[MUSIC PLAYING]
ANTHONY: My name is Anthony Francis,
I'm 22 years old, and I go to school
at New York City College of Technology, Brooklyn, New York.
I was born in Brooklyn, but I was raised
in the Caribbean islands--
small tropical island called St. Lucia.
[INAUDIBLE]
Occasionally, I would come up to Brooklyn on vacation,
summertime, stuff like that.
MAN: I have never heard, 'I was in St. Lucia
and I go to Brooklyn for a vacation.'
ANTHONY: [LAUGHTER] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It was different.
I came up here at the age of 12 to start my schooling
and get better opportunities.
Here, I'm always on the go--
I'm going to class and rushing to work.
Going to the city, it's a very different life.
[INAUDIBLE]
I had a little bit of engineering background
from just tinkering with stuff.
Then high school came along and I
started really getting into the nitty gritty of math.
My mom told me, there's the school named New York City
College of Technology.
The prices is reasonable and they
have some very good programs.
When I applied for there, my first class
was machine shop 101.
One of my professors told me, this is not a class
where you're going to be sitting down.
So if you don't like that, you might as well just drop out.
I was like, you know what, that's
exactly what I want to be in.
It's fun to read, it's fun to sit down and look
at the pictures in a book, it's another thing
to actually see it and do it.
And I fell in love with it.
And that was the turning point of my career.
We all know mechatronics is the combination of mechanical
and electrical systems programming.
So we kind of took that mechatronics and then we
tried to make it into a place where we could all come to work
and collaborate together.
ANTHONY: There we go.
STUDENT 2: There you go.
ANTHONY: You wake up in the morning you come over
here like, hey I want to build something today,
I have an idea.
Let's do this.
What do you think about this?
I definitely want to put, like, a robotic arm
so we have something kind of close
to, like, a bomb detection.
I mean, this is a tank, after all.
DR ZHANG: Mechatronics technology
is considered as a top 10 emerging technology
of the 21st century.
What it does is incorporate the mechanical design,
electrical design, computer programming, software design
into product design.
ANTHONY: Dr. Zhang is more than
a professor or a teacher to me--
he's a mentor.
He's my mentor.
DR ZHANG: Anthony was very quickly
learning that programming.
ANTHONY: Remember the last day of class
when I got the robot to work?
That was a good day for me.
EDUCATION COORDINATOR: So I was curious about the engineering department
here and the mechatronics lab and how long it's
been in existence.
DR ZHANG: Mechatronics Technology Center
was set up in 2010 by a grant from National Science
Foundation's ATE program.
This is a big area in industry, that's
why our students should be exposed to this emerging
technologies to benefit them when they're looking for jobs.
EDUCATION COORDINATOR: You just graduated this year
and you're working already.
ANTHONY: Yes.
Currently working at Makerbot industries in Brooklyn, New
York.
Makerbot is all about the 3D printer,
creating desktop 3D printers.
Anybody could just take it and just run it, make anything.
I got connected through the previous president
of the mechanical engineering club.
I applied and I got the job, which
was the most exciting day of my life.
So right now, I'm in charge of making sure
that the 3D printer it is up to spec and make
sure that when it comes out the box
the customer could just plug in the power,
put the SD card in, and start printing right away.
Working with something that's revolutionizing the industry
right now, it's just amazing.
I am achieving and succeeding.
Let's go out there into the world, no matter what happens,
try the best that you can and you will succeed in life.
[MUSIC PLAYING]