The honors seminar I took in the Fall semester of last year, Sticky Innovation, has had a large impact on my personal, academic, and professional goals, as well as the way I see certain things. This course further emphasized how important hands-on experience is for me in both the academic and professional setting. In the past, I’ve been able to use my design and fabrication skills to manufacture niche products that are useful to me. Sticky Innovation was able to show me new ways to approach these problems and opened my mind to more efficient processes to reach the same end goal. Throughout the course of this seminar, we were given multiple assignments based around the creation of a physical object to solve a problem. The 1819 building, where this seminar took place, has an incredible makerspace (and makerspace staff) that was able to help us accomplish almost anything we put our minds to. This skill of 3D visualization and effective manufacturing is especially important in today’s ever changing world where companies are trying to create products that make an impression and last, rather than disposable pieces of technology that need replacing every few years. This was also emphasized in the seminar, which talked about the need for humans to be conscious of the amount they consume and their individual effect on the environment. After all, the class was centered around saving the bees!

 

In the future, I will plan my experiences and job opportunities around this hands-on experience that I believe is so important. In fact, that’s part of how I decided on the major I’m in (Mechanical Engineering Technology). The main difference between MET and Mechanical Engineering is MET students get more hands-on experience that could translate to career opportunities in the future. I hope that I’ll be able to use my background in art and design as well as my new knowledge on manufacturing during my career. One way I’m planning on making this goal attainable is by creating a self-guided honors seminar where I’m able to learn more about different approaches to problem solving using new ways of creating that I’m not familiar with. This will put me outside of my comfort zone and allow me to learn things from first hand experience. It puts me at ease knowing that this honors experience has furthered that goal of mine and reemphasized how important the physical side of projects are to me.