A Place to Succeed
Meet a few of the students, alumni, faculty and staff who have found success at RIT/NTID.
Scott Hansen
Picture a 5-year-old boy being taught to swing a pint-sized golf club by his grandfather at golf courses in his hometown of Twin Falls, Idaho. That was nearly 20 years ago, yet the image is still fresh in the mind of Scott Hansen, a May Applied Computer Technology graduate, who has grown up to become part of the six-man team that led the USA to victory in the 2006 Deaf World Golf Tournament in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. That same summer, Hansen also competed in an 18-state tournament to defend his individual championship title for the third year in a row, winning in spite of a broken rib.
Hansen went to high school at the Oregon School for the Deaf. While there, his father helped established a golf team on which Hansen played. As he gained experience, Hansen joined local and district golf leagues, and eventually played with the Oregon School Activities Association team.
But this summer, career goals are taking precedence over golf. Instead of being at a qualifying tournament for the 2008 Deaf World Golf Tournament, Hansen will be in New York City on co-op with Citi, pursuing his other passions—cyber security and systems administration.
“Last winter quarter, I decided to focus more on networking and cyber security because I have become so interested in those areas,” he says.
Hansen will either pursue a bachelor’s degree or begin his career in networking and cyber security on the West Coast, to be near his family.
“I’ve learned so much about independence, decision making and time management while I’ve been at RIT. I’m involved in the Christian organization on campus, and I really enjoy the friends I’ve made here – even though the golf season is shorter in Rochester than in California!”
From the Spring/Summer 2007 issue of FOCUS magazine