VI-A M.Eng. Thesis Program

If you were to describe MIT to another person in the most concise way, probably “drinking from a fire hose” is the best you can do. Despite the countless hours in labs and head banging on desk before exams, this learning experience is both challenging and rewarding. If you were to ask me about my experience in ADI for the past month, the very same description wouldn’t be an exaggeration.  Simply put, I learned a lot!

What you learn in ADI is beyond the scope of school: simple circuit schematics just won’t do. You learn about how product gets released starting from nothing. The different types of engineers play essential roles in a product cycle: application engineers, product engineers, design, layout,  characterization, trim, test and so on. A product needs to go through so many people before it goes to the customers. As a design intern now in ADI, the first thing you have to get your head around is the concept of “designing for resilience”. The world you deal with now is not perfect anymore. Your design needs to be robust in different temperature, process and power supply conditions. Those are things school just won’t teach you.

For the past month, it mostly has been a meaningful learning experience. I learned so much about what a designer does and IC chip layouts. MIT has prepared me well to adopt the same learning style in my new work environment. The moral of the story for me is that “drinking from a fire hose” is not unique to MIT; it is a lifelong skill MIT student has to absorb knowledge quickly. I look forward to the rest of my summer, prepared to drink even more.