[94-107; 123-135] I’m currently struggling with a lot of feelings I have when I go to class. I don’t usually have productive thoughts. I feel like things are scaring me more than helping me now. Or I’m getting scared more than I’m learning. I hope it’s just the mental health thing. Recently, I’ve been getting better. I’ve been paying more attention, and I’m going to pass. I met with a psychiatrist last week. I just got medication and hope it will lift my spirits. When I go to class, I’m paying attention for the first 10 minutes. But after that, I start to have like breathing problems or my mind is wandering off. It’s like an escape. I’m in the classroom because if I’m in there, I’m more likely to learn something than if I’m not. But at the same time, once I look up at the board and see all the equations, all the steps that I phased out on, that’s the moment that I start getting anxiety and scared. So, I look away and I go back in my head so I’m not as stressed. It’s a cycle. It goes throughout the entire hour until I come back out without anything in my notes.
Author: godwina
[150-165; 189-194; 187-204] My Physics 2 class was all conceptual and was in a giant lecture hall with an older professor. He was very good and knowledgeable in physics. But he didn’t understand his students. His examples were too smart. His analogies didn’t make anything simpler. He tried to do was have us visualize these in certain ways, and I felt like that just complicated things. However, I appreciated him because he actually had class participation. He gave us a chance to ask our own questions. He gave us opportunities to work in groups. The reason why I failed it was mostly because of me. He gave me multiple second chances to bring my grade up. And it came down to my lack of energy.
[169-186; 221-229] My statics teacher was very enthusiastic. His accent was a little hard to discern but other than that he was one of the best teachers I’ve had. If I had the teacher again, then I would gladly take him because he’s good. He asked or he drove class participation with grades. I think that’s what helped a lot. My statistics teacher was the best one. If I don’t become an engineer, then I’ll be a statistician just because of this teacher. She did everything that my Physics 2 professor did, but she had better examples and conveyed her ideas a lot better. She went through the problems concisely, and the steps were all clear. One time, somebody corrected her in class. They followed out the steps that she was doing on the paper and realized there was an error. She checked her work and, indeed, the student was correct. They got rewarded. But weirdly enough, the graphics teacher was my worst teacher that I’ve had. The class was a hot mess. My professor came back with material from 20 years ago. According to other sources, like my friends who took the course before, they didn’t have to hand draft. I was sitting there drafting out a weird-looking screw in isometric 3D by hand. He felt like a little behind the times. I understand why we did the things, but I also feel like we could have used our time better. He seemed like he wasn’t organized at all. I had a lab at a separate time. During that lab we learned AutoCAD, SolidWorks and Creo by our TAs. I felt like I learned a lot more because I learned something relevant. But I still ended up passing the course. I think that course in particular was low level and very forgiving.
[272-296] I’m retaking statics right now. I’m also taking chemistry, Calculus 3, and Chem Lab. My statics course has more people but less attention. That professor, compared to the last one, he gives out better homework and tests, but otherwise he’s just lecturing to a brick wall. My chemistry teacher, kind of the same way. Then my calculus teacher, who I think is the best out of my professors this year, he comes in with Wolfram Alpha, all his notes written out on the computer. With plots and 3D shapes that you can move around. The way he teaches he has his notes projected, he’s writing on the board and he has a tablet in his hand that has the notes already on it, so he doesn’t have to go back to the computer. I think he’s the most well prepared. Doing his homework is a nightmare. But I feel like going through it is actually rewarding. I like this professor, but not for the same reasons that I like my other professors. For Chem Lab, TA is good. She doesn’t have to teach as much because we’re just reading off of a manual. So that course is easy.
[312-325; 334-340] I got my faculty adviser last semester. He is an actual professor in mechanical engineering, so I can talk to him about related issues. He was actually interested in me, which is a lot harder to say for the people in the Central Advising Office. I’m actually going to talk to him in a couple of hours to talk about my next semester. I’m excited for that. I really should go to more office hours, but I’m nervous to talk to my professors. And I’m looking into joining a club in the Engineering College, so I can get more interaction with friends and faculty. I don’t interact much with peers in engineering field, but I’m looking for more. I’m in clubs that are not related to engineering. I was only in a club last semester and we didn’t get much things done. Because a lot of our members were seniors and they were dealing with senior design
[58-115; 302-309] At the end of spring, I failed chemistry class since I wasn’t really interested. I’ve been having a hard time getting through the Gen Eds just because I don’t have the passion for it. I did well on the rest of my classes. That was pretty low for me, but overall I went up. The summer was very nice. I adopted a pigeon. I don’t feel like it’s necessary to censor that. I went back home. I went on vacation, getting ready for my new summer job. I was a camp counselor and a camp instructor. It was fun to interact with a lot of other STEM majors and with a lot of interested young adults. It makes me feel better self-confidence and eye-opening. I went to several tours of places related to engineering. I really want to internship with one of them, so I’m going to contact them privately. I taught soldering, 3-D modeling, SolidWorks, and Rhinoceros 6. Summer was the highest point because that job was very fulfilling. I started to lower down as the summer job ended. I was ready for starting a new semester. Being at home is kind of suffocating just because there’s not much for me to do that is engaging and enriching for my brain. I got a new e-board position. I became the president of a club. That has been a good hobby to get me off of worrying about classes. Lately for the past few weeks, I’ve been on the decline just because I’m retaking Physics 2 for the third time. It is a problem that I still don’t have a plan or the energy to get through them now, so I’m struggling. Another huge problem was that I didn’t have a creative outlet anymore. All of my class are math-based and have nothing to engage me on a creative side, so I started looking to music. I try to do that when I can because it also takes me away from the math monotony. I feel more hopeful that I have been in the past few weeks, and the antidepressants started working. I felt happy to finally feel that way. Overall, it’s expected to be generally lower during the degree because I know for a fact the degree is hard. But going through this experience will be worth it in the long run. I don’t mind a little low point as long as at the end of tunnel I get a fulfilling job and a fulfilling paycheck.
