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Decisions, decisions: saddles and spurs, electron microscopes and chemicals, or blueprints and calculators? As a bit of a renaissance man who finds many things interesting, these were some of the professional paths Steve Sorensen milled around before deciding to become an engineer.
Shortly after earning a chemistry degree from the University of Colorado, Boulder, he worked at the University of Utah Medical School doing cancer research. That led him to apply to the school’s PhD program, which connected him with a group of eclectic engineer personalities who worked with artificial organs. To pursue an advanced medical degree or take on the new challenge of engineering: that was his dilemma. (He’d since abandoned the cowboy world)
As any critical thinker would do, Steve decided to contemplate his decision while hitchhiking his way to Alaska to see new country, go fishing and hiking, and basically just think. That was in 1973. As these how I ended up in Alaska stories always seem to go, he fell in love with the place and staked a homestead in the 20 Mile Valley near Portage, Alaska, where he built a cabin and began guiding heli skiing, and coaching alpine and cross country in the winter, then working construction in the summer.
That was in 1973. Five years later, he earned his engineering degree from the University of Alaska Fairbanks. This year, he was recognized as Engineer of the Year by the Alaska Society of Professional Engineers (ASPE) Fairbanks Chapter. | 