UW-Madison student Colin Peck steps into the internship his brother died before completing (2024)

Former UW-Madison student Brian Peck had a strong heart.

That’s how his younger brother, Colin Peck, a UW-Madison senior studying computer engineering, describes him. An adoring older brother, Brian nurtured a love of technology in Colin similar to his own and had a summer internship lined up at Medtronic, a Minneapolis-based global medical device company, where he thought he could improve people’s lives through technology.

But Brian never got the chance to fulfill that internship. He died in December 2019 from sudden cardiac arrest as he studied for his last final exam of the semester. An otherwise healthy 20-year-old UW-Madison biomedical engineering student, Brian had unknowingly developed arrhythmia, an irregular heartbeat, after a recent bout with a virus scarred his heart tissue.

Five years later, Colin is taking up the mantle in his brother’s honor, interning in Medtronic’s cardiac rhythm management department, where he works with devices that might have saved his brother’s life.

Colin primarily deals with ensuring devices meet European Union standards and has developed an interest in the return products lab, which investigates what went wrong with devices and why.

“I like to picture that (Brian is) my mentor here, as he could have been if he was still here. And I see him in everything I do here,” Colin said. “As an intern, I can only do so much, but I know it goes a long way and it reaches that bigger picture. It’s an honor to be able to contribute to this cause, and I know Brian would be proud of me.”

Colin reached out to Medtronic for a summer internship after recalling the way the company reacted to Brian’s death. Brian hadn’t officially worked there, but the company still contacted the Peck family to offer condolences, which the family found moving, Colin said.

When Colin was assigned to the cardiac rhythm management division, he was overcome with emotion. It wasn’t the first time Colin was working for heart health: After Brian’s death, Colin had helped organize EKG drives at his high school, sharing the story of losing his brother to arrhythmia.

But getting assigned to the cardiac rhythm management department was a lightbulb moment for Colin: Like his big brother, he’d wanted to find a way to improve the lives of others. This was how he could do it.

Becky Kieffer, senior manager for Medtronic’s early careers team, said she sat in both Brian and Colin’s internship interviews. Four years apart, she remembers both Peck brothers were focused and had clear plans for themselves in what they wanted to do.

As an intern, Colin has turned grief to growth as he builds a legacy for Brian, Kieffer said.

“During the interview process, Colin’s dedication and passion really stood out, obviously because of his experience with his brother,” Kieffer said. “His commitment to carrying forward his brother’s legacy was just extremely inspiring and deeply moving, and we’ve continued to see that passion throughout the internship ... we’re really, really fortunate to have him here and really grateful to have him.”

Brotherly love

The Peck brothers had a rule for themselves once Brian left for college: Neither was to come through the door or leave without giving the other a hug.

Brian was back home in Orland Park, Illinois, for Thanksgiving break in 2019, less than a month before he died. With Brian still asleep as Colin was leaving for high school, Colin debated: Should he wake his brother up to give him a hug before he left?

Brian would be headed back to UW-Madison that day and wouldn’t be there when Colin came home. So, Colin woke up Brian, to give the last embrace the two brothers would ever share.

Weeks later, the Peck family was in Madison to pack up Brian’s belongings, without Brian. Among them, the family found Brian’s backpack, filled with cores, wires and resistors.

“It was just an engineering mess in there,” Colin said with a loving laugh.

But that’s who Brian was, Colin said. Brian loved technology — so much that as a teenager, he wired up his tablet to his car to effectively make an early model CarPlay device, and his Christmas presents to Colin would be introductory circuit board kits.

And during last Thanksgiving weekend the Peck brothers had spent together, they’d sat up one night into the early morning hours talking about technology, artificial intelligence and how it would shape society, and the futures they saw for each other.

Brian would just never know how much he impacted his brother’s.

“I do think about him a lot, especially when I’m working here, and seeing the differences and impacts I’m making definitely reminds me that I’m in the right place,” Colin said.