Jacob Villeneuve ’23 loved working as an audiovisual specialist in high school, running the sound and lights for school plays, graduations and other events. When he learned that UMass Lowell has a premier sound recording technology (SRT) program, he made a beeline to campus for a visit.
“I caught one of the professors in his office over the summer, and he gave me and my family an impromptu tour of Durgin Hall (now Moloney Performing Arts Center) where the SRT classes are held,” Villeneuve recalls. “Then he asked me when I planned to audition.”
Villeneuve was unaware that all students in the Music Department, even SRT majors, must pass an entrance audition on an instrument or voice.
“I’m not a musician,” says Villeneuve, who wondered on the car ride home to Clinton, Massachusetts, if he could learn to sing or play an instrument in six short months — something that “was not happening.”
But Villeneuve could major in electrical engineering while pursuing an SRT minor (no audition required) — and that is the path he ultimately chose.
“It complemented my electrical engineering degree nicely,” he says of the SRT program. “A lot of things that I learned in sound recording technology courses, like signal flow, are grounded in electrical engineering — you’re just working in a different frequency range. One is in the audible frequency range; the other is more like data.”
Villeneuve, a first-generation college student, also joined the university’s Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) to help pay for school. After two years of general military training, culminating with a two-week summer capstone experience in Mississippi, Villeneuve advanced to professional officer courses. By his senior year, he oversaw a cadet corps of 30 students.
“There’s a family feeling to it — people who have shared experiences and the same goal in mind of becoming Air Force officers,” says Villeneuve, who is putting his electrical engineering skills to work during his four-year commitment to the Air Force. “The ROTC program was very rewarding, especially because it meant a guaranteed job after college.”
In addition to his SRT minor, Villeneuve began working on a Master of Science in Energy Engineering as an undergrad through the Bachelor’s-to-Master’s Program — a degree he may continue depending on where he is stationed. He became interested in renewable energy after taking a graduate-level course on solar panels.
“I’m an outdoor nut, so helping the environment with my engineering know-how is the perfect marriage,” he says.
Villeneuve landed two cybersecurity internships with MITRE Corporation and an electrical engineering technical internship at BAE Systems, where he verified documentation for older aircraft systems.
“It was very schematic-driven — almost like I was looking at components in one of my (electrical engineering) lab courses, just on a much higher level,” he says.
If Villeneuve doesn’t pursue a career with the Air Force, he can see himself applying his electrical engineering and SRT skills in the audio industry, perhaps at Shure in Chicago or, closer to home, at Bose in Framingham, Massachusetts.
“I’m keeping an open mind,” he says.
“The location, the cost and the ROTC program — everything just lined up and fell in my lap. It was the only school I applied to.”