Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering with Verena and Ashley Padres

Our 10th episode! And for this one we went big - exploring our biggest major here at Cornell Engineering, Mechanical Engineering. Come learn about what mechanical engineering is and where it can take you, especially how it applies to many other fields including Aerospace engineering. We have two incredible students, Verena and Ashley who talk about their love for mechanical engineering and how a simple bottle rocket project started their interest in it, taking them all the way to Space X. Finally, we talk about our favorite Cornell traditions and where to get some good information when researching engineering programs.

https://www.mae.cornell.edu/mae
https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges
https://www.bls.gov/ooh/architecture-and-engineering/mechanical-engineers.htm
https://www.asee.org/
https://irp.dpb.cornell.edu/
https://www.mae.cornell.edu/mae/alumni/sibley-150-celebrating-150-years-mechanical-engineering-cornell

Transcript

Opening Credits:

Teri:

Hi, I'm Teri Carey and welcome to VIEW, Voices of Incredible Engineering Women. Are you interested in math and science? Are you curious about the world? Are you an engineer? Well, maybe you don't know yet! The world of engineering is huge and we want girls to be included in the future of it. So grab a cup of coffee, get your curiosity going and listen in as we talk to real women studying engineering at Cornell.

We hope you enjoy our view.

Introduction Segment

Hello everyone, welcome back to VIEW, I’m Teri Carey and I’m really excited for today’s episode. We are going to talk about mechanical engineering.  Now, mechanical engineering is a huge major here at Cornell, one of our most popular, but also it is a type of engineering that can be applied to any field inside of engineering or outside.  So what is mechanical engineering? Well, mechanical engineering deals with the design and creation of machines and mechanical systems - pretty much anything that moves! And there is a really wide range here, you can think of mechanical engineering as a can opener - solving the problem of how to open a can with a tiny moving machine, or it can be a rocket ship - solving the problem of how do we get to space plus many more problems in between.  And mechanical engineering has been around for a really long time. Simple machines, like pulleys and levers were invented by mechanical engineers.  They were making draw bridges go up and down, defending their kingdoms with trebuchets, and designing carriages that were rolling through towns… but something that changed the world forever was the invention of the engine.  Engines helped people utilize power in a new way and made transportation much easier, faster, and cheaper.  So now people could ride on steam engine trains, get in a car, or even fly across oceans because we had the ability to utilize the engine for travel in ways a horse or your own two feet never could. And eventually out of this came Aerospace engineering, propelling us further than we could have ever imagined with people walking on the moon, satellites orbiting space, and rovers exploring planets.  But I want to emphasize that while mechanical engineering is a big part of transportation and space exploration, it is actually foundational to solving many problems in engineering fields. Take for example biomedical engineering, mechanical engineering principles are used in designing and building medical equipment like MRI machines, prosthetics, and surgical instruments. Or how computer science and mechanical engineering come together to create robots that can do jobs for people in unsafe environments, or even bringing them all together and using mechanical engineering, biomedical engineering, and computer science to do 3D printing of tissue engineering.  Air conditioning, pace makers, door knobs, bicycles, drones, mechanical engineering is everywhere in your daily life and it is taking on the most difficult problems in cutting edge technology, exploration, and research. 

Cornell’s Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering just celebrated it’s 150th year anniversary. And while one of my favorite childhood teachers, Bill Nye (yes the science guy!) was a featured speaker at the event being one of our esteemed alumni, I want to take this opportunity to highlight some of the female voices in this field. Mechanical engineering has been a part of Cornell’s academic offerings since it’s first semester, being called the “mechanic arts.”  According to our Cornell Alumni website, within a decade of the school’s existence, it was graduating nearly 20% of the nation’s newly minted engineers. In 1888 Kate Gleason became the first woman to enroll in the mechanic arts.  And while she was unable to finish her degree because she needed to help her family business, she did go on to be the first woman elected to the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, as well as the first female president of a U.S. national bank.  She was sometimes called the “First Lady of Gearing” and the “Marie Curie of Machine Tools”—but at Cornell, she was known as “Sibley Kate.” She repeatedly said, “Engineering was one profession where a woman could achieve career equity.” 

