on a project to update the Microsoft taskbar, located on the top of all Microsoft products!
In the Data room, Alia Abdelkader (Cohort 27) shared her experience working in the Congressional Budget Office. She plans on working there for a bit, as she is extremely passionate about the tax policy she works on. Abdelkader is considering a PhD in the future, possibly in public policy!
In the final room, Engineering, Joe Dadzie (Cohort 23) and Charles Grody (Cohort 29) discussed their work experiences in chemical engineering and manufacturing. Dadzie mentioned how he is ready to move back to his lab coat and work hands-on in his new project engineering role at ASR Group.
Samantha Taskale, Cohort 38 student and one of the co-leads for QUESTech, reflected, “The QUESTech alumni panel event was an amazing opportunity for QUEST students to explore possible career paths and build connections with our alumni network. We are very grateful for the alumni who took time out of their schedule to speak to the students and answer all of their questions.”
The QUEST faculty and staff actively enable and encourage students to take advantage of our extensive alumni network, which includes over 1,500 alumni. Sometimes reaching out can seem daunting to students, but QUEST Corporate’s mentorship program helps. Entering its fourth year, this program pairs QUEST students with an alumni mentor working in a field that matches their career interests over the course of a semester.
The QUEST Honors Program at UMD is a popular and selective program. But what makes the program so popular? Or rather, who?
This month, I had the pleasure of talking to some of the members of a fabulous QUEST student organization: QUEST Recruiting. Let’s see what they’ve been up to!