Afterlife: Sheona Sequeira

In the rubric ‘Afterlife’, Electrical Engineering alumni from the University of Twente look back at their time as a student. They take us along their study time and subsequent career path and share what defined their period at Scintilla and the University of Twente. In this edition: Sheona Sequeira

It’s been approximately 1,5 years since I left the University, but honestly it seems like it was yesterday. It seems like yesterday was the day I took a huge leap of faith in myself and decided to move to the Netherlands and straight in to the second year of the Bachelor Electrical Engineering program. The journey at the UT, although relatively short, was one super fun and enjoyable period that I will remember and cherish for the rest of my life.

Study period at University of Twente 2017-2021

As every electrical engineer (well most, I think) I was quite a shy person. And moving half way across the world did not help me make me any less shy. It took me a bit of time, I think around one quartile I believe for me to slowly emerge out of my comfort shell, and see what the university had to offer other than the study part of course. After looking around on the student union website, I discovered that the University had a choir of its own. Since I really do love singing and playing the piano, I decided that joining the choir, Musilon, would be a perfect fit for me. Within the year, I had so much fun, both with singing and also simply hanging out with the lovely people, that I decided to take on the role of the Treasurer in the year 2019.

As for Scintilla, let me tell you where my journey as an active member began. Well, well, well in my first few months at University, I probably went to 3-4 activities of Scintilla, with most of them being lunch lectures. I was always curious about how the lunch lectures would be organized, but the thought of actually being one to organise them in the future simply hadn’t crossed my mind, well at least until one Karaoke drink at the Abscint. I fondly remember being asked by the then candidate board member for external affairs if I would like to join the LEX which I of course very happily agreed to. In 2018, all of the Scintilla committees were still in Dutch, but with me joining the LEX, everything slowly started shifting to English. I feel like the warmth and happiness that I felt being a member of the LEX, motivated me to join more committees, namely the Vonk and the Lustrum Camp.

Have you heard of the saying ‘All play and no work makes Jack a pure toy’? Well that’s something I was on a mission to avoid. So, no matter how active I was in Scintilla and Musilon, I was adamant to make sure it would not have any consequences on my studies. As a young child, I have always been intrigued by the different medical devices we have in the field, ranging from devices as simple as a blood pressure system to complex MRIs and surgical robots. I finished my Bachelor thesis on the 5th July 2019 where I defended my research on ‘Development of an algorithm to determine the respiratory rate in children using Stereo Camera’. This assignment had a lot to do with computer vision algorithms, but still included amounts of signal processing. At the end of my bachelors, I discovered something new about myself and that was that I really liked Computer Vision. But since I also had a fondness for robotics, I did my Masters Electrical Engineering with a dual specialization. This allowed me to learn a lot more on both the topics that I really found interesting. During the course of my Masters, I did my internship on Signal Processing of respiratory data within Demcon. I feel like my internship really helped get me into a nice work rhythm. Furthermore, I also worked with a lot of nice people who were always very open, welcoming and helpful, which made it really nice to go into work every morning. For those of you who do not really know Demcon, I will introduce it to you a bit later.

I concluded my study time in the University of Twente after defending my approximately 6.5 months long master thesis at the Robotics and Mechatronics group in July 2021. Thus scoring myself a Masters degree in Electrical Engineering with my specialisations in Robotics and Mechatronics And Computer Vision and Biometrics. The subject of my thesis was the 3D Reconstruction of the Breast Surface from Ultrasound Images acquired by a 7 DoF robotic manipulator. Quite a big subject, one may say, but trust me the research was really captivating!

Software Engineer at Demcon (2021 - Now)

So let me start by introducing the company I work within (as promised a bit earlier). Demcon is an Advanced Mechatronics company that works on a lot of exciting projects in both the high tech and medical industries and is headquartered in Enschede (right in-front of the University actually). I, however, decided to move to a new home and a new city, Eindhoven and thus work at the Demcon Eindhoven branch.

Many people ask me, you studied Electrical Engineering then why do you do Software? Well the answer is pretty simple honestly…It’s because I like it…

Demcon offers you a chance to work on a wide range of projects. To name a few in the medical area, it could be something as small as a wearable on your arm that senses your heart rate to something as large as a respiratory machine. And I can happily say that I really do like working on such projects. My role in Demcon is an Embedded Software Engineer, which is why despite the on-off corona restrictions in 2021, I mostly did work in the office together with most of the other Embedded software engineers. I am actually really happy to have a nice bunch of colleagues who really made me feel welcomed into the company.

When I started working in August 2021, there were still quite a bunch of Corona restrictions albeit less than the previous year. This really made it quite difficult for me to get to know other members of my project team. You would of course see their faces on Teams, but that isn’t really the same as seeing a person in real life, is it? Thankfully, the corona situation has taken a turn for the better, and we can continue living our life positively.

One of the qualities that I really do like about Demcon is that they really do try to allow every individual to reach their potential. You are encouraged to try out new roles and opportunities. I have recently taken over a new role as the Internship Coordinator for the software department and have become a board member of the Personeelsvereniging. Having opportunities outside my job description as a Software Engineer, really helps me develop my soft skills a lot more and helps me network with people from different backgrounds.

Well, to use the reverse of the quote I earlier used during my study period, I know quote ‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy’. Well that is definitely not the case in Demcon. There are activities organized at least once a month where in a bunch of colleagues come together and have a drink and furthermore, we always have the Vrimibo. And not to forget the yearly super nice Demcon weekend. The hours that I am not at Demcon or at a Demcon activity, I really like to either hang out with friends, just relax, play the piano and sing a bit or go to the gym/kickboxing.

Let me conclude by saying something really short and sweet which hopefully can positively strike a nerve in you (the reader). If you like something go for it. If something costs too much energy, there’s probably something else out there that suits you better. This is really the best way to find your true passion.