Another really neat alum is Aerospace engineer, Dr. Swati Mohan. She was the Guidance and Controls Operations Lead on the NASA Mars 2020 mission and she was the voice many people around the world, including me, were listening to when watching NASA’s most technologically advanced rover, Perseverance, touchdown on Mars.  She was navigating us all through this incredibly difficult landing and her words as she declared the success of the mission were, “Touchdown Confirmed, Perseverance safely on the surface of mars ready to begin seeking the sands of past life.”  As I mentioned, I watched this landing with my two young boys and remember welling up with tears after seeing all of the NASA team jump up, cheer, celebrate, standing in amazement that they had just successfully completed their mission through a pandemic no less. When Swati was on the Kelly Clarkson show she spoke about how Perseverance was an incredible achievement in mechanical engineering, in that it was the most technologically advanced self driving, self thinking, vehicle they have ever sent to another planet. She spoke to the fact that this little machine was capable of doing its own science.  Which is incredible, but also that they integrated a whole other vehicle onto it, a helicopter named Ingenuity that could fly down into craters and explore terrain that the rover could not manage. It was able to take the first flight of any powered vehicle outside of Earth. How cool is that?

I think mechanical engineering is one of the coolest and most integrated fields in engineering. You can do anything from designing bicycles to sending rovers to far away planets, and you can find a home in any field from computer science, environmental science, biomechanics, business, law, wherever there are problems to be solved, a mechanical engineer will be there. And I am doubly excited for the student interview portion of this podcast, because today I am interviewing not one, but two incredibly amazing and talented mechanical engineering students, twins Verena and Ashley Padres.

Student Interview

Teri 

Hi Verena. Hi Ashley, how are you doing today?

Verena 

I'm doing great.

Ashley 

Also doing great, super happy to be here. How are you, Teri?

Teri 

I am great. Thank you so much. And yeah, today we have two wonderful students who are going to be talking about their experiences in mechanical engineering, Verena and Ashley, they’re sisters. And I'm so pumped that they're here to be able to tell us about their individual experiences because mechanical engineering is such a popular major. I thought it would be awesome to have two different perspectives. So can you guys go ahead and just introduce yourselves?

Verena

Sure, I'll go first. So my name is Verena. I'm a sophomore studying mechanical engineering and I'm from California, as well as Ashley. We are, I'm a member of the space systems design studio at Cornell and in my free time I like to do some painting and some reading.

Teri 

Awesome, thank you so much.

Ashley 

Yeah, and so my name is Ashley. I'm Verena's twin, if that wasn't already obvious. I'm also a sophomore studying mechanical engineering here at Cornell. And in my free time at Cornell, I do work some work with the Cornell University Unmanned Air Systems, also known as CU Air. And similarly, I like to read, paint, that kind of thing.

Teri 

Awesome. Thank you guys so much. And it's so unique that you guys are both interested in mechanical engineering together. I would love to hear more about how engineering was brought into your life when you first got introduced to it or got kind of got excited about STEM fields and how that journey happened.

Ashley 

Yeah, of course. So I think engineering has always been kind of a subtle part of our lives, mainly because both of our parents were civil engineers. And so it was always kind of there in the background. But I think the first time I speak for Verena as well in this, the first time that we really thought engineering was something that could be ours, that something that we could pursue ourselves was, I think, when we were maybe like 11 or 12. Basically, there was this event at the Science Center near us where they had this bottle rocket launching event where basically, you took a two liter water bottle, emptied of its liquid and then turned it into something that was rocket -esque. And then the competition was basically, when they put pressurized water in it, could you get your rocket or your bottle rocket to stay in the air the longest? And so I remember that as kind of one of the first experiences where I was fascinated with this idea of like, seeing what possible ways I could go about engineering this problem or like, can I be creative about how to make these fins? Like how am I attaching fins to a water bottle? Like things like that. It was just such a unique opportunity where, and it was a collaborative one too, which is I think very indicative or like a very good example of what engineering is written in the real world. So, but yeah, it was a really cool opportunity to just explore like creative problem solving in a physical manner. And so I think that was something that really introduced mechanical engineering to me. Oh and of course I have my eighth grade science teacher, shout out to her. We did a lot of small creative competitions where we made a marshmallow launcher where the competition was to like, who could throw a marshmallow the furthest out of whatever you have in the classroom.  And things like that where I think it was just really like seeing how I could use some sort of physical asset to solve this problem in a very creative way. And so I think that was my first introduction to mechanical engineering, kind of what hooked me on this really creative and cool idea of using what you have to solve the problems in the world.

Teri 

That is awesome. I'm so glad that you were able to participate in that. And that's such a cool memory to have of like specifically, especially something that is simple yet complicated, the bottle rocket, right? Like it's a very, like everyone has those at home, you know, but there's so much you can do with it. And your thought of like, where do I put the fin? How do I make this happen? It's so ingrained into engineering and figuring out those problems and those little parts that you have to solve in order to accomplish the goal of keeping it in the air the longest or whatever it is, the highest, whatever. I love that. I love that you guys had that experience. So you're interested in engineering. You obviously have these little events or projects that you do that continue your interest. How did you guys find Cornell, especially being from Southern California, that's definitely all the way across the country. It's a much warmer place. Tell us about your journey here and how you kind of found us.

