Throughout the spring semester, we are honoring our senior student-athletes with a "Senior Salute" series. Today's featured senior is Paul Thomas Fischer, a statistical and data sciences major from King, North Carolina. Fischer is a member of the football team.
Q: Why did you choose to attend The College of Wooster?
A: The College of Wooster checked all of my boxes as a prospective student with a beautiful campus, great academics, and great athletic facilities. Wooster had an energy that drew me in from the first time I stepped on campus. Wooster offered me a place to grow and discover myself for four years.
Q: What does being a Fighting Scot student-athlete mean to you?
A: It means a great deal to me. Over four years I worked extremely hard as a Fighting Scot student-athlete, achieving both team and personal goals along the way. Most importantly, being a Fighting Scot student-athlete brought me friendships, memories, and life lessons that will stick with me forever.
Q: What are some of your favorite memories as a student at The College of Wooster?
A: My favorite memories are navigating my first year of college during COVID with some of my best friends, beating undefeated Wabash College on the road as a sophomore, living in Bryan House as a junior, and concluding my academic and athletic career while learning so much from both along the way.
Q: What is the best part about being a student-athlete at The College of Wooster?
A: The growing sense of pride you feel for both your athletic and academic achievements and the lifelong friends made along the way.
Q: What else were you involved with on campus besides your sport?
A: I am the vice president of the Men Working for Change student organization, worked as an athletic training room assistant for four years, and was a STEM Zone intern for one year.
Q: Which College of Wooster faculty or staff member has made the greatest impact on you and why?
A: So many incredible people have had an impact on me over my four years at Wooster. One that sticks out the most is Nate Huston. Over my college career, Nate has been my athletic trainer, employer, mentor, and friend. No matter the role he took, Nate allowed me to escape the stressors of college life through friendly banter and various life talks. Nate is a true professional that is well-respected by all, traits I aim to emulate in my own career.
Q: What other people or resources impacted your Wooster experience in a positive way and how did these people and resources set you up to be successful at Wooster?
A: The entire Wooster football coaching staff provided me with leadership as I navigated my athletic and professional career. All the faculty I have encountered at Wooster have been nothing but helpful. The faculty taught my lessons in the classroom and have always been understanding of personal problems that arose. Both my coaching staff and faculty have helped me in my pursuit of a professional career and have provided me with recommendations, networking opportunities, internships, and general advice.
Q: Tell us a bit about your Independent Study project?
A: As a statistical and data sciences major, my Independent Study aims to capture the power of computer vision and deep learning. I am compiling a dataset of car images that will be fed to a convolutional neural network. The network will then go through stages of training so that it can identify the make and model of each car image with the highest accuracy possible. Through various statistical methods, I am going to analyze what car design elements are most recognizable.
Q: Tell us a bit about something cool you did as a student at The College of Wooster?
A: I had the opportunity to complete a 10-week internship with the College's AMRE (Applied Methods and Research Experience) program. I was assigned to work for a company, completing a specific project alongside two other students. My group was paired with Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company. This internship was extremely rewarding and provided me with industry-specific experience.
Q: Reflecting back on your time at Wooster, what advice would you give your first-year self?
A: Do not be afraid to be yourself from the get-go, your people will find you. Take responsible risks. Nobody remembers the night they stayed in their dorm room all night. Go on the spontaneous road trips, say yes to everything you can, and you will be glad you did.
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