Ginger Wilkins, '19 BS Entertainment Engineering & Design and '26 Ph.D. Electrical Engineering, has spent much of 2026 stepping into new experiences. And on the other side of each achievement, they rediscovered a Rebel spirit that’s been alive and well since childhood. Though, at the age of 10, they used another word.

“I’ve always associated [being a Rebel] with being punk,” said Wilkins. “I know punk doesn't always have the nicest connotation, but to me, it’s a way of life. It’s about choosing where you stand and what you stand for, and it's an ideology that really helped me out when I was starting to figure out who I wanted to be in the world.”

In 2026, Wilkins is showing up in the world as a newly minted Ph.D. in electrical engineering. They also earned their first full-time teaching position this fall, joining the ranks of UNLV’s new Department of Applied and Interdisciplinary Engineering (AIE).

Landing an assistant professor-in-residence position just a month after defending a dissertation is an achievement to be celebrated on its own. But for Wilkins, the appointment is not the destination — it’s just the beginning of a journey to invest in student success. 

Wilkins is one of about 10 faculty members who are on the ground floor of shaping the  mission, values, and trajectory of the nascent department. Determining how the department fits in, or more appropriately, stands out from the College of Engineering’s more traditional departments will require true Rebel (or punk) grit, they say.

Wilkins is up for the challenge.

In January 2026, the College of Engineering debuted the new AIE department, and you just joined as a new faculty member. What about this new department makes you excited to be a part of it? 

First, I feel very fortunate to be a part of this team. It's a really cool opportunity to get to help build this program alongside other faculty members who are just as committed to student success as I am. Our department is trying to be very responsive to the students' needs and the acceleration of society right now. We’re deeply focused on the career futures of our students.

Industries are asking faster and faster for more hands, but they're asking faster and faster for different specialties, skills, and leadership. We’re trying to make sure that our students are able to get out as fast as they want to as well as be able to remain relevant to what the industry needs. 

Can you talk about the recent transition from Ph.D. student to faculty and what you’re learning in the process?

It's been kind of interesting because I was doing a lot of teaching in my graduate studies. I worked as a part-time instructor and my assistantship led me to tutoring and in some cases, to actually taking over one of the classes as the primary teacher. 

Part of it, I think, just hasn't sunk in yet, but it's real — those three little letters are mine now. I’m taking the time to think about how to maintain my authenticity and discovering what it means to be a teacher in a college classroom. 

Three months in, what do you think that role is?

Our students are our junior colleagues. And we have to treat them that way in order to prepare them for the real world. I position myself as their client in some cases, as their boss in some cases, or as their mentor. I try not to let there be an imaginary wall between the authority figure of a teacher and the students because at the end of the day, I think taking that approach is a disservice to them. The safest way to tear down that wall is with someone who cares, and in an environment where failing means quizzes as opposed to the high-stakes situations you encounter at a job.

This semester you’re teaching a Product Design course and your syllabus contained a unique take on generative AI. Can you explain your take on the role of generative AI in the classroom?

So AI is a fantastic tool, but it's not there yet. And what it's being advertised for is not really what it's capable of yet. The truth of the matter is that it makes mistakes and it is prone to mistakes. And mathematically it has been proven that it's going to reach about 70% accuracy and that's all we can hope for with the way these modern large language models have been trained. 

The point of the Product Design class is for students to practice ideation, research, critical thinking, and design. I need my students practicing their cognition. I don’t need them to outsource this very expensive education they’re paying for and giving it for free to Google. They’re paying a lot of money to learn, and for a piece of paper that gives them permission to work. I’m telling my students that creative work needs to come from you because you need to practice being creative on demand. That's what's going to differentiate you from all of the drudge work that is getting outsourced to AI right now. 

I'm going to teach them how to think about it critically so that they can at least make good decisions when they choose to use it. But in all my classes I'm going to have a very clear policy: no AI allowed.

What would people be most surprised to learn about you? 

I live on a homestead in Pahrump. We have chickens, ducks, horses, guinea hens, and we grow vegetables in the summer. Basically I'm a ranch hand. We moved out here from Tennessee during the Great Recession, in ‘08 or ‘09. My family decided that this was our opportunity to do what we always wanted to do and move out to the country.

The holidays are just around the corner. What tradition are you most looking forward to?

The big one for me is always Thanksgiving. A long time ago when I was a kid, we decided that no one actually likes turkey that much. So we tried a seafood boil, and it stuck. We boil lobsters and do a scallop bake and things like that. It’s a time where we go all in and we get to be together and make a meal together.

The Fall 2026 Senior Design Competition is also just a few weeks away. As an EED student in 2019, you created a tabletop animatronic character to give voice assistants a more human feel. What advice would you give to students both presenting this fall and those who are a few semesters away from Senior Design? 

Senior Design is an awesome chance to practice entrepreneurship. There are a few opportunities to earn cash prizes, but I believe the true prize is in the opportunity to come up with an innovative product idea on your own, and then practice pitching it. You could end up pitching the product to an actual venture capitalist who sees potential in your product, which could then end up becoming an actual business.

My advice is to commit to the process and remain receptive. Try to get as much feedback as you can because this is a great opportunity to learn how to ideate from start to finish. 

After earning your EED degree, you went on to pursue a Ph.D. in electrical engineering. What drew you to that path?

When I was an EED student, the degree was not yet accredited. I thought I was good with that, but then as I was graduating, the world had shifted, and I wasn’t convinced I had enough on my resume to be hireable. This, however, was a personal fear. It wasn't really real. It was imposter syndrome winning. 

But I did have a mentor at the time, Dr. [BJ] Das. I had taken one electrical class and he saw something in me that I didn't know was there. He believed in me. I had been working with him in undergraduate research and different projects for a while, and as I got close to graduation, he suggested I try for grad school. He encouraged me to go for the direct-to-Ph.D. program, with the worst case being that I only ended up completing my master's.

With stakes that low, I thought, I’ll go for it. And when I got into it, I got really stubborn about it. It didn’t take long to realize that yeah, I want to do this.

I was raised on PBS NOVA, so my superstars growing up were physicists and engineers and people like Michio Kaku. I was not a movie stars and pop idols kind of kid. I was very much an “I wish I could see a scanning electron microscope one day” kind of kid.

With where I am today, it turned out to be a really good decision.

You’ve described feeling like a Rebel since you were a kid, though you called it something else back then. What does being a Rebel mean to you?

It’s always been really cool that my school gets me. Growing up, I was goth. And my parents thought it was cool. They didn’t try to deter me from it. It’s who I am. I've always had this wonderful privilege of support. And I think it’s the same way here, at UNLV.

We're all rebels. We're all gonna do that thing that we believe in. We're gonna stand for that thing that we believe in, even if it's not popular, even if it's not the most common thing to speak out about. So, that has always really mattered to me — that UNLV is actually what it says it is. It's diverse. It's open-minded. It's really, really about where we as a community stand. It’s a real point of pride.