suppliedFifth-year engineering student Marcus Stack had been thinking of working for Tesla since he was in high school. That was a goal he finally accomplished when he secured an internship with the company last year.
Stack spent the last eight months interning at Tesla Motors, the American automaker specializing in electric cars. In his time there, Stack worked in their Vehicle Integration and Packaging team where some of his projects include parts for the Tesla Semi, which is planned for a 2019 release, and projects related to the Model 3, Tesla’s latest and most affordable car to date. While he didn’t get a chance to meet Elon Musk, Tesla’s Chief Executive Officer, Stack said his internship with the company was still everything he thought it would be.
Tesla’s headquarters is located in Palo Alto, California where a number of other tech companies like Facebook and Google have their base of operations. While it wasn’t Stack’s first time abroad — he had previously spent six weeks in Japan as part of an automotive engineering program — he said that working in the San Francisco Bay area was a rewarding hands-on experience.
“I enjoyed my work so much and for me that was an incredible experience, being down there and working every day on really exciting and fun projects,” he said.
Stack’s interest in Tesla goes back to his time as a high school student as their vehicles spoke to his dual interests in technology and the environment. It was his desire to work for Tesla that got him into engineering.
“When I first read about this electric car company that made some of the coolest cars on the face of the planet, I thought, ‘Wow, that’s taking design and sustainable tech and putting it in a package,'” he said. “The first time that I saw a Tesla, I was completely sold. I thought this is a technology that culminates all of my passions and interests, and has the ability to change the world and really inspire people.”
With that goal in mind, he studied the internship postings on the company’s website during in his first year of engineering so that he could tailor and develop the skills they were looking for throughout his degree. One of the things he did was joining the EcoCar team, the student-run organization that designs and builds hydrogen-fuel-cell-powered vehicles, which exposed him to engineering design.
“EcoCar was my biggest extracurricular activity that took an incredible amount of dedication and time because it was an awesome learning experience,” he said. “If I had not been on that team I would not have ended up at Tesla.”
While at Tesla, Stack had a chance to work on parts of the Model 3. In particular, Stack’s work involved looking at manufacturing Model 3 variants outside of North America in compliance with laws and regulations in other markers.
Currently there’s a lot of skepticism surrounding the Model 3, with commentators saying that Tesla will be unable meet their production targets for the vehicle. However, Stack said he is confident the Model 3 will revolutionize transportation.
“I think there’s a lot of naysayers right now and a lot of skeptics,” he said. “But once they sit behind the Model 3 I think they’ll be convinced that it’s just the way of the future.”
Having returned from California, Stack said he intends to finish the remainder of his mechanical engineering degree. He expects to graduate this coming November, after which he intends on returning to Tesla.