Verena 

Yeah, so I think it was honestly a little bit unexpected. Like if you talk to younger me, maybe me like going into 12th grade, I would tell you I was going to some school in California. I was not expecting to go out of state. We only really applied to two schools out of state and Cornell was one of them. The biggest thing that we had like we're thinking about going into where we were going to go to college is the biggest thing is we wanted to go together. The second biggest thing was that we wanted to make sure that there was a lot of engineering opportunities at that school so we could both pursue our interests while going to the same school and still have a school where we're able to like really take advantage of everything that we're interested in there. And it doesn't like hinder us, for example, like if we go to a school where there are specialties, what I'm interested in, well, then Ashley might not get as much benefit out. So you really wanted a school that we'd both be able to pursue our passions in. And then also, of course, we wanted to go together. And I think Cornell ended up really just being the best opportunity that we had. I still honestly remember when, when we first got in, we were honestly really surprised because we both got the likely letter and basically for that you get an email on, you just get an email that just says, hey, you're in. And so I remember we were just getting ready for track one day and Ashley like looking through emails, she's like, my gosh, I got into Cornell. And I'm like just sitting there, my heart is pounding. I'm like, do I check my email? Do I open it? Like I was freaking out. I was just so worried. I was like, what if I open my email? I don't see anything. I open my email, I didn't see anything. I refreshed it, I saw this email come up. I’m like oh my gosh, there's no way. Could it be? I click on it and it's the same thing. And I just remember we were freaking out. It was the funniest thing ever, but it was very unexpected, but also very exciting to get that opportunity. It was honestly, I think, one of the best things that happened to us, to be able to come here and to be able to come together.

Teri 

Yeah, and the dynamic of that, especially when you think about, OK, one person is worried, will I get in? But then you see somebody else who is not even your peer, your sister, who's in the same boat as you. And you're like, wait a second, she got it. But I don't know if I did that layer of uncertainty. But then afterwards, you must have both been so excited. And you said you were at track. Or did you have to go down to practice and run?

Verena 

Yeah, it was right before practice like like walking from like our school building to the track We were like texting our family and calling our parents and being like, my gosh, you won't believe just what just happened

Teri 

Oh that's awesome. You must have run really fast that day, but you were energized. You're ready to go.

Verena 

Definitely were, yeah.

Teri 

Oh that's so cool. I love those stories. Every time I do this, I always am I’m very excited to hear how people heard about it. And it's always different. Everyone has always has a different reaction. I mean, it's usually joy, but there's a different situation that you're in. And especially with this to have your sister be in the same boat, that's really cool. Alright. So you are interested in engineering. You come to Cornell and you're studying mechanical engineering and aerospace engineering as well as a part of our department. So I am interested to hear what you guys think mechanical engineering is. What is your definition of what this major is?

Ashley

I remember seeing somewhere online, I don't remember how long ago, that mechanical engineers design and produce machines. And I was like, OK, that's pretty general. I don't really know what to take from that. But I remember also seeing something else, is that generically, mechanical engineers work with the study of objects and systems in motion. And I just remember growing up, I remember always asking my dad, why and how? Why do phones work? How do planes fly? What makes an elevator work or a car drive? We just lived in, like, we live in a world that's like full of rocks and water and like sunlight. So like, how did we get to the point where we have like phones and cars and planes? Like what happened? Like how did we do that? And this intrinsic curiosity with the working of the physical world and just the ways that we can use like physics and the way we can use like what's around us to harness like this world, these rocks and this water and this sunlight to make something amazing, which is so incredible to me. And I think in that kind of sense, that's mechanical engineering. It's like, it's using what you have around you, using the physical solutions, using what's in this world, what already exists to work on what doesn't exist, to create new things, to create new solutions to the problems we have, to get us around the world faster in this plane or to send someone to Mars or any of that kind of thing. That's like, that's the core of mechanical engineering in my mind.

Verena 

Yeah, Ashley, honestly, she touched on that perfectly. It really is like, at least for me just adding on to that, yeah, it's really just the design of like, how do you design something that moves? Like, it's a very interesting challenge trying to figure out how to make sure you understand exactly what's going to happen to something that's in motion. And for a lot of systems, we need something in motion, like a car. But the whole point is it can go a lot faster than you can. And so you need to be able to find a way to understand how to design something that's in motion and what forces are on it and all these different things. And being able to put that all into perspective of, well, we have the physics and then how do I apply that in a way that makes sense for whatever I'm trying to work on? And how do I make sure that I'm not forgetting anything and that my assumptions are correct? Really just understanding the world around us in a way that we can then utilize and take advantage of it, like Ashley mentioned earlier.

