Lindsay France/University Photography

David Schneider delivered his "last lecture" April 30.

Imagine you are a bright young engineering student. Your cell phone rings: “Tell me, what could NASA do for you?” says a voice.

In his hypothetical “Last Lecture” April 30, David Schneider, lecturer in systems engineering, shared anecdotes like this in an overview of his career as a Disney screenwriter, teacher at Columbia and Cornell universities, an engineer for NASA, national competition founder for Intel, video game designer for the National Science Foundation and lead adviser for student project teams such as Cornell University Sustainable Design.

Schneider, who wears Hawaiian shirts to be more approachable, welcomes being questioned by his students and lives by the motto, “It’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.”

He said he had a life-changing conversation with Mark León, a director at NASA’s Ames Research Center, who got Schneider in touch with David Lavery, program executive of NASA planetary solar exploration. “Yeah, the sun. He’s in charge of that,” joked Schneider. Together they created the NASA Robotics Alliance Cadets Program to modernize engineering curricula.

Lindsay France/University Photography

A modbot stands on the sidelines as David Schneider speaks in Goldwin Smith Hall.

Schneider, M.S. ’05, Ph.D. ’07, also created an educational robot to function as a “super-textbook” for students, and his students drove one of these “ModBots” around at the lecture. He also talked about founding the G*TA task allocation algorithm, the fastest problem-solving system of its kind. “I was willing to look at new ways of using the same information,” Schneider said. “I found that to be a real source of innovation.”

As a 22-year-old, Schneider developed the most popular freshman engineering course at Columbia based around toys. Since then, he has made five sustainability-based video games that teach computer science for middle schoolers and helped found the Cornell Cup USA presented by Intel, a national innovative embedded systems competition.

Schneider said carefully weighed risk-taking with back-up plans and not allowing your own inhibitions to hold you back are two traits that helped him advance his career. To prove his point, he started up a lively audience chant of “to be enthusiastic you must act enthusiastic” from the Hugh O’Brian Youth Foundation, gave a Seinfeld impersonation and even donned a flannel shirt to sing “I’m a lumberjack and I'm OK” in an English accent to the crowded lecture hall. “[This] shows how dedicated I am to wanting my students to actually learn,” he said.

At Disney, Schneider worked his way up from crowd control to production assistant and eventually became a screenwriter. But he emphasized that determination and hard work are key to further one’s career.

“Make the most out of any opportunity that you have. Really seek to find ways that you can contribute, ways you can gain experience. Look for it; don’t expect somebody else to offer you that opportunity or let you know that the opportunity even exists. … [Also,] give every job your very best. Even if it’s demeaning, people will recognize the value in that.”

Concluding, Schneider said: “You’re the only person who holds yourself back. Look at all these different things I got to do, just because I put myself out there, you know – positive attitude each time. If you’re going to do it, give it your all.”

“Last Lectures” is a series sponsored by Mortar Board, a national senior honor society.

Natalie O’Toole ’16 is a writer intern for the Cornell Chronicle.