An Interview with Eric McLean
Eric McLean is a very special graduate of the MCS Program here at UW-Whitewater.  He is a two time Leukemia survivor.  Here is what he had to say about our program, his life now and so much more:
I loved each and every minute that I spent at UWW and wouldn't trade any of it for anything. Enjoy your college experience while it lasts. Don't rush it.  Take your time and do it right.  Focus on your academics and any extracurricular activities offered by the school, or the local pubs. The friendships you make in college will last the rest of your life.

My job is awesome. I'm doing pretty much exactly what I was taught in school as far as development goes.  I'm using Eclipse and I am primarily doing web development using java.

The most important advice I would give to every single MCS student: Get an internship BEFORE you graduate!  The experience is so very, very valuable.  The amount of knowledge I gained and my ability to communicate with different types of people at my internship was immense.  I applied for many internships and interviewed with them all. When it came time to find my “real” job, my experience was such that I had a large pool of options to choose from.  It got to the point where I felt like I was interviewing the companies rather than them interviewing me.  I quite literally got to choose where I wanted to work while I heard other students complaining that there were no opportunities. I compared salaries, vacation time, holidays/company shutdowns, benefits, education reimbursement programs, etc. I feel that my ambition with my internship and the process involved in getting it was one of the main reasons I had so many options. The first step for anyone interested in pursuing this is to get a suit, a leather binder/folder, a well-written resume, and go to a career fair!  Don't be lazy! Do it!

Other advice; 1. GPA is a bigger factor than most students realize. Getting a high gpa in MCS is not very easy to do. 2. Seek help from your professors whenever you have any kind question, even if you consider it "stupid”.   Each time that I kept my mouth shut and didn't ask that question, everything got more difficult.  Projects and assignments would start to snowball and I would get further and further behind.  Before I knew it, I was an assignment or two behind and still spending 30+ hours in the lab each week grinding away at my MCS projects just trying to catch up so I didn't lose anymore late points on assignments. 3. Don't procrastinate! Start your assignments, even if it’s a weak start, the day they are assigned. 4. Make friends in your MCS classes.   I still talk to some of those students and it's been great for networking.
The differences between the real world and school are:  Beauracracy and politics go on behind the scenes in companies. You have to watch your p's and q's...dot your "i's" and cross your "t's."  Another huge difference is communication and teamwork.  They should go hand in hand and are both very important in the workplace. Teamwork wasn't really factored into our classes until Systems Analysis & Design. Without teamwork in the workplace, we'd get absolutely nothing accomplished. Sprinkling in teamwork all through the college education should be a bigger purgative.
One of the most difficult things for me to do was start my college career as a freshman at Whitewater.  After that first year, I was diagnosed with my cancer for the first time.  I had to be away for an entire YEAR and it was VERY difficult for me to come back and get back into the swing of things.  I had to get reacclimated to everyone and everything all over again...for the next 3-4 years I worked my tail off to finally graduate in December of 2007 cum laude.  I put just as much effort and work into getting the job offer from Harley-Davidson....bought a car...moved into a new place in Milwaukee....was all set to go...and then BOOM - cancer relapsed and I was thrown back in the hospital for another 6 months.  Right when I thought everything was going amazing and perfect...that happened. It was surreal.
For more about Eric’s battle with leukemia, fundraising campaign and life in general, you can visit: www.donate2life.net. He has provided a great service to anyone who may be facing some of the challenges he faced by keeping a journal of his experiences.