Teri 

Yeah, it encompasses so much. You know, you think that first definition that you had where it was just putting something together into a machine or, you know, solving a problem with that. But like, it is so much broader than that. And you're solving problems that are much more complex, you know, whether they are simple or complex, but you know, you are solving problems that encompass much more than just a machine maybe. I love how you guys said like in motion. I think that was a great way to put it. So here at Cornell, you guys are obviously in classes and doing labs and things like that. And you said you were involved in some other organizations. Can you tell me about what you're learning here in mechanical engineering?

Verena

Yeah, so that's a great question. So I think what we've been learning here is how to, like I mentioned earlier, just take the physics and take what we know about how the world works around us and figure out how to apply that. So that works in a bunch of different ways. So we've taken classes like statics where you're basically just trying to understand how to analyze the forces and loads on different structures and what sort of deflections they'll see as a result of that. We're also currently finishing up dynamics, which is kind of the other side of that coin is how do you analyze things that are in motion, things that you can't assume are static. And how do you use that to your advantage to design like mechanisms or linkages or different systems that move is how to, yeah, essentially take the physics around us and figure out how to apply that. So we're learning through a bunch of really cool different ways. Like for example, for that class, we had like a lab where basically what we took is a little model of a satellite. And we basically were able to apply the concepts we were learning through that class to be able to analyze important information that you need about that CubeSat in order to then control it when it's in space. So we're not actually control, not launching this little dummy thing into space. We're not doing any of that, but we're starting to understand the basic concepts of how engineers in the real world actually will analyze a system like this and analyze a satellite that doesn't, isn't like perfectly symmetric or anything like that and understand how to get a lot of really important information about that so that you can then control it when it's in space.

Ashley 

Yeah, and we also did some work, I remember, in both statics and dynamics, so both the structural analysis and the motion analysis kind of classes. We worked a little bit with a forklift. We actually have a Toyota forklift in one of our labs for those classes. And so for statics, we got to see, OK, well, when we put the loads over here or here, how are we offset? Where is the tipping point? What is the balance like? If I have a bunch of weight super far forward on this forklift, is it going to tip? At what point does it dip? Like, you know, that kind of thing. And then also just like learning like how the mechanism works. Like how does the forklift raise its arms up to lift up its load? And it's a heavy load. How does it do that so well? Things like that. And then I also remember there's this really cool opportunity that we had to basically disassemble a Toyota six cylinder inline engine. So it's basically just a big Toyota old, it's an old Toyota forklift engine that we got to disassemble and having known nothing about engines, it was super cool to be able to go through this process of taking it apart and seeing all the different components and being like, well, this here is a lot bulkier than this other piece I removed. Oh it must be because it's hot. It's getting a lot of hot exhaust products through it. So it has to have a lot thicker metal so the heat doesn't transfer out and, I don't know, burn you if you touch it. It was just such a cool opportunity to see that all the things we've been thinking about in thermodynamics and in statics and that kind of thing. And even in dynamics, when we made a model or we analyzed the model of a piston and then getting to see the six pistons that are inside of this engine and just being able to see all these concepts kind of in the real world through these labs is also such an amazing experience. And just being able to see that, like, here's an example of engineering and mechanical engineering applied and whether it was from an engine or a forklift or even this like small mock -up of a satellite that we had swinging in the middle of this room. Like, there's all these kinds of different ways that you can really see what you've been learning kind of in the physical world. And I think that was such an amazing thing that we got to do through our classes.

Teri 

That's really cool. I've seen from the outside, I've seen the lab that you're talking about, the Toyota Forklift lab. It seems really awesome. And it's really cool that you guys do have that hands -on experience. You're not just reading about it or taking a test on it. It's like, let's go look at this. Let's go take it apart. Let's go see what it actually is. I love your ability to draw conclusions about things. Like you were saying, like how the… it was a thicker piece of metal or something. And why is it a thick? You were able to draw those conclusions because you had it in front of you. That's really, really neat. And I love that you guys have that experience in mechanical engineering for that. So you do have these academic courses and you're doing a lot of hands -on work, but are you involved in other things at Cornell, like research or project teams? You said you had a couple of organizations you were a part of as well. How else are you participating and learning through those programs?

