Thoughts from an Engineer – Celebrating Engineers During National Engineering Week
Episode Description
National Engineers Week is Feb. 18-24. To celebrate, Matthew Boynton, engineer at BTC Fiber, joined the podcast to tell us about his journey to telecom engineering, and to help our listeners understand how engineering impacts every area of our daily lives.
Transcript
Transcripts have been lightly edited for clarity and readability.
Intro: The following program is brought to you by the Tennessee Broadband Association. Lead Tennessee Radio, conversations with the leaders moving our state forward. We look at the issues shaping Tennessee’s future: rural development, public policy, broadband, healthcare, and other topics impacting our communities.
Carrie Huckeby: Hello everyone. Thank you for joining me on this episode of Lead Tennessee Radio. I’m Carrie Huckeby, executive director for the Tennessee Broadband Association. National Engineering Week is February 18th through the 24th. And I learned something that I didn’t know about Engineering Week. It’s designated that this particular week, because of President’s Day, George Washington. He’s considered the nation’s first engineer. And this year’s theme is “Welcome to the Future.” It’s to highlight the achievements, while also looking where the field of engineering is going. And who better to talk to about engineering than my guest, professional engineer and PhD, Matthew Boynton from BTC Fiber. Welcome, Matthew.
Matthew Boynton: Well, thank you and thank you so much for having me. And that was a great introduction about George Washington. I think I just learned something.
Carrie Huckeby: Well, I didn’t know that. It makes perfect sense, but I thought, oh, never too old to learn something.
Matthew Boynton: Sure, I think, I think I knew if I’m not mistaken, he was considered a surveyor as well.
Carrie Huckeby: I think that’s right.
Matthew Boynton: A pretty impressive fella.
Carrie Huckeby: Yes, he was. So before we dive into all things engineering, tell us a little bit about BTC Fiber, for those that aren’t familiar with the company. And then follow that by telling us how long you’ve been there at the cooperative.
Matthew Boynton: Okay. Well, BTC Fiber was founded as Bledsoe Telephone Cooperative. We’ve recently sort of done a little rebranding to the name BTC Fiber. But it was founded on April 14th, 1953. In 1986, Bledsoe Telephone ran its first fiber optic cable to all of its exchanges, where they converted to digital switches. Building the foundation for not only telephone, but also for, at that time would have been in the 90s, would have been dial up internet. Leading us to today where we’re trying to connect everyone with a fiber optic connection. We’re in the middle of that process, and we’ve changed our name to BTC Fiber. I came to Bledsoe Telephone Cooperative as an intern when I was doing my school work at Tennessee Tech, as a summer intern in 2005. I worked full time for the year of 2006. I left and went to work for a consulting firm in order to work under a professional engineer. And that was the experience needed to obtain my professional license. In the middle of all that, I went back to school, went back to graduate school, went on to Virginia Tech and engineering education. Graduated there in 2014 and returned, and I’ve been here from 2014 until now in the engineering department here at Bledsoe Telephone Cooperative or BTC Fiber.
Carrie Huckeby: Wow. So your cooperative has a rich history, and you have got, you know, an interest in history too, of how you landed at BTC Fiber. So your journey here in engineering, before we talk about how you landed there and how you came back to BTC, what inspired you to become an engineer in the first place? And there’s so many specialties in engineering. How did your path take you to telecom engineering?
Matthew Boynton: It ultimately was the internship, but how I came about the internship is kind of an interesting, definitely fitting rural Tennessee story. But as far as engineering as a profession, I’ll have to say that that was heavily based in my grandmother. Her name was Mrs. Thelma Boynton, and she was a a science teacher as a profession here in Bledsoe County. Prior to that, she came into her love of math and science, particularly science in World War II. She was an attaché to the Air Force. You know, in that period of time, understanding from her, you know, everyone wanted to do something toward the efforts in World War II. She was a civilian attaché, but they sent her through what she said was basically a crash course in electrical engineering. And she went to Wrightfield and worked in what they called test section. They were testing radio communication, trying to make different – the tubes would break with the changes in altitude, the changes in pressure and temperature in the planes or a hard landing. And they saw it as part of their mission to try to make a better, a better tube for the radio so the pilots could communicate. So that was kind of her contribution there, but it also gave her a real experience and background in science and engineering that she brought back. And they did, you’ve heard heard lots about it. They took students to the national science fairs and all of that, during her time. So she definitely, probably, encouraged, pushed me toward math and science fields, and particularly engineering.
