Ward is a Half Puerto Rican Half White Materials Science and Engineering Major. He recently graduated in the Spring of 2003 with honors (Cum Laude). He is originally from New Buffalo, MI and was at MTU for 4 years..
  

I come from a small town in SW Michigan (New Buffalo). I was actually born in the Chicago area and I am half Puerto Rican (Love you mom!). Despite my mother being straight off the “boat” from Puerto Rico, you couldn’t really tell by looking at me. The only Puerto Rican characteristic I have is my skin tone. My father is mostly of German decent. Put the two together, and you have a 6’2” tan guy who sounds like a “typical” Michiganian. If anyone even realizes that I’m not just a “white guy with a tan”, they usually think I’m something totally different than Puerto Rican. I recall some people thinking I was Indian (from India) when I was a freshman in high school. I don’t consider my ethnicity as a barrier to anything. So, I am not afraid to go anywhere or do anything. For the most part, I have never really cared about what others think about me. Most of the time, if someone thinks I’m weird, different, etc. it is because of who I am, not what I am.

I graduated with 42 people, so coming to Tech was actually a huge change in scale. In high school I was always very active. I was on the Cross Country team all 4 years (you wouldn’t guess that if you met me now), the Track and Field team for all 4 years, Basketball my freshman year, and Golf my sophomore year. Other than athletics I was on my high school’s quiz bowl team, in the marching/concert/jazz bands (I was drum major my junior and senior years), the school newspaper, the yearbook, in all of the plays/musicals and on the student senate. Somehow I also managed to graduate third in my class with a 3.93 GPA, while holding a part-time job at the local video store, of course. Essentially, I was used to being very busy all of the time.

When I was starting to think about college, I decided that I wanted to go into some field of engineering, since I was good at science and math. I heard about MTU and how they were very good at engineering and they had a famous/crazy pep band. Yes, the pep band was a factor. I wanted to continue in music, but not too seriously. I also have a love for sporting events, so it made good sense to me. My second choice was MSU. It’s a good all around university and most of my friends were going there (If you can’t get into college go to State). I chose Tech for two major reasons. (1) I wanted to attend a “smaller” university and not just be a statistic and (2) Tech offered me a full ride. Simple choice, eh?