2026 LLRISE students complete two-week radar engineering course
This July, 24 high school students from across the country were seen around Lincoln Laboratory for the 14th annual Lincoln Laboratory Radar Introduction for Student Engineers (LLRISE) summer program. In this program, students learn the fundamentals of radar technology through hands-on workshops and experiments, including building their own radar and presenting what they learned to the Laboratory community and visitors at the MIT Museum.
Carlos De Armas, a rising junior from Florida, says he was drawn to the program for the opportunity not only to learn from engineers but also to understand what they do in their day-to-day work.
"It was very interesting to hear from engineers who have decades of experience and to get to see what it is that they work on and what they did to succeed in their fields," he says.
De Armas wants to study electrical engineering and plans to spread the word about the program when he returns home. "Not a lot of kids in my area know about these kinds of summer programs, and I really think they are an incredible experience."
Yelina Britos-Milian, a rising junior from North Carolina, is also interested in electrical engineering and says she applied to LLRISE in order to learn a new aspect of the field in a challenging environment.
"I didn't know anything about radar and appreciated having the LLRISE community to guide me through understanding the material," she says. "I also felt like I was actually utilizing the skills that we learned, and not just learning things to learn them."
Along with a new understanding of radar fundamentals, Britos-Milian says that the friendships and time management skills she built through the program are some of her biggest takeaways.
"We all came from different places and have different backgrounds. But at the end of the day, we all came here for the same reasons — and that connected us way more than anything else could."
Along with a new understanding of radar fundamentals, Britos-Milian says that the friendships and time management skills she built through the program are some of her biggest takeaways.
"We all came from different places and have different backgrounds. But at the end of the day, we all came here for the same reasons — and that connected us way more than anything else could."