Ashley 

I think actually it's pretty unique. Verena and I are in both. I'm in a project team and Verena is in a research lab. So from my experience on a project team, like I said before, I'm on the Cornell University Unmanned Air Systems, like CU Air, or like otherwise known as CU Air. And we basically build an autonomous search and rescue drone that basically does, yeah similar to what's like a search and rescue mission where it has to like autonomously fly along the path and then take photos of the ground and then basically land a matching payload on a matching target on the ground, like all autonomously. Super cool project. And I think what's amazing about it is that it's a really cool opportunity to work with like a big team of just undergraduate students. Like my team is like, like overall, like probably 60 undergraduate students and being able to work on choosing projects to pursue and then choosing how to pursue them and making the design choices yourself and defending those design choices and all that kind of all those kinds of things like pulling from my knowledge of statics I just finished or my dynamics class I'm taking right now and being able to make a product and test it in percentage of my team and be like okay well here's what I've done here's a custom two -axis gimbal so that we can basically keep our camera pointed at the ground over in flight. I've tested it, put it on the plane, let's see how it works. Can I be this smaller piece of this greater whole and really work with the rest of this team to make something for this project and help us succeed in our mission? And so it's a really cool opportunity where I can learn and actually apply my knowledge for my classes and actually produce a product that we can use and that we can test and see working. And it's such an amazing opportunity. And there's such amazing people there that I've worked with from all kinds of different backgrounds. And so I'm getting to interface with electrical engineers and computer scientists and material science engineers and all in this kind of like overall arching goal. And so it's a really amazing experience, I think, just to turn this like theoretical or this high level engineering into something that's like tangible and physical and like, yeah, this was this was started off in CAD. I CADded this. But that was a physical model and it works. Like, it's an amazing thing.

Teri 

Yeah. That's really cool. So where do you, you know, if you're doing this mission, the CU Air mission, where do you do that on campus? Do you just fly something in the air and try to test it and stuff? Or do you have like a special airspace that you have to do that over?

Ashley

Yeah, so our plane is actually quite big. It has a 12 foot wingspan and it weighs 55 pounds.

Teri 

Whoa.

Ashley

So to fly the, yeah, so if we want to, and I guess another little asterisk is that our plane, I guess we've been working on implementing and finally successfully implemented this last year at competition, a plane that can fly vertically and horizontally. So it has the ability to fly like a drone and fly like a plane.

Teri 

Cool.

Ashley

So which is really helpful for trying to take images of targets or drop payloads, but it's so much faster to fly horizontally. So we have the best of both worlds, I guess. And so if we're flying vertically, like a drone, then we can go to a local farm. That's like a 10 minute drive. But if we want to fly horizontally and we're flying at around 60 miles an hour, we have to go to a local airport called Ovid Airport so we can fly there. 

Teri

That is so cool. That is so neat that you're able to like really do that. Flying at 60 miles per hour in a real, 

Ashley

Yeah, it's amazing

Teri

Oh my gosh, that's so cool. That's awesome.

Ashley

Yeah. And I guess the yeah, and I guess one of the coolest things to me is that like no one told us to do this.

Teri

Yeah

Ashley

No one told us that we have to have a plane that can do both. We just chose or I guess I wasn't technically on the team when they first decided to pursue this. But my team was just like, wouldn't it be cool if we could do both? Like there's teams, there's other in our in our international competition. There's plenty of teams who do horizontal planes and plenty of teams who do drones. And we're like, OK, well, these teams do well in certain things, these teams do well in other things, wouldn't it be cool if we did both? And kind of just chose on our own to pursue that. And yeah, it wasn't easy, but I think it was so rewarding to see it work and to see this innovative idea. And it was actually an idea we got the most innovative award for, because we had no other team in the competition's history had ever done something like that. And so it was just out of our pure will to engineer something cool. And I think that's something so amazing about project teams and research is that you can kind of just pursue whatever you want because it's cool. You want to engineer something cool. Like yeah, it's not easy, but it's like if life was easy or if engineering was easy, like everyone would do it. I think it's just, it's a really cool opportunity to push yourself and to see what cool things you can make just out of your sheer will to like find something cool or do something cool.

Teri 

Yeah, congratulations on that. That's really neat that you guys kind of innovated that. Well, not kind of, you did. You innovated that whole thing. And that's a national competition, right?

Ashley 

It's actually international. About half the teams are from... Yeah.

Teri 

well then. That's really, really cool. Congratulations. That's really awesome. I love that. That's awesome.

Ashley 

Thank you.