Matthew Boynton: My dad is a land surveyor. And so between the two things, civil engineering seemed like a good fit. That definitely, you know, from a high school students perspective, I saw that as being outside, building that kind of a field. Just like you said, as I found when I entered the actual school, there are so many, even within just the field of civil engineering, that doesn’t really narrow it down. You know, you’ve got transportation structures, environmental, which is water and wastewater. So the even once you enter, what you might think of as a field of engineering, there’s still just so many different aspects of that. So as a student, that’s what I made my focus. Now, how did I come to telecom engineering? That was standing in line at our local funeral home with my dad during my senior year. It took me four and a half years to finish, so I had one extra semester in a fifth year. And during the spring of 2005, we were standing in line with Mr. Greg Anderson, who was the manager here at Bledsoe Telephone Co-op at that time, where my dad looks at him and says, “I bet Bledsoe Telephone needs a summer intern engineering student.” And he said, “You know, I believe you’re right.” And here we are. So that’s kind of how I branched into telecom engineering, strangely enough – in line at a visitation at the local funeral home.
Carrie Huckeby: And I think that probably many of us that ended in telecom or have had careers in telecom have very similar stories. Where, you know, in our communities, we ran into someone and that conversation led to other things. So, it sounds very familiar.
Matthew Boynton: What’s interesting about that is one, I guess, a bit of a concern. I’m thinking back several years now, but, you know, I really didn’t anticipate finding a career in engineering in rural Tennessee, in my hometown. I didn’t anticipate finding that career here. I anticipated having to live elsewhere and/or commute. Now, I guess you might have that career here as a telecommuter. Because of what? You know, mainly because of our rural cooperatives, that’s possible. But that definitely wasn’t a reality then.
Carrie Huckeby: Well, it’s certainly a good story, and your grandmother sounds like such an interesting lady. And I’m sure she had stories to tell. And that must have been – I mean, that’s awesome that she was such an encourager to you of what she learned in her experience. And, you know, those stories she could tell you about.
Matthew Boynton: For sure. I know she told once that at the time, she had special privilege to carry what we would think of now as a walkie talkie. She had special privilege to take it out of the test lab. Only certain people could carry it across the base. It was a top secret item, you know. And I know she told me once that you could go to any store and buy a better one than they had then, but that was a top secret instrument.
Carrie Huckeby: Wow. Yeah, very interesting, I’m sure. So just talking. How has the engineering landscape changed, Matthew, from just when you started as that intern at Bledsoe and later as you earned your degree and your PhD. How do you envision it? And too, how has it changed? And how do you envision it changing with AI or other technology in the next few years?
Matthew Boynton: You know, in thinking about that question, I know that that the engineering landscape, it has to have changed with technology since since I was in school. Let’s say, I graduated with my bachelor’s in 2005. Goodness, if you think about how basically our online and our computer dependency or the presence of that technology in everything. So I worked for about three years before going back to Tennessee Tech in a very interesting opportunity through their extended education office to go back and do my master’s in engineering, and that’s under Doctor Susan Elkins. And she’s from Jackson County. Her husband, Tommy Elkins, was a retiree of Twin Lakes Telephone Co-op. You know, she had I went back with and taught engineering classes in rural high schools. So I taught through a program called Project Lead the Way. They had a grant and needed someone to go and to fulfill that grant, they needed a teacher to teach engineering classes. And that was at Jackson County High School. And we expanded that up to Clay County High School. It was just a fantastic experience. I did that, that was my graduate student work, while working on my master’s there at Tennessee Tech. Actually extended that into an EDS program so we could continue. And I continued as a student at Tennessee Tech. But we just had a great experience. We did all sorts of projects, a very hands on, project based class. We built cardboard boats and did some little robotics simulators. And we took all of those kind of projects, and then applied the math and science behind why they worked. It was really a fun class to teach.
Matthew Boynton: But during that time that I was, just in that short period of time that I was out of school, and then back. When I went back, our assignments that I had to do were all on a computer. It was very different. We literally went from pencil and paper to our assignments, being basically on a computer in that period of time. But, you know, so I know that the engineering landscape has definitely changed with technology. Probably more tools available, more computer-aided design or CAD, is definitely, continues to advance, and the things you can do between that and GPS systems. But if I think about how it has changed from 2014, in telecom engineering, particularly here in Tennessee, I would say that the state of Tennessee and the ECD, or Economic and Community Development, they have completely changed the landscape in that through the state grant program. I know they’ve really changed what we’re able to do through the grant application process. So, you know, when I first came back, we were obviously staking our lines to new homes and doing those things. But now in the past few years, we’ve been working with ECD to apply for grants to expand fiber optics into rural Tennessee. I guess it’s given us the ability to expand. Yes, to expand our fiber optic program, and to be able to reach, affordably reach, our service area with a fiber optic connection. So they’ve completely changed. May not be from a technical standpoint, a technology standpoint, but they’ve allowed us the ability to, I guess, fulfill our goals.
