Stacey Keener '88

What is your fondest memory of your time in the CS department?

My fondest memory is working on a project in one of my classes where I had to build an equation parser. I had to take a math equation as written normally and convert it into Reverse Polish Notation that the computer could understand. I had one sign error in the program that I had to fix, but otherwise it  worked great. Even the professor was impressed with how I programmed it. He put in the program and the parser a very difficult equation, along with the graphing program that someone else wrote, and was able to create the graph he was expecting.

How has your education impacted your career?

My education at Michigan Tech helped me deal with adversity. There was a time when I thought majoring in Computer Science was not for me. I felt so far behind all the men in my class because I didn't have my own computer and I had to learn programming from scratch, since I had only had a semester course in computer math programming BASIC programs on an Apple IIe in high school. However, I didn't really want to change majors, so I just kept at it and finally I was able to do better in my computer science classes. I think that being able to get over that hurdle and graduate was something that has carried me through other endeavors I have had to muscle through. Being a minority in school helped me handle being a minority at NASA, since there were not as many women in science and engineering jobs 35 years ago.

Stacey is a member of the Michigan Tech President's Council of Alumnae and the External Advisory Board for the CyberCorps: Scholarship for Service (SFS) program at Michigan Tech. She participates in the CS1000 Alumni Assignment project where alumni correspond with first-year computer science students and answer questions they have about the school, the program, the industry, or just life in general at Michigan Tech.