Ethan Forde is a powerhouse in the Tufts community. Not only is he an international student and varsity athlete, but he is also an engineer and president of the ATO of Massachusetts fraternity on campus. And on top of this, he finds time to give tours in our Admissions Office and conduct research with a professor. When asked how he finds the time to do everything, he simply says “I like to do as much as I possibly can because I feel like if I’m not busy, I’m wasting my time here.” Taking advantage of every opportunity is perfectly in line with his time at Tufts so far. Academically, Ethan chose to pursue what is considered one of the most challenging yet rewarding majors at Tufts in electrical engineering to set himself up as optimally as possible for his plans for the future. “Coming from the Caribbean…my passion for renewable energy, specifically solar power, could impact my home. I could work with a company that develops some semiconductor device that could be used to harness solar energy back in the Caribbean, or I could join a company, work hard and start my own branch [focused on renewable energy], or be a consultant back in the Caribbean. I would be doing something that would help my country.” In pursuit of that goal, he has taken on roles in the Renewable
Energy and Applied Photonics, or REAP Labs, here at Tufts. Within the REAP Labs, he works specifically for the Quantum Nanomaterials Lab within the larger facility, focusing on analyzing material compositions for future semiconductors. Ethan was kind enough to explain the work he is doing with a quick analogy: “Think about a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. So we have the bread, which is a specific material, in this case it’s Aluminum Antimonide.The sandwich stuff in the middle, which is the peanut butter and the jelly, it’s two different crystalline structures, two different elements, and we change the compositions of each. Think of it like changing the thickness of the peanut butter spread or the sweetness of the peanut butter spread, and then also changing the thickness of the jelly layer, and then the sweetness of the jelly layer. So that’s kind of what we’re doing, we’re seeing what aspects of the materials can be changed to analyze and optimize the electrical characteristics for semiconductor devices.” Outside of the lab, Ethan has a very busy senior year coming up. Besides running his fraternity, his time with the varsity track and field team is shaping up to be very impactful as well. As the team welcomes a new head coach, there is a lot he and
ETHAN FORDE ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING MAJOR WITH A DOUBLE MINOR IN ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT FROM DIEGO MARTIN, TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO
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his fellow upperclassmen have stepped up to do. “We’ve won three NESCAC championships in a row. If we win one more time, we’ll be the best team that Tufts has ever seen, that the NESCAC has ever seen. It’ll be a lot of work getting everyone’s mindset focused on the same thing.” When asked about any advice he has for students applying to Tufts, he had one quick answer: just be yourself. “It’s easy to get stuck in that mindset of how many boxes can I check off to look the best for admissions counselors? What grades should I have, or what extracurriculars should I do and stuff like that. But at the end of the day, these admissions counselors are admitting a person, not a grade. What sets you apart from all the other people applying is you being yourself. Admissions counselors see the applicants as people adding to the community. The more real you are in your application, the more expressive you are, the more passionate you are when it comes to talking about things that are important to you, those things shine so much brighter than whatever grades you have. I always tell people at the end of my tours to just have fun with it, with the whole application process, because it’s a nice way to look inside and see what you actually want for yourself.”