Carrie Huckeby: The funding.
Matthew Boynton: The funding aspect has really, it’s really been beneficial to BTC Fiber. So that’s changed our engineering department greatly. So right now, a big part of what we do is, is work on fulfilling our state grants that we’ve been awarded. And we’re on track to be finished in 2024 with the our entire service area. Everyone will have a fiber optic connection.
Carrie Huckeby: I get that. I think what you’re saying is you would be on a slower pace probably.
Matthew Boynton: Yeah.
Carrie Huckeby: Without the funding. You might have the technology, but you probably wouldn’t be turning out as much work and getting as many people connected without the extra funding.
Matthew Boynton: Exactly.
Carrie Huckeby: And so, it’s been a mixture of technology changing, but it’s also been having that funding aspect that has kept it going faster or made it happen faster.
Matthew Boynton: Or made it made it affordable to fulfill our goals.
Carrie Huckeby: Yes. Okay, I get that. Do you feel like that AI – you know, you talked about going from pencil and paper to laptops and computers and, you know, that’s really moved things along and helped you create things or get things done faster. How do you see AI fitting into the engineering field? Do you feel like it’ll change processes or again, just speed up things?
Matthew Boynton: As far as decision making, I’m sure that it will. How will it change the landscape? I don’t know that I have that answer. I had a coworker several years ago. He talked about, he went to a conference and realized after attending that conference that, you know, our copper networks that we were using – and this may have been 20 years ago. He said they didn’t have new tools and new things in the copper industry. That all the vendors were showing off their things associated with fiber optics. And he said, I realized right then that that’s where we were headed, even though we were still a little bit behind that as far as fiber to the home. He said, I realized copper was a thing of the past. They weren’t really making any advancement. So I kind of take that same sentiment when I go to the conferences. I thought that was interesting. And I, you know, I see what is the the newest thing that’s being talked about. And last year it was definitely AI and also quantum networks. Our partners and neighbors over at EPB Fiber Optics in Chattanooga have created a quantum laboratory using real fiber in the field. And they’re inviting people to come and try to get their quantum computing up and working on just real field based fiber optics instead of a laboratory based fiber optics. So, you know, if we think about how those two things are going to possibly come together and change computing, change data transmission, you know, I don’t know. But those were the two notable things that I noticed last year at conferences was quantum computing and AI were definitely being talked about.
Carrie Huckeby: Yeah. I think there’s no way right now that we can really tell where it will take us, and if it will all be good or not. But it’s definitely going to change the landscape for a lot of fields and careers, I believe. So we’ll have to sit back and kind of watch it. Engineering education, of course, is so important to our nation’s infrastructure. And I mean, it’s in everything. It just, it’s what makes the world go round, pretty much. And for the next generation of professionals that are coming up behind you, Matthew, what advice do you have for those students that might that may be considering engineering as a career, or those that haven’t even thought about it. Now, I mean, your intern program must be great with tech where they come in and actually, you know, hands on, and they learn about whether they want to stay in it or not. But if I’m a high school student or a college student, I haven’t thought about engineering yet. What would you say to them?
Matthew Boynton: So, your question is great. And it really stands out when you say those students that haven’t thought about it. And that kind of leads back to my PhD program at Virginia Tech, and even to that program that that Doctor Elkins had at Tennessee Tech that we were trying to reach out – the goal of that program was to reach out into those rural high schools and introduce engineering as a career choice. And that led me to Virginia Tech and where we were fortunate enough that my research and dissertation was funded through a National Science Foundation grant to study engineering career choice in rural Appalachia. We interviewed students in Tennessee and Virginia in rural high schools. And, you know, a lot of students hadn’t thought about engineering. We had a very open interview protocol, where we didn’t lead into engineering necessarily. We were talking about careers and to see if engineering was even. And in a lot of cases those students didn’t know an engineer. So, actually, the title of my dissertation became “People, Not Print: Exploring Engineering in Rural Appalachia.” And we found that that connection with a person, with a real person that was in that field was really the difference maker in whether they considered that a possible path. You know, so many times I think it’s presented to students that to be an engineer, you got to be good at math. And they don’t know a whole lot more about it than people have told them you got to be, you know, extremely good at math. And to those students, I think I would say that it is so much more. And I’ve had the opportunity to now use this profession in my home area to help bring a fiber network to this area. We have created, I think ultimately a department, we’ve got two other young men who are we’ve got Trey Colvard and Webb Allen who both have engineering degrees.