Verena 

Yeah, so I can touch a little bit more on my experience here at Cornell. So like I mentioned earlier, I'm a member of the Space Systems Design Studio. Specifically, I'm working on the Sailing to the Stars mission, which essentially is a mission that aims to use the International Space Station as our testing platform. So we're working on technology for these types of satellites called light sails, which they're super cool. They basically, they harness light to move them this way that boat sails use wind. Super cool definitely would look into it more if that's something you're interested in.

Teri

Wow

Verena

But it's a really cool physics demonstration, and we're working on a new version of those light sails. So light sails have existed out in other missions beyond Cornell, and we're working on just a smaller version of that, just a basically new technology demonstration that aims to help develop this satellite technology a little bit further. And we're essentially aiming to understand the dynamics of this sail deployment. So when you're opening up the sail, once you're, whatever your satellite that transports it into space, when it's opening up, it's like, we're just trying to understand more about what the event looks like. And that's really hard to do. It's really hard to analyze here on Earth, because it's a lot of flexible structures. And that's not an easy thing to analyze. It's a lot easier to analyze something that you know, it's solid, and it's like, it's not supposed to move. Like, yes, you'll see some deflections, but it's like, supposed to be relatively rigid versus like us. It's a flimsy sheet of material. So it's a lot harder to analyze. So essentially what we're using is we're using the International Space Station as our, like I said, our testing platform. So we'll be doing a couple of these deployments within it and getting some video footage and some data from some sensors on the satellite that is, the mock satellite that's deploying it. So super cool opportunity. It is a very unique to Cornell, like this research lab is very unique amongst the ones at Cornell. A lot of research labs at Cornell are very theoretically focused where they're focusing on things that have our completely new concepts. Our research lab more focuses on technology. It's a little bit further down the line. So it's not like completely like the first time the technology has ever been invented. We're just aiming to help further that technology or spin off of it in a new way. As we're a little bit more hardware based in my research lab. So we actually do work with hardware. So there's a couple of CubeSat missions that have been launched to space from my lab. They're working on another one right now. I was previously working on the one that they're finishing up right now. So it's the Alpha CubeSat mission. It's also working with light sails. So right now our lab is relatively heavily focused on light sails and developing that technology, at least with the hardware side of that. So yeah, it's very interesting getting to work on this project. It's not something you usually get to work on as an undergrad.  I'm hopping on calls with people from other companies and talking to them about, okay, well, what do I need to do to get this thing certified to work in, to like launch to space, to have astronauts interacting with this? Like there's a lot of safety concerns and other concerns that come with that and material choice and all of these different things. And so it's a really cool opportunity getting to like kind of get a sample of that real world interaction where it's like, I know what I want and what I want to do, but I don't get to do always what I want. I have to like work underneath different guidances, like guidance and requirements from other outside people, whether that be like NASA or the government saying that, okay, well you have to meet ABCD or like for us, it's we're working with this company who's interfacing with NASA on our behalf to help us with getting all these things and making sure we meet all these requirements. So it's a super, it's a very interesting experience that you don't really often as a freshman or not as a freshman, I'm a sophomore, that is an undergrad. You don't usually get as an undergrad. So it's a very cool experience and there's a lot to learn from that both on the, of course, like the design side, because we are still, of course, designing everything and prototyping in lab. But then also from the more human interaction side that is really like what you see a lot of in industry, but sometimes you don't necessarily get to see too much of as an undergrad. So it's a super cool opportunity and there's a lot we can learn from it both as undergrad students developing our skills in mechanical engineering and of course other majors as well. Or and just as like as people just these person to person interactions. Yeah, that's all we can learn.

Teri 

Man, I am in awe of both of you. Like that is so cool. So you literally like have things launched into space that like you worked on, right?

Verena 

Yeah, it hasn't happened yet. Hopefully we will launch not too far from now. But yeah, it's...

Teri 

Yeah, that's what I'm saying is like you are a sophomore in college and these are the goals that you're working on. That is incredible. How does that feel to know that like that these are such big things that like are real problems that you are solving that you are working with real companies? You said NASA, like they're involved like the International Space Station is, you know, a goal I think people think about for like, you know, years down the line after you graduate and you have a career and you're sitting here as a sophomore participating in it. How does that feel?

