During his time at Laurel Ridge, 2026 graduate Andy Desmedt was able to lock down a solid career path. This fall, he is transferring to Virginia Tech to study mechanics and robotics.
He is taking with him all of the skills he learned as part of his associate degree in engineering, as well as through a yearlong internship and his experiences attending an international robotics competition a couple years in a row.
After graduating from high school through the online Penn Foster program in 2023, Desmedt, who lives in Stafford County north of Fredericksburg, decided to enroll at Laurel Ridge.
“I knew a few people who went to Laurel Ridge. and I knew that I was interested in engineering,” Desmedt said.
At Laurel Ridge, Desmedt met a fellow student who invited him to a local robotics club for high school-aged students, Fresta Valley Robotics Club. Because he was 16 when he started attending Laurel Ridge, Desmedt could participate as a student with the club for two years before graduating to mentor level. In 2024 and 2025, he and his team attended the First Robotics Competition in Houston.
“There are 3,500 teams worldwide at the event, and every team builds a robot to compete in the game,” said Desmedt. “It was like nothing else I have ever been to. There were teams from across the world. The venue was giant. I think there were 50,000 people there. I’ve never experienced anything like that before.”
When he first came to Laurel Ridge, he knew he was interested in engineering, and thought maybe he would pursue electrical engineering. Through doing his design project at the college and his participation in the robotics club, he was able to crystalize his aspiration to work in mechanics and robotics.
Desmedt has been interning at Stel Controls in Fredericksburg since August 2025, and that also helped him focus in on his vocation.
“What was nice about coming to Laurel Ridge was I didn’t have to have a specific major because this is an engineering associate degree,” said Desmedt. “Also, I didn’t have to move from home right away. And, it’s much more cost effective here. If I had been a first-year student at Virginia Tech, I probably would’ve had to spend another $40,000.
“My favorite classes were Physics and Engineering Design. Physics brought together all the math and showed the uses for it. It helps to set in concrete what the math actually is doing because you can see it. Engineering Design was good because I got some experience working with a group to accomplish tasks.”
His favorite professors were Ray Rogers for Physics, Jeremiah Dyke for Math and Serdar Durdyev for Engineering. He actually traveled to the Middletown Campus specifically to take Professor Rogers’s class.
“I had been referred to him from someone I knew who had already gone through the engineering program,” said Desmedt. “Professor Dyke was always willing to help and work with you on anything. You could tell Professor Durdyev was interested in the subject he was talking about.”
Desmedt received the Philip May Memorial Endowed Scholarship for Engineering. While at Laurel Ridge, Desmedt was in the Math Club, Phi Theta Kappa, an international honor society for two-year college students, and in Epsilon Pi Tau, an international honor society for technology.
He said he would “definitely” recommend Laurel Ridge to others.
“My classes always had less than 30 students, and some of them were less than eight people,” Desmedt said. “The instructors were always willing to help us.”
In addition to the money he saved by completeing the first two years of his bachelor’s degree at Laurel Ridge, Desmedt was impressed with the guaranteed admissions agreement the college has with Virginia Tech.