Matthew Boynton: It is possible to use that to do things for your, even your home area. And engineering s a definition. Merriam-Webster defines it as the application of math and science by which the properties of matter and sources of energy are made useful to people. And I think that’s the part that sometimes gets left out, is that you don’t only need to be good at math. I don’t do complex math on a daily basis. But you’re taking those concepts and you’re trying to make things that are useful to people. Most everything we interact with or touch on a daily basis has some form of engineering behind it. And that was also another finding is that students really wanted their careers. They wanted to help others. They wanted to do things that were good for people or for society. And I think engineering is a great fit for that, even though it’s not always portrayed in that way. So I think that advice I would have is, is to look at it in a very broad fashion, that it is a lot more than just being good at math.
Carrie Huckeby: Well, I think it’s one of those careers, as you said, that it’s very hard to envision what it looks like. Sometimes if you’re in high school and you think, oh, well, I’m terrible at math and that just seems too hard, but unless you have an opportunity to meet up with someone that is an engineer and kind of see what it’s really about, it is difficult to envision it. And, you know, I’ve always looked at engineering as problem solving, whether that’s water, wastewater, whether that’s something with the environment getting fiber to every Tennesseean and whatever it is, building bridges for transportation. I mean, it’s problem solving for the day to day living quality of life, I believe.
Matthew Boynton: Absolutely. And I think one of the things you come out, you know, you do work and solve a lot of problems, as far as engineering education goes. And I think it gives you, as much as anything, it gives you that ability to work through a complex problem. And that may not always be, you know, as it’s portrayed that you’re sitting down with a calculator to do that.
Carrie Huckeby: Right. Well, if you could share one message with the audience about the impact or the importance of engineering and just how it affects us in our daily lives, what would it be?
Matthew Boynton: You know. I thought about, thinking back as far back as in my undergraduate, I’m not sure I can say that I went into engineering fully understanding what it was. As you said earlier, I’m not sure any of us went into our careers fully understanding where we were heading.
Carrie Huckeby: That’s true, very true.
Matthew Boynton: I remember, we had a little group, it’s called the American Society of Civil Engineers and had a lunch meeting, maybe monthly. And they brought in a graduate that was a structural engineer. And so you think about, you know, your first thought is that those those folks go and design a high rise in a city. But he brought back artificial implants. I think, he had knees and hips. And he worked for a company as a structural engineer designing artificial knee and hip joints. And he told about the different features and functionality of those. And so if we think about the importance of engineering and how it affects our daily lives, you know, that was really an eye opener that I never would have thought about the concepts of structural engineering going into an artificial knee or hip, so that that helps people on a daily basis.
Carrie Huckeby: Very important.
Matthew Boynton: Very important. And and you know, that’s not, definitely not, how an engineer is typically portrayed that they might be working on that. I also had the opportunity to hear a NASA pilot. He had flown a couple of missions. And at first I was very disappointed because I really wanted to see a PowerPoint with all the great pictures he took from space, but he had none of that. He just stood up and talked. And he said, he was talking about NASA, but ultimately engineering. And he said – kind of on your same question. He was talking about the importance of the development of the NASA program. And he talked about the hydraulics. He talked about the automatic transmission, helicopters, G.P.S. location. He just went on and on with all these things that we take for granted and use every day in our daily lives, even down to a synthetic truck bedliner. And all those things had been developed out of the NASA program, and ultimately developed by engineers. And I think back on that sometimes that, that so many of the products that are all around us, that we take for granted and use on a daily basis are developed by engineers.
Matthew Boynton: And going back to even the definition, which is the application of math and science, by which the properties of matter and sources of energy are made useful to people. And I think the last part right there is what we leave out of engineering from time to time, that you are doing things that are useful to people, whether you said, is that clean drinking? That’s your clean drinking water, your wastewater treatment that keeps our environment clean, or designing a fiber optic network that allows people to do their work from home and make a living in the comfort of their home. All of those things are very useful in our daily lives and has a big impact.
Carrie Huckeby: Well, we can certainly agree that engineering touches far more than we give it credit for or think about on a daily basis. And, it certainly deserves its own week, the National Engineering Week in February. Well, Matthew, I thank you for your time. I appreciate it. Learned a lot. Learned not only that George Washington was considered the first engineer, but a lot of other things I’ve learned about engineering.
Matthew Boynton: Well. And I thank you for asking me to join you on this podcast. And I hope that we’ve definitely helped people understand a little bit more about engineering. And, hey, maybe we’ll, reach a potential student and give them a little something to think about from our discussion.
Carrie Huckeby: Maybe so. That’ll be our goal, for sure. Well, my guest has been Matthew Boynton. He is a professional engineer and PhD for BTC Fiber in Pikeville, Tennessee. You’ve been listening to Lead Tennessee Radio, produced by the Tennessee Broadband Association, cooperative and independent companies connecting our state’s rural communities and beyond with world class broadband.