Verena 

Honestly, really cool. It's such a crazy opportunity. I fly about this so many times where it's like, if you were to talking to younger me, I would be like, my gosh, like if I graduate, maybe someone will take me in space. Like maybe if I do all of these things, I get A's in all my classes and I do all this, maybe I'll be able to join us like some company that's working in something in space and maybe I'll have that opportunity. Like I honestly didn't know that CubeSats were a thing coming into college, but I think those are so advantageous in terms of allowing students to get their foot in space. CubeSats are essentially these satellites that are, they have these standardized dimensions. The smallest size is called a 1U. So that's 10 centimeters by 10 centimeters by 10 centimeters. So it's literally this square like this big. It's very tiny, but because it's so small, it allows you to decrease the cost of launching a lot. So if you're able to get, for example, a grant or an opportunity, like if you went to a NASA competition or something where they'll sponsor it, you pretty much just remove all your launch costs. And so now all you have to do is actually build this thing, which of course isn't crazy cheap, but it's nowhere close to as expensive as some of those, like the very larger satellites that you'll see NASA launching that are like hundreds of millions of dollars. So it's a really cool opportunity to like get to do these things. I didn't know about that. That CubeSats were like even a thing going into college. And yeah, like saw the Spaces and Designs Studio website when I was like trying to decide if I wanted to go to Cornell. And I'm like, that's kind of seems interesting, they're doing space stuff. Maybe I'll do that. 

Teri

Oh my gosh so cool

Verena

And yeah, like I didn't think I really understood the significance of what that lab is doing and the fact that like you can really be actively participating and like making active decisions on these things as an undergrad. It's a very cool opportunity. And yeah, honestly didn't see myself doing this when I was in the first semester of my last year of high school. It's not something I've thought I'd be doing.

Teri

Yeah

Verena

But it's definitely been really cool to be able to do that. And it's been actually very advantageous for applying for internships and stuff, which as a mechanical engineer, internships are very important to get one, ideally, if you can, before you graduate. Just because it helps you get a lot more real -world experience. You are working directly with the engineers and directly with some outside company or group. And having this experience and being, it's a very unique experience to be able to say that I am working on something that's going to space and I am having to have all these concerns and, well, will this thing break when it launches? Like the vibrations, the loads, like having to understand all of that and just, even if we're not necessarily doing it to the same scale that they are, it's like we're starting to develop some of that intuition and some of that basic understanding of what's important, what's not important is super relevant for the industry. And so it's been a really cool opportunity overall, yeah.

Teri 

Yeah, so Ashley is going to build the rocket or the device that's going to get it up there and you're going to build the satellite and you're going to put it together. I'm just kidding. But I mean, that's so cool. You guys both like are, you know, you're working at different things, but look how cool they go together, like the cohesiveness of it.

Ashley 

Yeah

Verena 

Yeah, it's actually very funny that you actually mentioned Ashley working on what's launching into space and what's on top. Because for the summer actually, Ashley is working at, like we're both working at SpaceX and Ashley's working on Falcon 9, which is the booster, and I'm working on Dragon, which is what goes on top of the rocket. So we're actually really working on two things that go together, which is really cool opportunity and honestly so unexpected, but super cool.

Teri 

That is so cool. I know you can't see me, but I like had my hands like on my head because I was just like, this is so neat. Total sidebar. I have two boys and we watch rocket launches all the time. And my older son is going to be so excited to hear that you guys are that I know somebody who's working on the dragon act. Like it's so cool. So cool. So SpaceX is a huge name. You guys are really out there with these companies, you know, between NASA and SpaceX. I think those are probably the two biggest names in this field. That's so cool. Congratulations. That's awesome.

Verena 

Thank you.

Ashley 

Thank you.

Teri 

Alright. I got to get back to my, my, after I'm geeking out over all the things that you guys are doing, and now I'm going to get back to my, my interview here. But, so I think this is a natural, pathway here, but what do you guys want to do with your major in the future?

Verena

Yeah, so for me, I think what I'm really interested in is I'm interested in unmanned and manned space exploration. So space is kind of like, you might have heard the phrase, it's like, it's the final frontier. It's the final big unknown. There's so much out there, so much we haven't seen yet, so much we haven't, like all we know about it is what we can see through looking through a telescope. And I feel like that there's so much potential to learn so much about the history of our solar system and the history of like Earth and what happened back then before we were ever there. And it's all around us. The thing is, it's just a couple million miles away. So there's a lot of interesting challenges when it comes to actually getting there and actually being able to learn things about what's out there. And I feel like that's a super interesting field that is constantly growing because there's always more space to be explored. And the question is, how do we get there faster? How do we get there within our lifetime? If we wanted to get, for example, to our closest star system, it would take hundreds if not thousands of years to get there just because of how spread apart everything is in space. There's just so much out there and honestly I think there's that kind of challenge of like, well no one's done it before, well let's do it. 

Teri

Yeah!

Verena

I feel like that challenge is just so intriguing to me and so exciting to be able to say I participated in that. Right now my current plan is to really be able to get involved in unmanned and potentially manned space exploration.

