{"426171":{"#nid":"426171","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Keeping up with AE: undergraduate researcher Tiffany Davis","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EFor AE undergraduate Tiffany Davis, the engineering bug bit early.\u0026nbsp;\u003Cstrong\u003E\u003Cem\u003EAnd hard.\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWhen I was11 I asked for a circuit board for Christmas because I thought it was cool that this board could play such a huge role in how something works,\u201d says the 20-year-old Washington, DC native.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWhat can I say? I was just one of those engineering nerds. I still have that circuit board. It\u2019s still really cool.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EMore than cool, Davis\u0027s unbridaled enthusiasm and intense work ethic have lately been garnering the attention of academic and industry leaders.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Boeing Company, for instance.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ELast week, the\u0026nbsp;aeronautics giant announced it had chosen Davis for its highly competitive Engineering Accelerated Hiring Initiative (EAHI), an elite program that elevates the employment and internship options for 350 of the nation\u2019s best undergraduate engineers. In November, Davis and other EAHI\u0026nbsp;recruits will fly to Seattle, where Boeing\u0027s top hiring managers will compete for their attention.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Ctable width=\u0022200\u0022 border=\u00220\u0022 cellspacing=\u00221\u0022 cellpadding=\u00225\u0022 align=\u0022right\u0022\u003E\u003Ctbody\u003E\u003Ctr\u003E\u003Ctd\u003E\u003C\/td\u003E\u003C\/tr\u003E\u003C\/tbody\u003E\u003C\/table\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWe get to interview them. It\u2019s beyond exciting,\u201d Davis said. \u201cI get to convey my interests to them and to see who might be the right fit for me. Right now, I\u2019m thinking that I might look for something in propulsion, but that could change. I am still considering my options.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EWhile she is mulling those plans, Davis will be busy in the ASDL, doing research for a year-long\u0026nbsp;\u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/ae.gatech.edu\/node\/1460\u0022\u003ENASA research initiative, ACRUM\u003C\/a\u003E. For the rest of this academic year, Davis will be collecting ephemeris data for the project, which is mapping out plans to capture and redirect the orbit of an asteroid.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIt was a little different last year, when, as a sophomore, Davis was selected to serve as a structural analysis intern for Boeing at its Huntsville, Alabama location.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cI was freaked out [happy] that I\u2019d gotten the internship, and freaked out because I didn\u2019t know what a structural analysis intern does,\u201d she said.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cBut then I thought about it, and I knew that I could read the book, seek the help, find out what they needed, and bring them my best.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe \u201chelp\u201d that Davis sought was not just anyone.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0022I ran into Dr. [Julian] Rimoli\u2019s office and I begged him to let me help with his research. I\u2019d do anything to learn more about structures,\u201d she said.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cIn our statics class, he\u2019d told us that his research was in advanced finite element analysis, which is a subset of structures, so, basically, I knew he could help me improve my base knowledge. I wanted to be ready to contribute when I showed up in Huntsville over the summer.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ERimoli remembers Davis well.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cShe was always asking the best questions in class, and delivering the best explanations for the problems we had in class. So when she requested extra time to do advanced reading and research, I agreed. And, there again, her intelligence was only rivaled by her tenacity.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Ctable width=\u0022200\u0022 border=\u00220\u0022 cellspacing=\u00221\u0022 cellpadding=\u00225\u0022 align=\u0022right\u0022\u003E\u003Ctbody\u003E\u003Ctr\u003E\u003Ctd\u003E\u003C\/td\u003E\u003C\/tr\u003E\u003Ctr\u003E\u003Ctd\u003E\u003Cem\u003EAE professor Julian Rimoli and then-sophomore Tiffany Davis during one of their many non-credit tutoring sessions last spring. The knowledge she gained from these sessions gave Davis the edge in her summer internship at Boeing.\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/td\u003E\u003C\/tr\u003E\u003C\/tbody\u003E\u003C\/table\u003E\u003Cp\u003EEvery week that semester, until Davis left for Huntsville, Rimoli met with his charge to give her extra readings and assign increasingly more challenging structural mechanics problems. In the end, he said, she was tackling work that he would normally have reserved for a graduate student.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EDavis did not receive any academic credit for this challenging tutorial. Nor did she ask for it. The plan was to be well-prepared when she arrived at her Boeing internship.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThe first day I arrived at Huntsville, one of my technical leads gave me a problem involving bearing stress on a part, and he said if I could have it to him by the next day, it would be fine. I had it done in an hour.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EMission accomplished.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBoeing lead recruiter Mark Lyden was not surprised to hear this. When he interviewed Davis for the EAHI position, she exhibited what he called \u201ca brightness\u201d that made her stand out among even the best.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cTiffany Davis is the kind of student we come to Georgia Tech to find. And I\u2019d like to see her working with my group when she comes to Boeing because I think she could teach others,\u201d he said.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cShe has the good grades, the leadership skills and the communications skills that we expect, but she also has that \u2018X\u2019 factor that makes her an outstanding person to work with. She\u2019s smart but not prideful, curious but meticulous in her work.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":"","field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"For AE undergraduate Tiffany Davis, the engineering bug bit early. And hard."}],"uid":"27456","created_gmt":"2015-07-16 15:13:12","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 03:19:12","author":"Britanny Grace","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2014-09-18T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2014-09-18T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"groups":[{"id":"1239","name":"School of Aerospace Engineering"}],"categories":[{"id":"136","name":"Aerospace"},{"id":"134","name":"Student and Faculty"},{"id":"8862","name":"Student Research"},{"id":"135","name":"Research"}],"keywords":[{"id":"2082","name":"aerospace engineering"},{"id":"135681","name":"Tiffany Davis"}],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[],"email":["communications@ae.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}