[220; 234-241] I came in as a mechanical engineering student. That first semester was very introductory into everything, college, engineering. It was mostly review: I had a chemistry course and I had Calculus I which I had already had in high school. So, there was a lot of repeat but I think they did that on purpose to transition you into college life, and it’s a different mindset obviously. But they started and gave us just a basic run down of what engineering was going to be. They split it up and gave us I want to say six or seven weeks in electrical discipline and six or seven weeks of mechanical discipline. The purpose is, if you decide you’re in the wrong one, you can switch without being behind in the spring semester.
Tag: institutional policies practices & procedures
[25-41] Prior to COVID, I went to a conference, I think it about a month ago now, for a weekend. This was my first time. Then after that, that week was when my school decided to close campus. We have the option to request to stay. I didn’t request it because I had some stuff at home to take care of and they were closing everything on campus. Which means I wouldn’t have anywhere to go for food and there’s no library if I want to go, anything like that. I decided that I was going to […] I guess I should have mentioned, they closed for two weeks. That was the original plan. That they were going to close campus for two weeks. I said, I’ll take two weeks and then I’ll come back. I made the request so that I would be able to come back on March 31st, the current at the time date. I came home and then the next week the governor decided to shut down everything. That meant I couldn’t go back to school. In the past week and a half, two weeks, however long it’s been since then, the school, they first extended the shutdown through the 14th of April. Then they have now extended it indefinitely through the end of the spring semester.
[300-310] Given the nature of the issues, I lean on my family a lot. Like I said, when I got sick, I came home, I laid on my couch all day for a week because that’s all I could do. My family was nice enough to take care of me and give me what I needed to feel better. Then of course, grandmother passed away, so I went home. Now that I can’t be at school working, I’m at home. My family has really been, I guess, the contact point there. Of course, I mean, I do talk to my friends a lot at school or the friends that I still have from home. I keep daily conversations with them. That was also helpful. Another thing is, since I don’t have schoolwork to do in the evenings and on the weekends, it gives me time to focus on when I want to go to the gym. It also gives me time to go on hikes, something that I enjoy doing. That was also helpful to clear my head in those times when maybe my family was busy and I needed to do something for myself.
[6-9; 394-403; 428-444] In winter of 2018, we were finishing up the hardest semester so far. So, my third semester, and as final exams were coming, I ended up not sleeping for 52 hours in order to finish everything, and so that was probably the worst part of engineering in the past two years. I realized that I need to go to counseling, and I need to talk to the engineering professors and say, hey, this is a problem. You cannot put any other class through what we went through because that is insane. It’s different if one person was having issues and debating things that shouldn’t be debated about themselves, but if the entire class was having issues, I’m like, “It’s not an entire class of people who are struggling mentally.” It was the classes problem.
So I was able to talk to my professor about the problem because I attend a small school. I was able to go into my professor’s offices and say, “Each of you have assigned major things that are due this week.” I know some of those are hard deadlines because we have people coming from other companies to come to [our university] and judge us on our poster presentation. Since the external judges tell us what they think of how our engineering program is doing, we were unable to negotiate the due date. However, other assignments like take-home exams, and large homework assignments that did not need to be scheduled that week were rescheduled. So, I was able to negotiate with my professor and say, “Hey can you move this deadline to a couple days from now? Then hopefully I’ll be able to get it done by the original deadline. But it just gives us the opportunity to put it off for a little bit and spread things out more evenly.” So I guess being able to negotiate with my professors and work with them helps me navigate the low points of the semester. I knew that they would do that. So that was comforting, and then realizing that I made it through last semester so I can do this.
