The experience of a Hokie alumnus in the greater Washington, D.C., metro area

Hi, I'm Vasanth Ganesan and I'm a two-time Hokie. I got my master's degree in electrical engineering in 2007, and my MBA in 2009. I had the opportunity to come to Virginia Tech directly out of undergrad in India. At that point, the Virginia Tech electrical engineering program was ranked highest amongst the universities that I had applied to. And that is what drew me to Virginia Tech. And as the years have passed, our ranking has only risen, that I believe now we're a top 20 program across the nation. I believe the Washington, D.C. market has seen some significant advances from various corporations, including Microsoft, Google, as well as Amazon. Just broke ground for their new headquarters here in Arlington, Virginia. And for those who may not be in the know, the Amazon Innovation Campus was made possible with partnership with Virginia Tech and is definitely one of the reasons why Amazon went with their second headquarters being located here in Arlington, Virginia. There's been a dramatic shift in terms of the need for computer professionals in this area. And more and more organizations, including the federal government, are looking to strengthen their professional workforce with computer science graduates. If I were to be at this point, be looking to enhance my professional career with a computer engineering degree. I would definitely consider the master's program at Virginia Tech. Just having seen from my own experience of how much impact the master's programs have had directly on my career. Overall, I think. Yeah. While you don't have the broader perspective of being on-campus in Blacksburg You still have a lot of students that are based out of Northern Virginia. And we built our own community. We had our International Students Association, which was heavily active in promoting understanding and cultural exchange between the various international students. It was a small, but tight knit community. I mean, we're all in grad school, you spend a lot of time on campus in your research labs, working with your research partners and you build a quite tight-knit community. And one thing is for sure, based on my time at Virginia Tech, my alumni pure group spans many, many multinational corporations and I think it was an invaluable network building experience for me. So when we're talking about NCR, we're talking about the National Capital Region, which encompasses DC, Northern Virginia as well as Maryland. To me a NCR Hokie is a Hokie first NCR just being the location of where you got your degree from. But in no way, I would say that experience was lesser than what I would have got down in Blacksburg. I had the resources of all faculty and staff from across the university, whether they were located down in Blacksburg enrichment, that I've even taken the classes and audited classes from when the guest lecturers where abroad. As a student and being a little bit of a history buff myself, to me, it was just fascinating to be so close to Washington DC as an international student to be kind of around the, power central capital of the free world, if you may, it was just very exciting. It is a very multicultural environment. I feel it was a lot easier for me to assimilate into my local area than other students might feel elsewhere. And as a working professional again, with the federal government being my client, I mean, I can't think of anywhere else that I would be able to effectively utilize my skills and deliver at the levels that I can. Being a Hokie is a sense of belonging. I mean, we're very close knit community and the estimates kind of escape me right now, but I want to say there's over 40 thousand Hokies that are living here in the National Capital Region area. It's a proud alumni network that looks after one another. Many of my jobs that I've transitioned over the years, have been through my alumni network. It is a great community that accepts everybody. And I think there's, innate value in that alumni community that it's hard to find at some other institution that's not local to this area. Based on the last 17 years of my association with Virginia Tech, I look forward to where this journey leads me to and I fully welcome each and every one of you to join other Hokies on this journey and look forward to seeing you as alumni of Virginia Tech.