This time we’re going to solely focus on the career aspect of being a student.
Engineering was never exactly something I dreamed about. After various peers and teachers said that I could be an engineer, I eventually began to research what that career was all about my final year of highschool. After looking at the general descriptions of the field and the specific types of engineering out there, I began to choose which ones were of interest to me.
Now, this was the method that I chose to start with because I didn’t have a good idea of what I wanted to do as an adult. There was nothing that I could call my dream job. So instead, I started my research from a broad aspect. This made my journey take a little longer, but it still brought me towards the path of finding my career of interest.
My research was more than just searching up engineering on Google. I watched YouTube videos of people in college describing their experiences as engineering majors. I also looked for the experiences of those already in the field.
Hearing people speak about their experiences helped me to gain the understanding that engineering is involved in many subjects of interest to me, in both the college life and in the field. I’m the type of person that has a great amount of interests, but there are so much career paths that an engineer can take. This kept me somewhat confused in my search for a while because there are so much things that I would like to do, but I know I can’t do everything. Fortunately, I had the understanding that all of my interests aren’t fields that I would enjoy working in for elongated periods of time. Because of this, I began to narrow my search to interests in which I had more passion in.
I eventually began stumbling upon the various interests of mine that I had actual passion for as I continued my search and gained more experience as a college student. In fact, I’ll emphasize on that. Experience is a key player in finding passionate fields of interest. One can believe that they have great interest in a topic, but once they begin gaining experience in it, they may come to realize that it’s not exactly something they would like to keep working on. My growth as a young adult is what allowed me to get this far in my thinking and planning. A few of the interests that I came to realize were fond to me are:
- Energy
- Material Science
- Nanotechnology
- Entrepreneurship
- Teaching
- Research
Now, out of all of these, Entrepreneurship is the biggest surprise to me. It was always a topic that I’ve been telling myself since high school that I wouldn’t be interested in. My reasoning? I couldn’t see myself being in such a huge role. I denied myself the chance of venturing deep into the topic in terms of thinking, “What if?” Teaching was also something I did not think I would be suitable for, since it involved being a big influence to young students. The straight up STEM fields were the only ones that would have seemed plausible to my younger self. Research and experience has really matured my mindset.
The Energy industry is where I’m pushing towards right now, and I’m seriously excited about it. I felt like I hit a huge accomplishment when I figured out I could actually pursue that field. When I was younger, I never fully grasped the fact that I would have to work on my own at some point of my life. School was just something I had to go to. I now have an understanding for why my parents have been sending me to school all these years. It’s to gain the knowledge and skills required for participating in the world of work, or to prepare for higher education for the more complex fields of work. From this realization, I started researching the difference career fields in the Energy industry, specifically the renewable energy side of things, precisely solar. I obviously saw solar panels, or photo-voltaic cells, and battery storage. This excited me even more because I’ve always been interested in solar panels.
Very recently, I began to set my eyes on the giants in the industry, like Elon Musk through Tesla. I looked into what he was doing with his companies and projects, and his projections of what’s to come next. Because of this, I learned about Tesla Energy and Solar City. The more I dug, the more researchers I found. Eventually I stumbled upon Dr. Vladimir Bulovic, an MIT professor. I was on YouTube when I watched a video in which he was speaking at a TED talk. The YouTube algorithm by then had a good understanding that I was looking for that type of work, showing me this video in which Dr. Bulovic spoke about his work of making flexible, lightweight, transparent photovoltaic cells that would innovate the world of Solar. I was outstanded, and began to do research on him. He is an MIT professor, an Electrical Engineer, does Nanotechnology research, and he’s a Co-founder to a few start-ups. Brilliant! That literally involves everything I considered as fond interests of mine. Because I got exposed to all of this research, I was rejuvenated on my career search. Now, I’m thinking to either go to MIT for graduate school and do research in similar projects, or try to gain an internship in companies that are making similar innovations to the Solar industry.
I have no way of displaying the amount of excitement I feel about this through the words that I am typing! It was only in the beginning of this summer that I got the realization that the Energy industry is where I would like to keep my focus on. Now I’ve recently been seeing all these innovations in the Solar industry that makes me want to dive straight in! I love it! I’ve finally found a career that I want to venture into. I already had back-up plans ready, but I never had my #1 plan settled. I must sound so backwards to you guys but that’s why I’m sharing my story, because no one has their whole life planned out!
So you may be wondering, “What’s next for me?” It’s the same as what should be next for you once you’ve made realizations like this…
The first thing that should be done is improve on what you’ve been doing and make the right turn around for your new ideals. I’ll use myself as an example. So I’ve come across this new realization during the summer and will be entering the 2018-2019 school year as a Junior double majoring in Engineering Science, with a concentration in Electrical Engineering, and General Mathematics. I’ve gone through my first two years at Lincoln University. What should I improve upon?
I should take my courses more seriously. Easy answer right. It’s the first thing you should think of, especially if your coursework is directly related to what you would be doing after college. In that case, the classes have certain topics that may show up again in the future. Even if there are mandatory classes you have to take that aren’t directly related to your future endeavors, there are indirect ways in which what you learn in these courses may benefit you.
After that idea has been settled, I can open the door to the other tasks on my road towards my career goals. I should seek research opportunities with professors who have a background in my field of interest or are going to be working on something similar during this upcoming school year. I should apply for summer internships and research opportunities early on, way before deadlines become urgent. I should start looking for graduate schools, and possibly start preparing for the GRE. In fact, I should aim for taking the GRE in the beginning of the spring semester, so I can have an early understanding of what I must work on if my scores aren’t suitable for my graduate schools of interest. I should also look for companies to apply for, just incase I decide on not going to graduate school right away. And finally, I should try to stay up-to-date with what’s happening in the Solar industry, and strive to continuously gain knowledge about the field.
What you do, your actions, your thoughts. They’re more important than you realize. Don’t assume that being a regular student will bring you to your dreams. You must work for what you want. You must strive for your goals of the future. Remember this. Even if you don’t believe that what you’re doing in the present is important, trust that your hardwork in the present will definitely be appreciated by yourself in the future.
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Here’s the link to my video on this topic: The Career Search