Suzu Abe started her electrical engineering education at Arizona State University in the Fall 2022 semester. Born in Japan, she lived there for seven years before moving to Austin, Texas, where she lived for 10 years.

The first classes that sparked Suzu’s interest in engineering were middle school courses called Gateway to Technology 1 and 2. In these classes, students worked on different projects to solve problems and learned about different aspects of engineering. As she continued on her journey of engineering and STEM through high school, Suzu’s passion for a career in engineering grew.

In her junior year of high school, Suzu took a class called Digital Electronics. This class that solidified her idea to major in electrical engineering in college. Working with breadboards, Arduino and general circuit design were activities that Suzu loved and something she could see herself doing as a career.

Shortly after her digital electronics class, Suzu grew more interested in building and taking apart technology. She also desired to understand how different parts work together to perform certain functions. This motivated her to build her own PC, which she describes as a fun and memorable experience.

Building her own PC allowed Suzu to get a better understanding of how a computer’s individual parts work together to perform intensive tasks. Her dad also inspired her interest in electrical engineering thanks to his job as a technical director at semiconductor company NXP. He would often tell Suzu about the type of work that he does, which fascinated her.

Some of Suzu’s hobbies include going to car shows, playing PC games, playing sports, traveling and spending time with friends. She is also involved in a variety of clubs and organizations at ASU outside of serving as an electrical engineering student ambassador, including the Japanese Student Association; Engineering Projects in Community Service, in which she is working on a project to improve sustainability; and the Grand Challenge Scholars Program, where she is focusing her theme on health.

Suzu’s advice for students:

“Don’t restrict yourself to clubs and organizations that are specific to your major. Branch out to other clubs and organizations that interest you and take advantage of all of the wonderful opportunities that ASU provides us with, like career fairs, tabling sessions and different engineering clubs. Overall, stay open-minded; a lot of these classes don’t just give out easy A’s, so you’ll have to work and manage time well, and never feel ashamed to reach out for help at places like tutoring centers and office hours.”

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