Christina Carroll

Major: Electrical Engineering

Graduation Year: 2024

Hometown: Bear, DE

Christina Carroll

Q: Why did you decide to become an engineer?

Carroll: When I was in high school, I loved physics and math—I took AP physics and my favorite subject in that class was circuits. I also had a cousin who majored in electrical engineering, and when he was telling me about his major, I thought it would be perfect for me.

UD has a great engineering program, but being on the golf team also brought me here—the team, the coaches, and overall it turned out to be a perfect fit for me.

Q: What has been your favorite course or instructor?

Carroll: My favorite instructor is Prof. Mark Mirotznik. I loved coming to his class, ELEG 205 (Analog Circuits), and I loved what we were learning in that class as well. It’s a lecture and lab-based class where we go through lots of different techniques and concepts.

I also really enjoyed CISC 108 (Introduction to Computer Science). I took it during my freshman year, it was my first introduction to computer science, and I really loved it.

Q: Have you done any summer research on campus? If so, what did you work on?

Carroll: Last summer I did undergraduate research with Prof. Mirotznik, where we built an automated system to measure the gain in radiation of antennas. We built a GUI [graphical user interface] using MATLAB to create the code to measure radiation for a range of frequencies up to forty gigahertz. We then used a 3D printer to create the mounts for the antennas, then a network analyzer to capture the data.

Q: What’s your favorite hang-out or study spot on campus?

Carroll: Sometimes I go to the library but mostly I like to study in Evans Hall in the Innovation Suite (iSuite). There I can also meet up with my classmates and go over questions about homework.

Q: How do you spend your time outside of class and research?

Carroll: Everything I do outside of school is basically golf! During the season, I go to workouts at 6:45am on Tuesdays and Thursdays and yoga at 6:45 on Fridays. Then I’ll go to class and whenever I get done go to a course to practice for 3 to 4 hours. We have access to a lot of different golf courses, but our main one is the Dupont Country Club in Wilmington.

This past season was pretty condensed, where we had five weeks of traveling back-to-back. We had our first tournament in South Carolina, then Wisconsin, then two tournaments in Colorado, and then our home tournament at Rehoboth beach to end the season in early October. During tournament weekends, the day after we arrive, we have a practice round that lasts all day, and then the tournament is three rounds, usually 18-18-18 but sometimes 18 and then 36 in one day.

Q: What advice do you have for incoming first-year students?

Carroll: My advice would be to dive into as many interests as you have. Before college I never really got introduced to computer science until I took my first computer science course here, and I think being able to dive into something that was of interest of me was really valuable. So, if you have an interest in anything, take a couple of classes in it, and don’t just focus on one thing, especially in the beginning.