[144-163] For counseling, because each week we had a different camp, we actually had several camps that people could go to. It was called Engineering Careers and was focused on various skills that an engineer should have. We took a tour of Engineering Building in my school. We saw multiple rooms that I haven’t even seen before. We saw various testing labs and huge workshop facilities. The next week, I counseled for games and puzzles. We were off campus to a forest preserve retreat by our school. The camp was all focused-on games and puzzles. A lot of creative thinking instead of strictly like math and engineering such as how to create and them. They had to create their own escape room, the one with the middle schoolers. By interacting with them, it was very nice to see just the development of their ideas. It reminded me of my youngest sister who just started high school.
[164-189] The next week I was an instructor. I instructed for the 3-D design camp. We gave them various challenges, and we tasked them with assembling each Lego into SolidWorks. They had digital helpers to measure everything. Eventually, we could 3-D print the model, so we could do a compare and contrast. The next project was like a key chain project we used Rhinoceros 6. You can do a lot in SolidWorks for assembly and for making precise components, but for Rhinoceros 6 it’s a lot easier to do artistic things. The last project, it was kind of rough. It was making a USB casing with old USB drives that are just lying around. They give out just for free. The project was to design it so you could put the USB drive and its internal components into a 3-D printed case. So we combined some aspects from Rhinoceros 6 with SolidWorks in order for us to actually make something both artistic and practical. The next week, I taught Product Design, which was basically teaching something basic things like woodworking, soldering, and 3-D modeling. I spent a day on each of those aspects and then for the rest of the week they had to design their own product. They had to think of their own unique product that they could eventually sell, theoretically. They were really creative and inspirational kids at some points, really annoying at some points too, but I didn’t mind.
[206-220; 224-237] For the rest of my classes, I have Mechanical Engineering Dynamics. My professor is very understanding and passionate about how he teaches. I really like the way he teaches. The very first day, I introduced myself to him, because I want to make that a habit. I told him about my mental health. He listened and simply stated, “I hope you feel comfortable in this class.” Not only that, but whenever somebody asks a question, he answers it thoroughly. This professor goes in depth and tries to answer everything concisely, so I’m not afraid to ask a question in class. He usually writes on the board. He has his own website where he posts certain things and programs some simulations for us to use. That’s really fun. Just being able to see some of these concepts. He has so much energy in every class that its contagious and makes me interested because he’s doing it in such an interesting way. Every time I go into the class, I feel engaged. I don’t feel like I’m just writing down stuff to write down. When I have a homework assignment from him, I can get through it and learning something really important for me. The other two classes I have are mostly math-based. I have Engineering Economics, which is interesting with a lot of math. I have Differential Equations. It’s my second favorite just because I have a good study group. I’m excited to work through those problems, just because I have a group that I can share it with. I feel like I understand Diff Eqau more than Econ at this point, even though I felt like at the beginning of this semester it was going to be the opposite.
[241-251] There’s this one person who I’ve been studying with since my freshman year. We’re more than just study partners. We’re really good friends. Spending time with them is fun. It’s also easy to study with them because I know them. Getting a study group together is hard because it’s about establishing a time and place, scheduling, and all the logistical stuff. I also have my girlfriend in the class, so I can study with the both of them and overall it’s during that time it’s fun and it feels easier to me to express my ideas.
[7-13] The end of the semester last year I was in two Engineering classes and two […] Let’s see, one was math, and I forget the other one. Going through my mechanical classes was a little rough that time around, so I was concerned I wasn’t going to pass those classes and move on to my next coursework. I ended up looking through my spring semester coursework and I ended up just revamping all of it because I thought I wasn’t going to pass. I changed it so I would have one Engineering class versus three. Then I also tacked on the last few of my pre-reqs. I intended to get those done during the summer, but then summer work became a thing and I decided to take those instead.
