Karl Reinhard wears many hats: a 56-year-old Army colonel, a father, and an ECE ILLINOIS post-doctoral student.
Written by Victoria Halewicz, ECE ILLINOIS
Karl Reinhard (PhD ’16) is not what you might call a traditional post-doc student. The 56-year-old retired Army colonel and father was featured in “Higher on the learning curve,” an article in the News-Gazette focusing on the unique stories of older, non-traditional students.
Reinhard began his doctoral work in 1998. With just two years of graduate school left, he was asked by the US Army to command an ordinance at Fort Lewis. Soon after, 9/11 occurred, and he remained loyal to his service for 28 years.
While at ECE ILLINOIS, he was advised by Peter Sauer. Reinhard has notably led a nine-student research team on using synchrophasor data to measure the power grid’s operating state in near-real time. He was named a 2016 Siebel Scholar, a member of the first class that recognized students in energy science.