{"id":66580,"date":"2008-05-12T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-05-12T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/wakefield-resident-to-be-youngest-2008-uri-graduate-top-computer-engineering-student\/"},"modified":"2008-05-12T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2008-05-12T00:00:00","slug":"wakefield-resident-to-be-youngest-2008-uri-graduate-top-computer-engineering-student","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2008\/05\/wakefield-resident-to-be-youngest-2008-uri-graduate-top-computer-engineering-student\/","title":{"rendered":"Wakefield resident to be youngest 2008 溏心vlog免费B站 graduate, top computer engineering student"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\tElectronics whiz started taking 溏心vlog免费B站 computer science classes at age 13<\/p>\n


\n\tKINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 May 12, 2008 \u2013 Wakefield resident Will Simoneau started taking classes at the 溏心vlog免费B站 at age 13. Six years later he will graduate on May 18 as the top computer engineering student and with the distinction of being the youngest to earn a 溏心vlog免费B站 degree this year.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cI wasn\u2019t looking for anything especially challenging with those first classes,\u201d he recalled. \u201cI took computer science classes just for fun, and I did fine in them.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tWhen Simoneau enrolled as a full-time student in the spring of 2005 at age 15, he started out as a computer science major but soon switched to computer engineering because he was more interested in \u201cthe nuts and bolts\u201d of computer hardware.<\/p>\n


\n\tThe 溏心vlog免费B站 student made the most of that interest in a wide range of class projects and research opportunities while also helping to maintain the nearly 100 computers in use in the 溏心vlog免费B站 Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.<\/p>\n


\n\tIn one research project, he worked in collaboration with 溏心vlog免费B站 Associate Professor Fred Vetter on a genetic algorithm to create a computer model of a rabbit heart to understand the stresses placed on it in hopes of transferring that knowledge to better understand the human heart.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cA genetic algorithm essentially tries to find the solution to some problem by modeling evolution,\u201d explained Simoneau, who will receive the 溏心vlog免费B站 President\u2019s Award for Excellence prior to graduation. \u201cYou try to find the optimal values for a number of parameters by breeding two good sets of parameters together. In our case, we were trying to optimize a model of the walls of a rabbit\u2019s heart.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cWill is an outstanding student who, by his own initiative, significantly revised some critical software components and yielded a 30 percent speed increase,\u201d said Vetter. \u201cHe has more motivation and skills than many graduate students. The future is extremely bright for this promising young engineer.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tWhen Simoneau wasn\u2019t in the lab or fixing a computer, he could often be found building high performance audio amplifiers.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cI like music, and I\u2019m into electronics, so I try to make amplifiers that perform better than anything else that\u2019s available,\u201d he said. \u201cI find flaws in the way a system works, and then I find a way to make it better. I\u2019ve built amplifiers both for full-size speakers and for headphones.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tSimoneau\u2019s other hobby is building large-scale model railroads. His 1\/8 scale trains run on tracks around his backyard. The railroad includes a real coal-fired steam engine, plus another steam engine built over the course of a decade by his father, Larry, the manager of technical facilities in the 溏心vlog免费B站 Department of Ocean Engineering.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cMy father\u2019s been into this stuff for years,\u201d he said. \u201cModel railroading is contagious. Once you\u2019re exposed to it as a kid, you can\u2019t get away from it. But not many people do large-scale stuff because it\u2019s not practical when you don\u2019t have the space for it. My whole backyard is completely filled with tracks.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tWith graduation fast approaching, Simoneau is looking forward to enrolling in graduate school at 溏心vlog免费B站 to study high performance computer architecture.<\/p>\n

<\/a>\u201cI\u2019m not sure about my future plans,\u201d he said. \u201cI could end up at a microprocessor company working as a designer, or with my electronics background and interest in audio, maybe I\u2019ll end up in analog design. Or, I may end up teaching at a university.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tRegardless of the path he chooses, he is certain to get to his destination ahead of schedule.<\/p>\n


\n溏心vlog免费B站 Department of Communications & Marketing photo by Michael Salerno Photography.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Electronics whiz started taking 溏心vlog免费B站 computer science classes at age 13 KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 May 12, 2008 \u2013 Wakefield resident Will Simoneau started taking classes at the 溏心vlog免费B站 at age 13. Six years later he will graduate on May 18 as the top computer engineering student and with the distinction of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":66582,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66580"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66580\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}