Name: Aleksandra Dervisevic

Birthplace: Madrid, Spain

Student Classification (Junior, Senior, etc.): Senior

AAE Major/Minor Concentration: Dynamics & Control/Design

Name and location of company/organization where you are on co-op: Rockwell Collins, Cedar Rapids, IA

What are your job duties? For this rotation, I am mainly working on migrating data to a new tool and also writing scripts to create a new environment for a more efficient communication with the client.

Why did you want to do this co-op? Because I consider working gives you an insight in your field that you cannot get from studying. I believe that working experience during college is an integral part of becoming a well-rounded engineer. I specifically wanted to work for Rockwell Collins because I love controls and I wanted to get hands-on experience in the field that accounts for my aerospace major concentration.

What do you hope to gain from the experience? I hope to gain coding skills as well as more testing experience in simulation environment.

Have you done other co-ops as an AAE student? I did an internship my sophomore year at Piper Aircraft, where I worked in the avionics department mainly solving problems in flight line. Last year I did my first rotation at Rockwell Collins, where I worked on testing for the Bombardier CSeries certification and also on improving a software tool.

What are your ultimate career goals? As of now, I would like to stay in academia and get my PhD in controls/systems. After that, I might either switch to management in an aerospace company or try to become a professor.