Samuel Knepper

As a rising senior and proud student of the University of Iowa, I have stepped foot into an assortment of experiences in advanced, cutting-edge technology. For over a year, I worked in a machine shop, running computer numerical controlled (CNC) machines fifty-plus hours a week. With different orders planned for pickup on-site daily, I constantly practiced perfect efficiency. A strict timestamp meant I needed to develop a diligence with energetic self-motivation to produce high-quality parts in a "quantity-over-quality" mindset. Soon after, I received a job at the Daily Iowan Newscast as a Lab Monitor. Despite the boring title, I have the exciting opportunity to setup, test, and run some of the best newscast technology and software in the business. Being relatively oblivious to such powerful programs in a news studio, I was able to learn unfamiliar software rather quickly from an impulse of curiosity and inspiration. Halfway through my sophomore year, I was hired as an application developer for the Medical Research Center at the University. As a developer, I discovered reading code is as important as being able to write code. Optimizing programs weighs heavily as a responsibility to my work, and I am constantly troubleshooting and debugging personal and public code in order to build clean and efficient applications. Through these experiences and my studies, I have acquired skills to program fearlessly, develop creatively, and learn endlessly. Building and rebuilding programs throughout the days and weeks while always expecting the unexpected has saved me from countless headaches. Also, while holding a knack of creativity, I have developed a way to fixate my fortes on building innovative applications. Now, having these proficiencies and experiences in hand, I have become well aware there is no time to stop learning and applying, and I could not be more excited to be a Computer Science major. Helpful note: Knepper is pronounced /napr/