During a dark time in her life, Hannah Pierson ’19 summoned the courage to light her own way by pursuing an education and career in photonics at UCF. Today, she is a beacon for others, creating an endowed scholarship to help future Knights pursue their own paths.
“Young Hannah didn’t see this coming.”
Neither the teenager who had no interest in college nor the young mother grieving the loss of a daughter could have imagined that one day she’d build a thriving career in photonics, endow a scholarship for future students and inspire her own son to follow a path he never considered.
Hannah Pierson ’19 is a success story by any measure, but that success came on her own terms, through a determination she summoned out of her darkest days.
Building a Life
After high school, Pierson moved from California to Central Florida, took a job at a call center, married and bought a house. Life was good.
When their first child — a daughter named Kyra — was born with special needs, Pierson became a stay-at-home mother, providing constant care. As the years wore on, it became clear that their family would need more substantial resources to pay for the equipment and extra help to continue caring for Kyra at home.
Pierson decided that she would be the one to provide those resources. Having never been interested in college, she now saw education as the path to supporting her family.
“I didn’t like school, but I was always good at learning,” Pierson says. “So six years after high school, I decided that I would go to college after all.”
Reframing the Dream
She enrolled at Seminole State College, but sadly, during Pierson’s second semester, Kyra passed away.
Pierson pressed on, finding purpose and stability in her studies while raising her young son.
“Having school to keep me occupied was good, and by then Floyd was 3, and he gave me a reason to get up every day,” she says.
As Pierson was preparing to transfer to UCF through DirectConnect, a guest speaker from UCF’s CREOL, the College of Optics and Photonics introduced her to an industry she’d never heard of.
“Hearing that this technology enables everything from Google Glass to LiDAR systems and even 3D printing — I was so excited. I came home and told everybody. I became an evangelist for photonics, and I changed my major immediately,” Pierson says.
Finding the Light
As a CREOL student at UCF, Pierson became part of a close community of students and faculty who encouraged, supported and challenged her. Professors took time to help her succeed, classmates became close friends and she found a sense of belonging as a student that she’d never had before.
“It’s a small program, and there’s something magical about having that tight-knit community and knowing that people care about you,” Pierson says. “And it transcends the college experience. I’ll be at trade shows, and when I meet students or alumni from our program, we all get so excited talking about CREOL.”
That’s one reason that, as an alumna, she has been a consistent donor to CREOL’s annual summer camp: She wants to help young people find that same spark that brought her to the field, and this hands-on experience for high school students does just that.
Throughout her college journey, Pierson relied on scholarships as she juggled school and life as a mom. Seven years after starting her degree, she earned her bachelor of science in Photonic Science and Engineering.
She entered the optics industry, quickly advanced from inside sales to business development and built a career that changed her financial future. After coming from humble beginnings, Pierson now travels the world, supports her family and experiences a level of financial stability that she never imagined growing up.
And now, she is paying it forward.
Inspiring Others
To help others on their journey, Pierson created an endowment that will provide scholarships to future CREOL students.
“As someone whose own path to higher education depended on Pell Grants and scholarships, I know firsthand how transformative financial support can be. Those investments didn’t just help me pay for school. They gave me the chance to earn a degree, build a career and create a different future for myself,” Pierson says.
Today as a donor, Pierson is investing in future Knights to help them create a brighter, bolder tomorrow. Her gift demonstrates the power and generational impact of Go For Launch: The Campaign For UCF’s Next Mission.
Donors like Pierson are invited to name their endowments, and she named hers The Whimsical Engineer Endowed Scholarship. It reflects her own non-traditional path and also gives a nod to her best friend, UCF electrical engineering alumna Cayla Hack ’19.
“Neither of us are typical engineers, and I hope this scholarship will appeal to others who are doing things on their own terms,” says Pierson. “Whatever their situation, I hope this scholarship will make their path a little easier.”
A Full-Circle Moment
This summer, Pierson’s son, Floyd, now 16, attended the CREOL summer camp at his mom’s suggestion. It wasn’t a path he had considered for himself, but he found his own spark.
“I picked him up on the first day, and he was just beaming. He called his friend and told him he should come to camp with him next year,” she said. “Then he turned to me and said, ‘Mom, you were right — I really like it. The professors were telling me I’m capable of doing this, and I never thought I was.’”
Floyd is now imagining his future as a college student, and possibly a career in photonics, following in the footsteps that his mom created for their family.
“I’m happy that it ignited something in him. I tell everybody that this program is life-changing. It certainly changed mine,” says Pierson.
UCF is ranked as one of the top 5 public universities for optics in the U.S. by U.S. News & World Report and listed among the best worldwide.
With her commitment to paying forward the opportunities she received, Pierson’s generosity will change futures and light the way for CREOL students for decades to come.
