Afolami Akinsanmi

You've probably heard the famous Hindu proverb : There's nothing noble in being superior to some other person. The true nobility is in being superior to your former self.

True, the CS labs keep getting better equipped but have no doubt that the best resource of this department is the people. The faculty and staff are very helpful and operate a truly open-door policy. The students I worked with in various research groups were quite talented and many of them have moved on to very exciting, challenging positions at Fortune 500 companies. I thoroughly enjoyed my time as a graduate student in UTEP.

Some of the more memorable experiences: Try asking Dr. Kreinovich a question! Surely you'll get an answer but he'll also ask you a couple of questions along the way. As a student, I used to feel this wasn't fair since he's supposed to give the answers now and ask questions on the exams. In retrospect though, his questions helped to clarify what I thought I knew. Try taking Dr. Teller's class! You'll surely come away learning how to say what you mean and mean what you say. I enjoy how she would repeat a student's response to a question and in my case, it always left me feeling like, that's exactly what I meant to say (in other words), especially if my response was somewhat jumbled! It's an excellent lesson in precision thinking, speaking and writing. And there was also the opportunity to explore new ideas. I spent a fair amount of time working with Dr. d'Auriol on a novel approach to intrusion detection using conceptual spaces. This experience taught me how to better manage a project, meet deadlines and define clear goals as a measure of success.

I have since moved on to a career as a Software Design Engineer/Tester at Microsoft working on some of the latest technology in Web Services. The ability to work effectively in teams, practice proper project management, and to ask the right questions are some of the valuable lessons from UTEP that I apply every day at my job. And of course, the door to my office is always open!!!

I'm proud to be an alumnus of this department. It's a truly noble place.

Afolami Akinsanmi