Advice on breaking into the industry?

[jayeshshetty]

I'm currently a junior in school. Last semester I took an FPGA based digital design course, and I loved it. My internship search has been unfruitful so far (could be worse, I'm on the 4.5 year plan so I'll have one more summer to get one). I might end up having a lot of time this summer, and I want to put it to good use. Right now I am thinking of making the Commodore 64. For people currently in the industry, what did you do during school that you thought really helped you land a job? Thanks for your time!

 

[TrickyDicky]

An electronic engineering degree will get you in - you can usually do firmware or software with it.

 

[danadakk]

Spent spare time building music synthesizers out of TTL logic and analog,
then doing some processor work, and coding.

Tons of reading, Circuit design articles and ap notes. And simple breadboard
experimenting.


Regards, Dana.

 

[dick_freebird]

If you can find a part-time electronic technician job,
that would beat a self-directed hobby (for starters,
you can't put yourself down as a resume employer
reference).

My path was child hobbyist, Radio Shack salesman,
technician (these, during college), and recruited
into the semiconductor industry as a design engineer.
The technician experience I noticed seemed to get
the recruiters' attention. The recruiters were all lead
or principal engineer types who had ideas about skill
set and inclination, that a HR flunky would not. My
grades were barely enough to keep their interest,
and I had to stick to my goal of chip design while they
offered me a few less interesting roles (like being a
SRAM product engineer, which mostly involved making
sure the parts were coming out the right chute of the
temperature handler on third shift). Don't settle, because
you will soon enough be "typecast". One of my amigos
from school who had lower grades took the SRAM
PE job I passed on, hated it, went into management.

Small local companies in the electronics business
are more likely to have unadvertised needs than
"big names" who will also have a ton of applicants
for any opening. They may only pay minimum wage
or close to it (my first technician gig was $4.50 an
hour, back when minimum wage was about $2) but
that still beats an unpaid internship.

If your electronics schematic and soldering skills pass
inspection you can get a technician job somewhere.
Now it's a search and diligence problem.