Welcome to My Portfolio!

Hello, I'm Matt Krueger. I am a Midwest native, spending my formative years in Wisconsin, my high school and university years in Iowa, and now starting my post-grad career in Minnesota. Born to two teachers in the K-12 education system, I was instilled with the importance of continuous learning and creativity at a young age. Some of my hobbies as a young child were building LEGOs, grinding Khan Academy badges, and playing Minecraft. My youth was also marked by many years of competitive sports, which taught me the importance of practice and teamwork: baseball (2 years), tennis (2 years), basketball (2 years), swimming (4 years), and soccer (10 years).

I always wanted to be an engineer but did not know which discipline to choose. During high school, I took as many advanced courses as possible, studying chemistry, physics, and mathematics to gain a broad sense of what some engineering disciplines may entail. However, none of these classes really piqued my interest. It wasn't until I built a gaming computer at age 15 that my eyes were opened to computer engineering. At this time in my life, I had high hopes of becoming a professional Fortnite player, competing in online tournaments and a few hundred dollars through 1v1 wagers. What held me back from becoming a true professional was my lack of computer knowledge. I did not do proper research before purchasing computer parts; I thought you could assemble any CPU, GPU, RAM, and Disk, turn the computer on, and be good to go. Not knowing the effects these poorly selected parts would have on performance, I built an antiquated computer for the processing power required in tournament scenarios and I simply could not compete. The desire to squeeze every bit of processing power from my I3 and RX580 computer led to researching into computer parts and gaining a high-level understanding about computer hardware basics. I learned the basic theory behind memory types, CPU vs GPU processing, and optimization techniques to improve CPU and GPU performance and installing software that improved latency. Although I no longer play any video games, they are what led me to major in Computer Science and Engineering with a focus on computer hardware.

My college years were busy, developing software part-time at John Deere (5 semesters) and FarrPro (1 semester) while juggling engineering and mathematics coursework. Having grown as an engineer alongside the rise and adoption of Artificial Intelligence and LLM-enabled coding tools, I challenged myself to learn engineering that is harder to automate: 3D Modeling and electronics. I purchased a 3D printer and taught myself CAD to elevate my projects and enrolled in cross-disciplinary EE/CSE courses to build a strong theoretical foundation in electronics. By combining my academic studies, industry experience in data and software engineering, and perseverance through setbacks, I have built a solid foundation for future engineering success.

Currently, I am working in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area as a Service Controls Engineer for TruNorth Automation. Here, I am gaining hands-on experience servicing and programming custom precision automation systems. During my free time I enjoy spending time with friends and family, playing adult league basketball and soccer, cutting hair, and enhancing my engineering skills through projects, and books. My current interests lie in blending multiple sensor inputs for automation applications.