Going Viral

Kaitlyn Franz smiles for the camera while hooking up electrical equipment at the Digilent booth.

Recent WSU electrical engineering graduate Kaitlyn Franz landed a full-time job with Pullman-based Digilent Inc., a leading electrical engineering products company serving students, universities, and equipment manufacturers with technology-based educational design tools.

Prior to graduation last summer, Franz balanced a busy schedule at included a full-course load, homework, organizing 36-hour hackathons as well as an internship with the company that hired her.

Why Kaitlyn chose electrical engineering as her major:

Kaitlyn first started her college career as an art major because she liked to paint and be creative, but it was short-lived since she didn’t want people to tell her what to paint. She then tried music and physics, where she realized how much she liked electromagnetism. And that is where she found electrical engineering.

“I also wanted a degree that was more directed to a job.”

What a Digilent intern does:

Franz interned at Digilent for 40 hours per week, writing documentation, moderating forums, answering customer questions, guiding new interns, and making promotional YouTube videos for the company.

“I’ve done two or three videos,” said Franz, “and they’re always exciting to create.”

How interning helped her be a better engineer:

Kaitlyn has gained hands-on experience that is related to the skills she has learned in classes and labs. By going to tradeshows, she learned event-planning skills, which helped her organize WSU’s recent Hardware Hackathon.

1st Annual Hardware Hackathon at WSU
Hardware Hackathon competitors

Balancing an internship with school:

Staying organized and color coding her weekly schedule helped Franz balance life between her internship and classes. It’s a lot of work, but she likes staying busy.

“I like being busy because it makes it so I can’t procrastinate because there is always a list of things I need to get done.”

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