From Boston to San Francisco, Student Speaker for Graduate Commencement used ‘Northeastern Experience’ to Discover a New Career
Chemical engineering alumnus Kristine Umeh, E’20, will be the student speaker at the 2023 graduate commencement ceremony.
This article originally appeared on Northeastern Global News. It was published by Cyrus Moulton. Main photo: Kristine Umeh will be the graduate student commencement speaker on Sunday at Fenway Park in Boston. Photo by Ruby Wallau for Northeastern University
Graduate commencement student speaker Kristine Umeh called it a “COVID reckoning.”
As the world shut down in spring 2020, Umeh was graduating from Northeastern University with a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering and a minor in Chinese. But her experience in co-ops and internships made her realize that she wanted to pursue something else. Instead, the technology world beckoned.
“I thought to myself ‘the technology industry is really booming right now, and I want to get a chance to be part of that experience,’” Umeh said.
Thanks to the Align Master of Science in Computer Science program at Northeastern University’s Khoury College of Computer Sciences, her inexperience in the field was not a problem.
“I decided I had nothing to lose by getting that education,” Umeh said. “And it was also at Northeastern, so I had the chance to be a double Husky, so I thought, ‘yeah, that sounds fun.’”
Umeh will deliver a speech about her experience during graduate commencement exercises at Fenway Park at 10 a.m. on Sunday, May 7.
Read full story at Northeastern Global News.