Maple Grove Native receives top award at Dunwoody College of Technology | Free

Maple Grove native Jeremy Berg received the Academic Excellence Award presented at Dunwoody College of Technology in April 2018.

Berg’s passion for engineering and mechanics reached a high when he attended the Automated Systems & Robotics program at Dunwoody College of Technology. Currently, he is in the Industrial Engineering Technology bachelor’s degree program and works at Ritchie Engineering, producer of yellow jacket products, as an automation engineer.

“The award was definitely a confidence boost. I put in a lot of effort and work. It was very humbling and good to know the effort I put in was noticed. It’s nice to have something tangible to remind myself,” Berg said.

Berg attended elementary and middle school in Maple Grove and graduated from Maple Grove High School in 2006. His father was a systems and material manager at a manufacturing company and sparked Berg’s passion for engineering at a young age.

“My brother and I asked for a video game system so my father gave us a bunch of computer parts and said, ‘I’ll teach you how to put it together and then you can play a video game,’” Berg said.

His father’s parenting helped Berg learn the basics of computers and how they network and talk to each other. From that point forward, he followed the family motto, “If you can, go figure it out.

After pursuing his initial dream of being a pilot, he discovered Dunwoody and took a 90-degree turn upward.

“Dunwoody has been absolutely life-changing. I discovered I like the controls specifically, designing the system and learning how the system behaves,” Berg said.

His previous mechanical engineering experience was focused more on theory, which Berg said wasn’t a bad thing. But, he didn’t get too much hands-on training, which is what he wanted.

“I like to get my hands dirty. I like not just knowing how something works––but seeing it work. It’s important to me to see what it’s actually supposed to be doing,” Berg said.

As a student attending Dunwoody, he inspires himself and others inside and out of the classroom. His creativity and innovative skills keep him wanting to do more.

“I’ve been fortunate to be Jeremy’s instructor for two separate classes over his last two years at Dunwoody,” said Dean of Manufacturing & Robotics E.J. Daigle on the Dunwoody blog. “It’s been an absolute pleasure to work with Jeremy.”

Some of the projects he has worked on range from a SCARA Robot programmed to play the Super Mario Bros. theme song, to a repurposed cartoning machine for his ongoing manufacturing capstone project.

“The piano playing robot was fun and there are several examples of projects like that, that are just fun to do,” Berg said. There is nothing more exciting than programming a robot to play one of the most widely known video game theme songs.

Alongside that project, the repurposed cartoning machine was almost a friend of the dumpster but was able to be redesigned by Berg and partnerships with the Computer Sciences Department and Design and Graphics Technology. The new machine will be able to produce boxes that are Dunwoody branded and will possibly be given out to prospective students.

“The most fun aspect of the project was I got to talk to so many different areas of the school that I wouldn’t normally be in,” Berg said.

The cartoning machine came with no documentation on how to use it and how it was built. It was said, no one knew how to get into the PLC (programmable logic computer) of the machine, and Berg was able to blindly break into the system and redesign most of the code. The machine is still in the process of being finished. Berg enjoys doing Cab and design work combined with automation robotics.

In the future, with no obstacles, he hopes to be able to work with and benefit people in the world through the custom making of prosthetics.

“It’s designing for good, but it’s also a challenge,” Berg said.

With his current and future plans, Berg continues to remain productive. This upcoming fall, he will be leading the Dunwoody Chapter of the Institute of Industrial & Systems Engineers course in the evening, performing as a mechanical designer for the Dunwoody Autonomous SnowPlow team and president of the School Chapter of the Institute of Industrial & Systems Engineer.

“Dunwoody encourages me not only to learn but to do something with it,” Berg said on the Dunwoody blog. “Most importantly, I learned how to do better. I will always do better because I can. I take that to heart.”

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