[520-536] In addition to managing coursework, I’ve been applying to internships. Now that I’ve been home for awhile, it’s given me time to apply. My dad is a computer science major and has helped me with resumes, and has lots of connections. So, we applied to a place […] We applied to a place last night and he had connections there. So, hopefully that one will work out, and I just need to find an apartment in a nice neighborhood and hope that this whole coronavirus thing will allow me to have a job in two months. Because if I don’t get my practicum this summer, technically you’re not allowed to graduate, because my engineering program requires that you have one internship. Your academic advisor has to meet with your employer and ask them questions about how capable a student is and their verbal communication skills, communication skills, work ethic, ability to problem solve, that kind of stuff. So, I need that before I graduate. I graduate next year, which means this is my last summer. But on the other hand, I understand that there are so many people in the same situation that the university may just have to adjust something. And it may be that my job that I get, after I graduate, they will count that as a practicum for the first two months.
[9-18; 20-23] Two days after our anniversary, I got a really bad test score back, an 83.41, in fluid dynamics. And I thought I had done really well on that exam, so ah, because that sucks.
[188-199; 202-207] I think it’s an off semester for fluid dynamics, but it was still pretty big. We took over, not like one of the larger lecture halls in class, but it was a big lecture hall. I’ve talked with the teacher a couple of times. On my second test, I had two points marked off that I just had the equation re-arranged than how the teacher had it, like instead of plus X on the left hand side, I had minus X on the right hand side. When I went to go get points back, he was like, we can talk the rest of this over and see if there are any other mistakes. So, I ended up getting four points back instead of just the two I went in there expecting, which was pretty nice. He’s a really good teacher. And he really likes what he teaches, but his test have curve balls that come out of nowhere. But the class is really good. Well, he knows what he’s talking about. He’s not one of those teachers that’s like, uh. I don’t know, read the textbook. Because that’s always frustrating. Part of it is just he’s a really nice dude, and he gets really excited. I don’t know about you, but my favorite thing in the world is not how fast does water flow through the pipe in the sewer system, but he made it sound really interesting, and something that was worth learning
[91-94; 96-98] My dad is an engineer, so I was from that young age I had that influence over me, I still do. So that was a big part. So I’m the oldest of four, so I have three other siblings. So I felt like there’s always that pressure to succeed, do well in school and all that stuff. […] I like knowing how things work and all that generic stuff. So yeah I’d say it’s a mix between. I do want to do it and I do like it, but I think also a big part of it was also my dad.
[9-11; 28-30; 38-44] …in terms of my academics at least, I always try very hard. I’ve always taken the hardest classes. I was in STEM Academy for my high school… it was everyone that was looking for majors involving science, technology, engineering and math and all that types of stuff, basically you get put in a cohort, to an extent. There was specific trips we were able to go on since we were in the STEM academy. The biggest thing, […] was an agreement they had with […] a local community college, and I got to transfer out, 16 college credits. I just picked whatever class I had, and if I got an A or B in them for the transfer credit I was able to do that, so I got to bring in those into [East coast university].
[58-62; 66-68; 70-72] they just introduced it in my senior year, an engineering class. So obviously I took it, because I was like, “You know, why not? Maybe it will be relevant, maybe it will be interesting.” So I took it, it was all right. It was mostly based on mechanical engineering which like, I’m biomedical engineering, so it’s still useful, I suppose, but I am not as interested in it. It was a good class. We watched […an] open-heart surgery, we got to watch that. So that was kind of interesting to watch. […]. I remember watching it and I found it pretty interesting, cause like I don’t know, I think that stuff is interesting, I don’t care about the blood or anything like that.
[76-78] So, the only thing I didn’t like about [the STEM Academy was], I don’t get to into it, but today nowadays they stress the women in engineering thing, I don’t have a problem with that, except then they have the trips only for women in engineering so I couldn’t even go.
