Alumni Spotlight: Stuart Hayes ('17)

Stuart Hayes graduated from Sage Ridge School in 2017 and moved on to Dartmouth College. When he entered Dartmouth College, he planned to study mechanical engineering as he greatly enjoyed the Robotics club and math/physics courses he had taken at Sage Ridge. During the fall of his junior year, he completed a manufacturing engineering internship at Tesla Gigafactory 1, where he was fortunate to be exposed to applied computer science. When he returned to Dartmouth in the winter, he decided to focus his studies on Computer engineering instead. That next summer and fall, he interned for six months on the semi-truck core engineering team doing mostly systems engineering design work and computer programming. He loved the work and found it incredibly rewarding to practically design a semi-truck from the ground floor up alongside 10 brilliant engineers, but felt that he owed it to himself to spend a few years bettering and challenging himself as an individual before most likely beginning a career in the tech world.

He researched options for several months and settled on The United States Marine Corps because of its reputation as the most physically demanding and disciplined branch. He was impressed by the pride every Marine Corps veteran he spoke to expressed about the Corps and wanted to be a part of it. Lastly, he has been beyond fortunate that his parents have worked so hard to provide an amazing education and lifestyle for him and his siblings (also Sage Ridge alums) in the United States. His background has been that of relative comfort—which he is immensely grateful for—and wanted to continue to push himself out of his comfort zone beyond the realm of academics and serve the United States.