Research Center

GAVIN

Hometown: Highland, IL 

Major / Minor: Computer Science/Business

Extracurricular Activities @ U of I: Engineering Initiatives, Engineering Open House, Engineering Student Alumni Ambassadors, ACM, Women in Computer Science, FOCUS Bible Studies and I also teach an Engineering 100 class as an Engineering Learning Assistant.

Favorite Class @ U of I: I really enjoyed CS 241 – System Programming. I enjoyed it because we learned the C programming language, POSIX calls, semaphores/mutexes and a lot of practical programming knowledge (we even wrote a simple web server!).

Hobbies: Computers, internet, web programming, playing piano, soccer and writing.

Favorite Quote: "Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe." -Abraham Lincoln

Hero/Role Model: My father. Among other things, he taught me the value of working hard even when others around you are not.

Favorite Restaurant in C-U: Za's or Papa Del’s.

Favorite Music: I listen to everything from Popular and Classic Rock to Classical music (especially anything with an amazing piano part).

Favorite Movies: I'm not a big movie person ... Office Space was pretty good, as well as classics like the Matrix and Angels in the Outfield. Anything created by Pixar is great, too.

Favorite TV Shows: The Screen Savers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Screen_Savers) was an amazing show before it got cancelled … There are still great clips on YouTube if you’re interested.

Best college advice: Get involved! There are amazing opportunities to learn new things and meet new people if you get involved. Join a variety of clubs, be an active participant in classes (sit in the first row!) and get some “real world” experience.

Project Work @ RC: Tablet PC Research - researching what are the best and most efficient ways to use tablet PCs for data input/acquisition. Using this knowledge, I am writing an application for use at job fairs. We'll have a working prototype for our Research Center HR Recruiter Tim Ellison to use at the University of Illinois job fairs by the end of the summer!

What brought you to the RC? I heard that the Research Center was a great place to work from other interns. Three things prompted me to apply: I would be doing interesting work for a great company, working on campus and gaining valuable experience for my future.

Best thing about working at the RC: Everyone is friendly, my projects are interesting and my project leaders always encourage me to learn about the things I’m working on.

Most surprising thing you’ve learned about State Farm: That it is such a big company (so many employees! Whoa!).

Life Aspirations:  Invent something that will improve lives - Something that truly makes a difference like the Wikimedia foundation (Wikipedia) or OLPC ... something along those lines.