Ethan Burd '25 Shares His Unconventional Path to a Computer Science Degree
What do treehouses, skipping rocks, gourmet mushrooms, spikeball and a plump pooch have in common?
Answer: Ethan Burd '25 and his unconventional path to a Computer Science degree.
The Austin native spent the Fall 2020 semester during the pandemic taking classes online. In search of creative ways to occupy his brain outside of class, he renovated his dilapidated childhood treehouse; cultivated lion’s mane and oyster mushrooms; and constructed a treat-wielding robotic crane arm to entice the slightly rotund family dachshund mix through the doggie door.
Finding Inspiration in a St. Edward’s Software Engineering Class
These projects continued to occupy Burd when he decided to take some time off until classes resumed in person. During this gap year, he also took culinary classes, studied permaculture and built sustainable off-grid houses out of recycled tires in Taos, New Mexico. When he returned to the hilltop, “I felt very shocked being back in person, and I wasn’t sure I would stay.” Then along came adjunct instructor John Mulholland’s software engineering class.
“It was a sandbox that illustrated what it’s like to work at a tech company,” Burd says. “We were thrown into teams of seven to create a product and do stakeholder demos, with the professor acting as a project manager.”
Landing an Internship at Texas Instruments
Burd loved the holistic look the class provided into the computer science industry, and the entrepreneurial focus fed the same desire for self-learning that had carried him through the pandemic. He soon landed an internship with Austin-based National Instruments, now part of Emerson, through the Institute for Interdisciplinary Science (i4); was selected to present a research poster on that internship at the annual Brother Lucian Blersch Science Symposium on campus; and became technical lead for TeachBack, a startup designed to educate and empower patients as they navigate the healthcare system.
Building Community Through Spikeball, Hiking, and Skipping Rocks
Beyond school and work, Burd has created an informal spikeball group — think volleyball but with the net parallel to the ground — that meets on Thursday evenings on the lawn near Trustee Hall. Every Monday and Wednesday between classes, he bikes to Blunn Creek and hikes the trail rucking a big log. And, inspired by the smooth rocks in Big Bend National Park’s Santa Elena Canyon, he uses concrete from Home Depot to mold his own skipping stones, which he skips on the Colorado River under the Montopolis Bridge.
Preparing for Graduate Studies in Technology and Entrepreneurship
“Education has never been linear for me — I value learning, and I value relationships,” says Burd, who plans to enroll in ESTEEM, the Engineering, Science and Technology Entrepreneurship Excellence Master’s Program at the University of Notre Dame. “I’m just captivated by the world.”
St. Ed’s Magazine
This story was first published in the Ƶ Magazine. Our magazine shares stories about the people, places and experiences that define the university's Holy Cross education.
