Ian Terry has carried a love of puzzles through his life. He graduated Shaler Area High School in 2009, and a penchant for math and science while at SAHS made a career choice easy. “I decided early (10th grade) that I wanted to study chemical engineering because I enjoyed my chemistry and math courses, but I picked up a lifelong interest in economics from AP Econ in 12th grade.” Terry combined these interests in a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering with minors in economics and mathematics, earned in New Orleans at Tulane University. After Tulane, he first worked as a physics instructor until connections led him to the financial technology industry.
Currently, Terry’s role is the Senior Consultant at Peloton Consulting Group (he notes, “not the bikes!”) and proves a fresh opportunity to apply his problem-solving skills first utilized at SAHS. He finds technological solutions for accounting departments of major companies, implementing Oracle’s Enterprise Data Management software. “My job involves working with clients to discover pain points in their metadata governance processes, designing solutions using Oracle’s EDM software, developing and testing those solutions, and creating documentation. At any given time, I can be working with as many as three or four clients, often at different stages of the solutioning process, so it can get pretty busy!” With practice built up in courses at SAHS, Terry expresses his enjoyment of devising solutions for his clients. “A lot of my job involves problem-solving. I always enjoyed working on math problems and logic puzzles, and in many ways, my work often feels like that. It can be very rewarding to knock out a challenging problem after grinding away at it for a while.”
Courses at SAHS gave Terry a sturdy foundation for building a career oriented to finding solutions. “Looking back, the Shaler classes that I got the most out of were my upper-level science and math courses. Again, I love to problem-solve, and I feel like those courses gave me a really good handle on how to tackle challenging problems systematically. Have I used calculus outside of recreational problem-solving since leaving teaching? No. Do I use the problem-solving part of my brain that it helped develop? Definitely.” He affirms about practicing perseverance, “I think the biggest lesson I learned in high school was to be persistent and consistent. My study habits and discipline were pretty awful in 9th grade and didn’t mature until a bit later. About halfway through 10th grade, I started striving for perfection instead of “good enough” and became a better student and person because of that.”
Terry’s puzzle-solving skills aren’t only for the world of data and science. A big fan of Survivor and competitive reality TV shows, he auditioned during his college years. A casting call for Big Brother resulted in his first TV gig. (In Big Brother, contestants are sequestered in a highly surveilled house and must strategize how to fend off eviction). Terry triumphed to win the reality show’s social experiment and challenges. He succinctly summarizes the whirlwind from casting call to winning, “Five months later, I walked out of the Big Brother house $500,000 richer. Crazy.” You might also recognize him from Season 4 of a current reality show. “The Traitors was a lot of fun to participate in. Meeting so many cool people and getting a free trip to Scotland will always be a highlight for me. I was a little disappointed to be eliminated early, but I learned that I need to work on hiding my intellect a bit more when I play these sorts of games.”
Terry’s wide-ranging interests, from puzzles, economics, reality TV strategy, or data solutions, culminates in advice to current students on uncovering their talents. “I would advise Shaler students to take advantage of the resources available to help them find their interests. There are a lot of great courses offered, and one is bound to find something they like. I do regret leaving stones unturned in the humanities, though. Maybe I’ll be more knowledgeable about literature and history in another life!”