[14-20] I ended up just changing that course schedule because I didn’t feel confident about my abilities in those classes. However, surprisingly, I passed all of those classes. I’m happy that I passed, and I don’t regret changing my course load. I think overall it was for the best because the course load that I’m in, it’s helping me deal with […] because last semester was a lot of math, a lot of intense […] it didn’t stimulate my mind that creatively, which I feel is important for me, personally. I was going to be a performing arts major before deciding to be an engineer, so I wanted to see if I needed something stimulating creatively in order to feel a little better.
[66-72] I don’t think the reason I didn’t feel stimulated creatively was more so in engineering overall. I think it’s just with the classes that I had, because it was a lot of the more simple […] I shouldn’t say simple, but it doesn’t have the design aspects that I want. It has the stuff that you deal with while you’re designing, before you’re designing. It was Dynamics and Economics, which were my two engineering classes last semester. Economics I could care less about. However, in dynamics, the professor was really good. I really, really liked him, but […] Actually, no, that class was good. I think it was just the other classes that were kind of all math, all science, nothing that I could incorporate my creative skills.
[76-81] I feel creative in engineering when there’s an aspect of design incorporated in the course. For example, when I’m dealing with a group project where I can talk to other people about design and what we have to do for the project. Those are the times when I feel excited to work on things. When it’s a homework problem with a bunch of numbers just thrown at it, I could do it, I could do the work, it’s just like I wish I had a purpose behind the work other than get a good grade. I guess I just want to get into the design aspects of my major. Overall, I think that’s what I want.
[86-98] I enjoyed my dynamics professor because he was very engaged, very engaged. He made his own website with a bunch of simulation-type games, where you could test out your theories. For example, if I have acceleration in one direction and speed in the other direction, the simulation game could help you determine how long will it take to get to zero, and whatnot. You could test all those things out with the software that he made, that he programmed. He made his own videos for that website about the stuff that he was teaching, kind of like Khan Academy. Basically, that same style of video, just with him. And in class he wasn’t just relegating everything to his website or to his videos, he was actively teaching. If there wasn’t a participant in class, then you weren’t going to get much out of it because he wanted you to participate, and that’s when he started teaching. He wanted to hear all the ideas, even if they were flawed, and oftentimes he would rather go over time discussing things rather than just getting straight to his answer. He was very engaging, he had the right amount of difficulty, not because the class itself was taught in a way that was difficult for me but because the coursework itself was engaging, but it was a difficult subject. He didn’t make it harder than it was, he made it easy to teach, easy to digest, and he gave us work that we had to work for, answers that we needed to work for.
[105-117] The way that my art professor structured his class, it’s basically […] For the first five weeks, we had to turn in three completed projects three weeks in a row. The first two weeks were talking about it and talking about prep and whatnot, but the next three weeks you had to make some intriguing artwork in one week, and then turn it another one the next week, and turn another one on the next week. That whole process in that five weeks you had to brainstorm enough ideas in order to find one that was worth working on. You had to then start making that thing. For me, I did all 3D prints. For other people, they did laser cut stuff. What else? They made metal projects. Some of the students straight-up just did paintings because that’s what they specialize in. He wanted us to go through a process of rapid design and he said, “I want you to make something that is worth looking at and I want you to work through all the mistakes. I want you to see those mistakes and see what you can do later next time. If you make a mistake, then it’s fine if you roll with that mistake and get through it that way.” And I did end up going through with three separate art projects, three different sets of models, and it was stressful, but it was really rewarding at the end. It was just a lot.
[143-148] Working on the project was rewarding because I guess it made me feel like, even though I have no idea how it feels like, it made me feel like an engineer because I had to solve these problems really quickly. For a couple of these mini projects, I had to find shortcuts in order to get through these designs as fast as possible. I had to learn the limitations of the 3D printer and of the amount of time it would take for the 3D printer. I had to learn and adapt really quickly throughout these three weeks in order to make those deadlines. At the end of it I had a product, a solid piece of art, that I could be proud of and I am proud of.
[121-138] One of them I decided to make something that only a 3D printer could do, at least do it well enough in a week. I ended up making a plastic figure. Through one side it looked like a film camera and through another side it looked like a man that’s walking. So, if you just turn the figure it looks like a completely different thing. I also made a box that it’s supposed to sit inside so you could see it at both angles. The next thing I decided to make a pun. On the outside it looked like a piece of poop, and then on the inside, when you take it apart, it looks like a pizza. It’s a pizza crap. That one, I wanted to make something more organic looking through 3D design and it was difficult. Who thought making a piece of poop in CAD was difficult? But it was not fun. Then, the last project I did I wanted to have interlocking parts, all of which did not need support material, because after working with the 3D printer […] After that first project actually, I had to get off so much support material and the support material didn’t look nice, even after I got everything off it still didn’t look like how I wanted it to, so I was like, screw this, I’m not going to have any support material for my next few projects. This very last one I made these parts interlocking. There was a hole at the bottom and then an insert on one of the sides, and through the design process I was like, how do I make it so that I don’t need any support material and that I don’t have to clean this up? I messed around, I did some research, and by the end of it I had four pieces that all interlocked together, and it did not need any support material. I think it was cool