people who assess radiation doses after, like, a Fukushima or Chernobyl accident and make sure things are safe. “Then, there’s the nuclear side, which is more me. It’s a focus on nuclear reactors or non-proliferation, radiation detection. I’m more interested in the reactors.” Both student-athletes began college elsewhere. Kazaroff, who’s from Apex, N.C., transferred to Tech in 2017 from Virginia, and Rivera, who’s from Jacksonville, graduated in May from Wofford with degrees in mathematics, finance and computer science. He’s taking all of those fields further in Tech’s QC+F graduate program. “It’s a combination of all three of my majors,” Rivera said. “It’s a combination of learning the different aspects of finance, but when you’re learning those aspects of finance, you’re trying to apply mathematical models and different mathematical techniques and trying to apply that to what’s going on in finance. The computer science is a big key, because we do a lot of coding.” Actually, Rivera’s path toward predictive finance has been kind of predictable, dating back to his peer group at Bartram Trail High School in Jacksonville. He had a couple shoulder surgeries as a senior, and was fascinated by working with physical therapists. So, when he went to college, “I started off wanting to be a biology major. Then, I took the first couple biology classes, and that wasn’t for me,” Rivera said. “I had already early enrolled in upper-level math classes, because I graduated [from high school] AP in Calculus A, B and C. They put me in multi-variable, and I really liked the teacher, so I knew that if I wasn’t going to do biology, I was going to do math. “I have a group of high school friends, and we all took a computer class together. Two of them went to Cal Berkeley to do computer science, and another one focused on computer science, and I think now he’s a software designer in Allentown, N.Y. Another one used to build computers for us. All of were just so into computers. The finance came when I was like a sophomore or junior.” Rivera found himself in a couple of finance study groups at Wofford – he cited an investment project as particularly inspiring – and eventually followed two group mates who graduated a year ahead of him, Richard Fields and Cole Higbie – to Tech’s QC&F graduate program.
His former position coach at Wofford, first-year Tech safeties coach Shiel Wood, lent an assist. Kazaroff’s trail to Tech has been more individualistic. Her parents urged their only child to try volleyball in seventh grade. “They were wanting to expose me to different sports, nothing serious, at the parks and recreation center. Soccer, softball. I really wanted to play football, but my mom wouldn’t let me,” said the defensive specialist. “So, I tried volleyball and really liked it, and my parents kept encouraging it because I was really quiet. They thought it would be a good way for me to be a little more outgoing. I’ve always been a little on the nerdy side, motivated for school. I found something I loved, and they thought it would open me up.” Upon graduating from Apex High, Kazaroff sought to be an engineer. “I always leaned towards science. I changed from wanting to be a neurological surgeon to a dermatological surgeon, and then my junior year of high school, I took Calc I and Calc II, and I was like, ‘Wow! I really want to incorporate this into something,’” she said. “I thought biomedical engineering or chemistry, and then I took chemistry and I was like, ‘No.’ “It kind of progressed into more math and physics as I found out more and more about it. At UVa, I was a double major in mechanical engineering and physics.”
CORAL KAZAROFF AND MALIK RIVERA ARE ON THE FLATS HAVING TAKEN ROADS SO RARELY IF EVER TRAVELED TO BECOME STUDENTATHLETES THAT THEY MIGHT AS WELL HAVE COME FROM DIFFERENT SOLAR SYSTEMS. AND THEY’RE PERHAPS ULTIMATE EXAMPLES OF WHAT SETS APART GEORGIA TECH ATHLETICS.
Kazaroff’s graduate program of nuclear and radiological engineering admits 20 students a year campus-wide.
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