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Alumni gives back through teaching

Every morning, Cal State Long Beach engineering professor David Stout walks from the University Library, to his office on the sixth floor of the Vivian Engineering Center.

For 30-year-old Stout, blending in with students at CSULB with his laid-back attitude, is an easy process. But getting used to his new role as a professor might be easier said than done

“It’s actually a funny story because last week I was walking through the Central Quad during the ‘Week of Welcome’ events, and two fraternities asked me to ‘rush’,” Stout said. “I was like, I’m faculty now, bro.”

Stout was born in Long Beach, and he returned to CSULB this year to fill his new position as a professor. He earned an undergraduate degree in aerospace engineering from CSULB in 2010.

During his undergraduate days at The Beach, Stout attracted some status.

In 2008, he submitted an application for the Undergraduate Student Research Program at NASA’s launch facility in Wallops Island, Virginia.

“For whatever reason, a faculty member who still works here, named professor Hsun-Hu Chen, came up to me and said that I should apply for this research project,” Stout said. “Two weeks later, I got an email from NASA saying I was selected.”

Stout spent a semester working for NASA during the program. There, he said he realized that NASA wasn’t for him.

“It was a wonderful experience, and I had a bunch of wonderful mentors,” Stout said. “But I’m a simple man, and deep down inside, that’s not what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.”

With the guidance from current College of Engineering Dean Forouzan Golshani, Stout pursued his interest in research and decided to pursue a doctorate degree.

“Dean Golshani pushed me to get my Ph.D., because it would teach me how to do research,” Stout said. “It teaches you how to become an expert in your particular field.”

While presenting his research circuit, a project that he used for his application to graduate school, Stout met an important person named Thomas Webster from Brown University. Webster invited Stout to a research program at Brown.

“At first I had never even heard of Brown or knew where it was at. But once the program ended, [Webster] asked me if I wanted to get my Ph.D.,” Stout said.

Stout graduated from Brown last spring with a doctorate in biomedical engineering.

His students say his easy-going demeanor and desire for his field gives students a unique and fun learning experience.

Stacie Quoi, a civil engineering major who is taking Stout’s analytical mechanical dynamics class, said Stout creates an open relationship between the student and professor.

“He makes it fun and energetic and wants us to learn. I’m not afraid to ask questions, which makes me feel like I can be involved,” Quoi said. “He’s really good at giving us information on materials, so we can understand those.”

But speaking to his former professors as colleagues, still might take some getting used to.

“[Chen] and I still talk, but now she tells me, ‘don’t call me ‘Chen’ anymore, we’re pals,’” Stout said.

Stout’s established credibility and relationship among his former professors ultimately guided him towards the position he holds today.

On the first day of school, Stout told his students that he once sat in their seats.

“I told them that ‘if I did it, they can do it,’” Stout said.

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