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Re: Academic advice...

From: Vito Miliano <>
Date: Wed, 1 May 2002 17:12:50 -0400

On Tuesday, April 30, 2002, 5:33:22 PM, Freeman wrote:

FP> Now at 36, it is time to go back and complete my schooling and to
FP> seriously apply myself to my fields of interest: pervasive
FP> computing, wear-able computing, and  human-machine interfaces in a
FP> pervasive computing  environment. (No, pervasive and wearable
FP> don't conflict; Wearables just aren't small enough to be invisible
FP> yet.)

I asked this same question on this list a while back (looking to get
into the same things, incidentally), and the biggest thing I took away
from the response I got (both on the list and privately), was that in
the majority of schools, undergraduates aren't allowed to touch
anything.

All the university-level research projects, be it MIT, Georgia Tech,
wherever, all seem to be grad-student-level projects.  I didn't hear
anything from anyone that indicated that an undergrad (freshman, in my
case), even with real-world experience, would be allowed to
participate in the projects in any meaningful way.

Even the schools where I'd been asked to attend by the professors
(whom I knew through private sector work) who wanted me to work on
their research with them, when told I would be a freshman, the
indication was that it might be a problem.

FP> I would like to ask those of you who are in the academic
FP> environment how I should go about doing this?  Should I start back
FP> at where I left off, or should I try to lean on my professional
FP> experience and try to get into grad school as some have suggested
FP> to me?  I do know that I would have to go back and relearn my math
FP> requirements - my math skills have atrophied over the years.

I'll likely be starting this fall as a freshman at the University of
Texas at Austin, with no clear major in mind, and the expectation that
I'll be continuing my wearable research on my own time, hopefully
being able to grill whatever professors and such are there who might
be helpful, and maybe getting around to completing and submitting
these half-finished papers to ISWC and the like.  Perhaps in four or
five years, I'll be "eligible" to participate "officially" in this
sort of thing.  :)

Thanks,
--Vito

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