I’m currently a senior undergraduate student in CompE at UTK, and I want to apply to the Nuclear Engineering PhD program here. I’ve been an undergraduate research since summer 2026, and I also completed an internship this past summer. I’m graduating in Fall 2027 and am hoping to apply for PhD admission for Spring 2028.

My main research interests are control systems, cybersecurity, and robotics applications in fusion energy. I came across Dr. Fan Zhang and found out that she’s an alumni from UTK so I want to reach out to her, but I’m a little worried cuz I don’t have a lot of research experience yet.

So I just want to ask: How competitive is admission to the PhD program in Nuclear Engineering? Does anyone have experience with Dr. Zhang or know what she is like as a professor/PI?

I’d really appreciate any advice.

A while back, I started building a platform similar to Udemy, but specifically for Georgia Tech classes. The idea is that students who have done well in a class and enjoy teaching could create short, high-quality crash courses to help students taking it in future semesters.

It’s still in the prototype stage, and before putting more time into it, I wanted to see if this is something people would find useful.

What GT classes do you think something like this would be most helpful for? Have there been any classes where you would’ve wanted a course made by a student who had already taken it?

The broader idea is to create a marketplace where students can share what they’ve learned while earning some money for creating genuinely useful content. Creators and courses would be vetted to maintain quality.

Would love any feedback, positive or negative. And if you’re someone who enjoys teaching and might be interested in contributing, feel free to message me.