Halfway through the term, disappointed in some respects, but not unpleased

This term has been a learning experience in more ways than one. Taking a course load with one more than required has made me a very busy person but I don't regret taking hydraulics. It's not something I'm going to commit to as a profession and neither is it a bird course, but it's the most interesting and out there so far. Provided that the extra education is free and that I can maintain decent marks, I don't see why I shouldn't try it out.

The engineering discussions course that I got admitted to is not what I had expected at all. Well not necessarily, I expected it to be a lot of mayhem and time stumbling trying to get its feet. A quick summary is that the class has basically been about designing a new university, what we'd focus on, what's the target group of students, how we'd hope for it to succeed. This was an idea of the prof's that we went along with, it seems a little random and we haven't done the best job at it really, though it's an overwhelming task to try and tackle. I've felt a bit odd that my ideas get shot down a lot when I try and suggest very out-of-the-box topics to discuss in relation to this new university project. The first day I stated my intention to learn more about the engineering society and try and find whether it is an honest group of people or if the problems in engineering are rooted in a flawed system. This was soon dismissed by the prof and I feel a bit rejected in that sense.

I did enjoy presenting bill C-32 about the Copyright Modernization Act that I felt tied into this university project's intellectual property (somehow) and I was able to expose the class to some vital information that I feel would benefit them to know. There was a coo in the second or third week of the class because there was no progression or direction, I think since then it's been better but I feel it spreading very wide now, by now I'm just watching to see what happens with this course, some people are being ridiculously committed to the course. This course is in replacement of a non-science course, which does not tend to impede on homework time. Though I commend people on being proactive, it's a bit much since the main focus of the course is to improve communication skills.

Another thing is that a lot of these students like to talk, I am convinced some enjoy hearing themselves talk, which is fine and dandy for them, but leaves little time for the rest of the students. I prefer to sit back and think for a bit so that I don't say something silly, but this course's marking would suggest that I need to speak up right away. Doesn't entirely make sense to me.

Therefore in summary, my protesting is being squashed, though I get some interesting comments in the conversations on rare occasions. We'll see how this course concludes, it seems its on the course calendar for next year.

I'm in, now how to get my answers...

It's been a while since I've posted, mainly since despite my digging for information, I've been on this side of fruitless in my search. All of the articles that I've come across on the internet regarding issues with engineers and engineering have been actually about the challenges that engineers face, which is entirely different. Nothing so far on the PEO and their model of their self-governing organization, other than what their site and Wiki have to say.

For Fall 2010 I've been accepted into the CIVE497 course that will discuss engineering issues in politics, environment and society in order to improve our communication skills. I have to admit, though I'm not insatiably excited about the course, I feel sometimes like this course could have a lot to offer and that this experience (if all goes well) could shape the rest of my engineering career. During the course, I really wish to be able to challenge the reasoning behind the structure of the engineering government and to fully understand their processes that I don't understand at the moment. Since the course is new, flexible, and presented as a course that can be altered in terms of the direction of discussion according to the students, it seems like I could get my questions answered and possibly spark some interesting debate about the existentialism of the PEO. A kind of 'taking it down from the inside' I suppose.

I have to admit though, discussion of politics and environment as it pertains to engineering (more specifically civil and mechanical engineering) is quite interesting on its own. Even as a recent example, today in Waterloo there was an intense rainfall where between the times of 8:00 and 8:15, 20mm of rain fell and as of the previous night, a total of 65mm had fallen. Pictures circulated the internet of local flooded roads, water gushing out like geysers from storm sewers, and the boardwalk at Silver Lake in Waterloo Park being completely submerged. Projecting the 20mm in 15 min rainfall would mean that this storm was in excess of a 100 year storm, a design criteria I know well from work this term. I can see that at this given amount of rain, the storm system was over capacity and the sediment-laden waters would run off the land straight into the water ways without any sedimentation or filtration. This poses huge environmental impacts since more suspended solids has temperature and habitat effects. I wonder if there's any political impact of this storm, such as water damaged properties or city infrastructure.

It was interesting to hear from my friend yesterday as we were discussing something as small as the environmental impacts of hand-drying alternatives initiated by Conestoga Mall, she commented on my obvious enthousiasm and knowledge on the subject. Though I feel I know so little and never enough (since the world feels like a limitless source of information). She commented how it got her to stop and think about the alternatives of cloth towels to paper towels to hand dryers (since electricity and industrial cleaners are not directly observable to the user, it seems like they are preferred options to paper towels, though this can be debated either way. I like the idea of cloth towels since one is not likely to use more than one and it's way too easy to take more paper towels than you need, and electric hand dryers are very slow and ineffective in most cases).

Also, I'm looking into this whole Engineers Without Borders and how it works. Since my boyfriend came back from a vacation to Tanzania, he's had a new humbleness for all of the fantastic things in his life such as running water and the ability to buy lots of food on a whim and make a large tasty dinner. As a civil engineer, I see how my studies can be used in the context to directly improve the quality of life for people living in developing countries where the access to clean potable water and sanitation are well defined and separated. I've gotten the urge to want to help, but I feel somewhat skeptical of development organizations. The type of work that I'd be doing in the Waterloo chapter would be to drum up interest in other people in town, nothing directly correlated to helping those in need since only a few people and students are sponsored each year. To volunteer so much as to be considered an involved member of the group in order to be more likely to be chosen seems like something I just don't have the time to do. I'm thinking that working for a firm or a non-profit organization that does civil and structural engineering work for post-disaster relief aid would be really neat and a great application of my skills to the real, deserving world (harsh I know). I quickly looked into it and it looks like it possibly exists.

Anyways, more on this later when I have some time to research.