21 May 2024 · Joseph Bakes
An early exposure to computer engineering at Edison Academy Magnet School started Kipsy Quevada on a career path of service to her country.
A 2014 graduate of what was then the Middlesex County Academy for Science, Mathematics and Engineering Technology, she went on to Stevens Institute of Technology and now works as a computer engineer for the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division in Lakehurst.
“Getting exposed to engineering at a very young age was crucial,” she said. “It gave me the opportunity to have the engineering mindset. It definitely prepared me for what was to come.”
Quevada said her Edison Academy experience taught her time-management skills, as she juggled the demands of academics and a very active extracurricular experience, including playing soccer and being a member of the orchestra club and the National Honor Society. She participated in the talent show and sang the National Anthem at events.
She was part of a team that won an MIT invention competition by designing an agricultural drone.
She now works as a civilian on the Navy’s Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System and says she is “really happy” in her job.
“This was one of the best decisions I made in my life,” Quevada said. “I want to be doing something that matters, impacting people in a positive way.
“I do really care about the country and the people who protect the country. People’s lives depend on what I do.”
Quevada’s parents were immigrants from the Philippines and she grew up in Iselin.
She recently returned to Edison Academy Magnet School to talk to students during Engineering Week.
“It was really emotional for me to return to the place where I first began to fall in love with STEM,” she said.
She said she was pleased with the changes she saw since her graduation and was happy to visit with Principal Amro Mosaad, who had been “amazing” as one of her teachers.
She said her advice to the students was to ask themselves, “Who are the people in your lives you care about? Which group of people has a problem you desperately want to solve? If you’re loving what you’re doing, if you’re working for someone, you will find the passion and the motivation to self-sacrifice for the end-users of the product you are engineering.”
“We are very proud of her,” Mosaad said.
