Clayton Burkhardt is graduating from ASU with a bachelor’s degree earned in the Fulton Schools electrical engineering program. He now plans to pursue a master’s degree in engineering with a mission to help improve magnetic resonance imaging, known as MRI, and other medical imaging technologies that helped to diagnose and treat his life-threatening cancer. Burkhardt was piloting a U.S. military helicopter in Germany during a training mission when he was overcome by a debilitating feeling, which turned out to be an effect from a malignant brain tumor, which hindered his speech. He relearned to communicate, then returned to his online studies at ASU, which he had begun while in the military. He now wants to write book about his story.

See also: U.S. Veteran Overcomes Brain Tumor to Graduate from Arizona State University with Engineering Degree, Hoodline-Phoenix