When thirty-year-old Dr. Damian Rouson completed his Ph.D. last April, the Stanford University graduate took a job at Failure Analysis Associates, a prestigious Silicon Valley engineering firm.

The youngest of his mother's five children, Rouson was recruited to Stanford from Howard University. He is not only the first engineer in the family, but the first of his siblings to complete a doctoral degree. His father also had a Ph.D. Rouson's ebullient personality, athletic gait, and infectious smile defy the traditional stereotype of techno-geeks.

Dr. John Eaton, a mechanical engineering scholar whose experimental research is in the field of thermal dynamics, was Rouson's advisor at Stanford. Eaton had hoped his student would pursue a career in academe. Instead, Rouson has opted to start his career in industry.

"I still think I'll teach eventually, perhaps at Howard [University]," Rouson says. "But for now, I'm more interested in the business side of things."

During his nearly two decades at Stanford, Eaton has shepherded thirty graduate students to the completion of their doctoral degrees. Five of these have been students of color, but Rouson is the first African American.

"We get very few [Black and Latino students] who say, `I want a Ph.D.,"' the professor says.

Eaton is extremely selective about the doctoral students he mentors. He prefers those who express an interest in academic careers and estimates that roughly half of the doctoral students he has worked with have gone on to faculty or scholarly research jobs.

"My students know I'll pressure them to get into an academic career." he says. "Damian knows I'm mad at him for going into industry."

The growing lure of careers in industry has made recruiting engineering students of all races into academic careers more challenging. And with the United States under-producing the number of native engineers needed to meet demand, engineering graduates are among the most sought after graduates in today's economy.