# @ncstatecals on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/CDMt5ipJpbE
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/15082499-ncstatecals-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/postThumbnails/127a3390ee.jpg
- **Posted:** 2020-07-28T20:11:39.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** NC State College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (@NCStateCALS) — https://gondola.cc/NCStateCALS

## Caption

"NCState was ready for me, but I was not ready for #NCState. I had a rough time. I couldn’t find my feet. A voice in my head kept telling me I did not belong here."
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Students may know NCState_BAE Professor Mike Boyette as the Grandpa of Weaver Labs, but they might not realize his path to #NCStateCALS was anything but easy. Shortly after enrolling as a student, he dropped out mid-semester in 1967, taking a job close to home running a drill press in a local manufacturing factory.
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Eventually he found his way back to the university and discovered #AgriculturalEngineering at a friend's suggestion as well as the encouragement of mentor and undergraduate coordinator, George Blum.
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"It took me about a minute to figure out that I was in the right place. This is where I belong. I have felt this way every day since. Sometimes life takes crooks and turns, but when you finally get to the right place, you know it. It dawned on me that this was an #opportunity for me to help the people back home."
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In 1976, Boyette earned his bachelor’s in biological and agricultural engineering, then started graduate school. However, his wife became sick, so he stopped school and took an engineering job with the manufacturing company he’d worked for before.
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Once again, though, he returned to his home at NC State and went through a master's and Ph.D. program to become a leading #sweetpotato expert, who helped turned the crop into one of our state's leading agricultural commodities.
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Looks like #dreams do come true — what's yours?

## Stats

- **Views:** 0
- **Likes:** 270
- **Shares:** 0
- **Comments:** 2

## Tags

opportunity, sweetpotato, ncstate, ncstatecals, agriculturalengineering, dreams

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