Recent graduate sees freedom in computer science
Alumnus works in artificial intelligence
Prudhviraj Naidu chose to study computer science because he wants to give people back some of their time. Naidu, who graduated in spring 2021 from the University of Cincinnati with his bachelor’s degree in computer science, is using his skills in coding, artificial intelligence and augmented reality to minimize the time people spend on mundane tasks so they have the freedom to choose how to spend more of their time. Naidu is working as a junior machine learning engineer at a startup, Passio Inc., that focuses on machine learning. Before he graduated, he was named Undergraduate Student Engineer of the Month by UC’s College of Engineering and Applied Science.
Why did you choose UC?
I chose the United States for a liberal college education. The years at college are the ones when an individual molds a big part of their adult life. For me, it was important to be able to explore diversity and different experiences before I set out as a full-fledged adult. UC’s co-op program, the international programs and breadth of knowledge of courses gave me just that.
Where did you co-op?
Prudhviraj Naidu. Photo/provided.
My first co-op was an intern at a research lab in UC College of Medicine under Dr. Deeptankar Demazumder. I wrote and maintained their website and worked on a research project of presenting wave data into an audio format.
My second co-op was through UC’s IEP (Innovation and Economic Prosperities) program in Singapore. The IEP experience connects students to potential employers which makes it a lot easier to find jobs in foreign countries.
I worked as an artificial intelligence intern for a startup called Omniaz. Omniaz produces augmented reality (AR) shopping experiences for consumer packaged products. I was responsible for the training object detection neural networks and writing image processing scripts to pre-process images for AR experiences.
I continued the rest of my co-ops with Omniaz as a machine learning engineer. My responsibilities expanded to more projects and my work ranged from researching state of the art solutions to providing production-ready solutions. The UC co-op program allowed me to work remotely from India during this time. So, I got a headstart when it comes to remote work.
My co-op advisor, Samantha Groh, was extremely helpful when it came to figuring out my plans to go to Singapore or work remotely from my home in India. She made the process a lot easier.
What was the highlight of your co-op experiences?
The highlight of my co-op was living in Singapore by myself. I had a one-bedroom apartment, went to work using the metro, ate meals in small shops and worked late nights. It was a complete experience of what adult life would be like living in one of my dream cities.
Why do you want to study computer science?
Prudhviraj Naidu graduated in spring 2021 with his computer science degree. Photo/provided.
In high school, I had taken a course on programming from online school Udacity. In that course, the instructor explained that computer science is a unique discipline. It’s a science; computer scientists conduct experiments, write proofs and publish empirical research. It’s also the study of linguistics; the principles of programming languages are the same as any other language. One of the classes deals heavily with the work of Noam Chomsky, who is a linguist. Since computer languages are languages, they have poetry and can express artistic expressions of thought and emotion. In fact, one book on software engineering even claimed that computer programmers are the unluckiest people on earth. They write beautiful prose never read by anyone but cold-hearted machinery. One can easily create art with computer science, such as games, but also abstract artistic experiences through AR. Lastly, it strikes at the core of philosophical thought. On a day-to-day basis, computer scientists deal with what is rational thought, abstract forms of logic and what is intelligence.
To me, computer science means freedom to be and do what you want. Whether you want to be a scientist or an artist or a literary scholar. For me, time is freedom. I want to give people more time. I want to open the door even a little more towards this future. So that everybody has the freedom to choose and pursue what matters to them.
How has UC helped prepare you for the future?
UC has certainly given me the basic technical skills to help with my future career. However, it has given something far more valuable. It has given me the opportunity to meet amazing people, make awesome friends and provided me the confidence to go out and change the world!
Featured image at top: An abstract conceptualization of AI and machine learning. Photo/Ryzhi/Shutterstock.
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