A little too busy, but a fun four years

Kaia Spero did a lot of things she never thought she’d do over her four years at NC State University.

Some experiences were fairly standard: she picked a different major than she expected, which then led to an unanticipated career path. Others were not so typical for most college students: she participated on the dean’s search committee for the College of Engineering and helped select the new dean. She also celebrated both the men’s and women’s basketball teams making the Final Four as Raleigh was the center of the college basketball universe in April.

“I think the nice thing about NC State is that you can do whatever you truly want to do,” Spero said. “There are so many different opportunities available, and not just in engineering, but in the school and the community.”

Spero, who graduates next month with a B.S. in mechanical engineering and a minor in Chinese studies, took full advantage of those many opportunities. She was on the Engineering Career Fair leadership team; an Engineering Ambassador; a member of Theta Tau, the professional engineering fraternity; part of Wolfpack Junoon, a Bollywood fusion dance team she first started doing during high school; and a member and former secretary of NC State’s student chapter of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.

“Those are the things I’ve been most involved in during my time — a variety of things, but they’ve been fun,” she said. “I stay a little too busy, that’s for sure, especially looking back.”

Close communities at a big school

Spero is from Durham, North Carolina, and she decided on NC State after seeing her sister’s positive experiences and for the lower cost compared to private and out-of-state schools. She started in August 2020, staying on campus for just a few weeks before the university switched to online classes due to the pandemic, and she moved back home. But despite the virtual environment, she was able to start finding her community before she returned to campus in spring 2021.

“I was nervous when I came to NC State that it was going to be really hard to get to know people and find that community just because there’s so many students, but the College of Engineering in particular feels so much smaller than it actually is,” she said. “Somehow I walk around campus, or I go to a football game, or I’m walking down Hillsborough Street, and I know people from everywhere, like the community feels so tight knit, even though it’s so big, which I really love.”

Spero loved it so much she decided to become an Engineering Ambassador to help with recruitment.

“I really like to talk,” she said. “I always wanted to be a tour guide, and I wanted to do it for engineering. I wanted to share my experiences … and explain why I chose NC State and love a land grant public institution.”

She also took on big roles with the Engineering Career Fair, which is student run and one of the largest in the country. Her first year, she did analytics and helped publicize the virtual fair, and by her final year, she led the volunteer coordinator team and organized over 100 students.

Because of her deep involvement with those two organizations, she was recommended as a candidate to serve as the undergraduate representative for the dean’s search committee.

“That was a really cool learning experience to understand how the College works and to help advocate for an undergraduate perspective of what we’re looking for in a new dean,” she said. “And the dean we picked is amazing, he seems like he’s been stepping into the role very well and really cares about students and mental health.”

Finding the right major

When Spero started at NC State, she initially was interested in eventually pursuing medical school, and then thought she’d pursue pharmaceuticals. She considered biomedical engineering and chemical engineering before landing on mechanical engineering.

“There were too many things I was interested in, and I didn’t really know where I wanted to go,” she said. “I liked physics, and that was more fun than I thought it would be. I like to work with my hands. I’m interested in space, I’m interested in energy, and I’m interested in prosthetics. And I realized ‘Oh, mechanical engineering isn’t so … cars.’”

Like many, Spero held the common misconception that mechanical engineering is all about engines and primarily related to cars. But when she realized its scope during her first-year classes, she recognized the broad range of opportunities the degree would open up for her.  When she starts her job in September at ExxonMobil, she won’t be doing mechanical engineering.

“It’s this great degree with great resources and then going forward, I’ll use some of those skills, and I’ll develop new skills, and it teaches you how to make those skills,” she said.

Spero will be working as a reservoir engineer and moving to Houston. She interned at the company the two previous summers. She’s looking forward to branching out in a new city, but first she’ll take a long break. Her extended family is coming to town for graduation, and then she’ll go on a trip to Europe before spending several weeks at home.

“It’s been a long four years, and COVID really impacted that,” she said. “It was a hard degree, and there’s a lot to celebrate.”