[793-818] Also, I went to an event, I totally forgot that I did this. It was either earlier this semester or in the back of the last semester. I think it was earlier this semester though. My professor that runs the lab emailed and told us that she wants us to go because we also, back then […] No. So, it had to be last semester. So, back then, we would have group meetings. Now we do individual ones with just me, my lab partner and her. But originally, we used to do group ones with everyone that was in the lab. And, so then, the one day she canceled, then told us to go to this thing instead, which was, basically […] I forget what her title was specifically. But she was doing some type of research and it was supposed to be on planaria, I think. I’m pretty positive. Which I would have found interesting I had known a lot about it, I would have been able to follow it. When I get there, it’s about some hydro looking bacteria or something that also replicates planaria. However, that’s probably one of the only similarities and I’m looking at it, trying to follow what she’s saying and I really couldn’t. But I still did find her research interesting. It definitely was still a good experience I would say, it just was hard to follow, just because she […] The lady already had so much background and experience in it and I obviously didn’t. So, I think that was probably one of the bigger factors. But again, like I said, I think if it had been planaria, which I think that it was supposed to be originally, then, I would find it a lot more interesting and it would have been useful.
[821-843] They actually have these events semi regularly, not always for biomedical engineering. But they’ll basically have speakers come out or whatever to talk about their stuff or it’ll be. I’m trying to think of what the right phrasing is. But, basically, try out I guess for them as a job. I don’t remember what the right phrasing is, but it has something to do with them presenting their data and stuff that they’re doing and, stuff along those lines. In terms of, I think it was potential candidacy for a position or something that, basically. That’s what it was. And so, then they would come and present or talk about whatever they need to talk about. And then, I don’t think every student that went got a say, but I think it’s better to have people there and stuff. And then I think, the professor would have to go and look at it and stuff along those lines. So, I don’t think only that specifically was the thing that we’re doing, but it basically is similar because […] I only say that because they send out basically these emails that have a picture of the person, the description of what they’re going to talk about and then just say like, “Okay outside researcher or candidacy spot open,” or whatever or whatever it is. But basically, when they have these events, so mostly, all of these is just them talking and then after the fact you just leave. And that’s basically what ended up happening. If she want us to say after your talk, we would have, but, she didn’t really seem to. And also, she actually stayed after and talked with the lady, because I think she already knew the lady. Because of her research with planaria. Even though she didn’t talk about planaria. But, that’s why she wanted to go, I think, and, still at least talk to her. So, she did. She went and talked to her afterwards but everyone else in the lab, pretty much just left.
[636-638; 643-650] The classes that I’m taking are interesting and relevant. Also, I have won two awards from doing well in my extracurricular activities. I’m going out of my way to try to incorporate engineering into the rest of my life, like for the project that I’m working on. I got the IT excellence award or whatever, because I’m on the IT team for my school’s newspaper. I did a lot of work for them this past term, and they appreciated that. I also won the multicultural award for really trying to participate in and go to every event by the Intercultural Community Bridge Program at my institution, which introduces international students to the culture of the local city, institution, and the United States. That was awesome. I really appreciate that. They’re not really like awards, but they’re something and I’m happy about it.
[194-202; 204; 209-214; 218-222] I’ve had depression for a long time, depression and anxiety. While I don’t want to say ADHD, because I’ve never been officially diagnosed with that, I have a lot of those symptoms as well in my classes, or in life. Right now, getting motivation at all is a struggle, it is very difficult for me to start something and finish something. But, I’ve been going to therapy since the semester began, and I skipped over this summer, but yeah. I think as of now it’s been a year since I’ve been in therapy. What else? Soon I want to go see a psychiatrist and get prescribed some medicine, because with this lack of motivation I don’t think I can pass any class, or pass any difficult class. Even starting a homework assignment is like really difficult. But, in college I don’t give myself that time to do homework like I did in high school. The reason for that is a lot more than I’m lazy, and I don’t want to do it right now. It’s a lot more than that, and I wish it wasn’t. I wish it was as easy as I just need somebody to tell me to get off my butt and do it, I don’t have the energy to do that. I’ve had this feeling for … I’d say about six or seventh grade, probably seventh or eighth. And, because my parents don’t really understand it’s hard for me to get that support. Now that I’m in college it’s a little bit easier to deal with it, because I don’t have to get my parents approval to go to therapy.
[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.