Teri 

Very cool. How about you, Ashley?

Ashley

Yeah, so I think Verena covered the fields pretty well. And I think I'm interested in a very similar thing. And it's really just the design and testing of any air or spacecraft that bring people either around the world, so on this world, and also off the world that sends satellites and rovers into space. And just working on any future international space stations, like a new space station, that's like a new idea, that's something that can be done. And working on future lunar or Martian bases for to to send the first humans to live for a prolonged period of time on another body in another celestial body, like those kinds of things I think interest me well. But yeah, Verena covered it so well.

Teri 

Awesome. Well, I have zero doubt that you'll have any issue getting to these goals. I think you guys are just awesome. Every time I do these interviews, and I said this in the last episode too, that I'm so lucky and privileged that I get to interview students and see what they're interested in and see what they're experiencing. And just like your future is so bright and just, I am so happy that we have all of these amazing engineering minds in the world that you're able to take on these problems, that we're lucky to have you guys doing these experiences. I think it's just so cool. And even when you do have these great, awesome experiences, you are going to have days that are going to be a bit more difficult, that you're going to be stressed out, that things are going to be hard. So in those days, who is your support? Who is the person that you...go to to say like, Hey, I need some I need I need a pep talk here.

Ashley 

Yeah, so I guess one of the great things is there's so many people here around me that I found on my project team who are so supportive. But I think like for as long as I can remember, my greatest support has been my parents. And I'm sure Verena thinks a very similar mindset on this. It's, I'll just say it's very interesting being on a different coast than my parents, because they're obviously in California and we're in New York. So, but I think the...

Teri 

Yeah.

Ashley 

kind of amazing thing that I've seen from them is that even with the time difference, even with the three hour difference of like, I'm calling them during my lunch, but for them it's 9 AM Like, they're always willing to answer and call and just hear me out and let me rant about something that annoyed me, or that I'm excited about. And it's just, it's such an amazing experience. And watching like even with my mom, my mom moved here from Egypt when she was in high school and she, there was a lot of things that she struggled with and whether it was like learning this new language or even for her, like pursuing engineering, like engineering in the Middle East for women especially isn't something that isn't really done. And so like, just like seeing her experiences and seeing how much she like pushed to be a part of this engineering world and seeing how she made it possible has just been so inspiring. And also with my dad too, like he's always been, so supportive and so encouraging us, and pushing us to take risks and just reach for the stars and yeah, why not try it? That might be hard and… you got that. I don't know, seeing both of my parents do what they do and having them as my support and as my inspiration I think has been so helpful and just seeing that yeah, it might be difficult and yeah, there might be roadblocks but that shouldn't stop you. That should just encourage you to push harder, encourage you to really reach for the stars, you know?

Teri 

The literal stars, you guys are the literal stars reaching for.

Ashley 

Yeah.

Verena 

Yeah, and just to add on to that, I think growing up a lot, our parents very much always encouraged us whenever we're like, I can't do this, I can't figure this out. And we're like, hey, can you help us? They're like, what have you tried? Have you really tried how to solve this? And so it's encouraging us to not just take the easy way out, which you know, as a kid, you just want the easy way out more often than not. I think that really helped us growing up to have that persistence and that determination to continue working on something when it doesn't go too well. And having them teach us that growing up. I think it's really butted into now and then honestly, where we are now, it's like we come to them with challenges and problems and they're not just like, I'm so sorry, that sucks. They're like, okay, well, let's figure out how to solve this. Have you tried this? Have you tried this? And they'll be willing to talk. They have the longest days. Of course, they're both working as civil engineers right now. They have the longest days too and the fact that they're still willing to sit down and talk with us for sometimes even more than an hour after their long days has been honestly such a great support. Having them there has been really amazing, even though, yeah, like Ashley mentioned, they are on a different coast. They've been so supportive of us this entire time.

Ashley 

Yeah.

Teri 

Wow, that's really awesome. I think you guys, I mean, they sound like amazing parents, amazing people. I love how you spoke about your mom coming here and maybe not always having an experience where women are welcome in engineering and yet she faced that and is now an engineer herself. I think that's beautiful. I think that's amazing that you are walking in those footprints. You know, you maybe went in a different direction, but her to be able to forge that pathway and then for your dad to support it, for your dad to say like, Hey, like this is an option. This is awesome and you know, going through those problem solving skills and not just taking the easy way out. They sound like awesome people. And I think they made two incredibly awesome kids. Like that's just, that's great. I love that. So speaking about that, can you, can you talk to me about what your experience has been, as a woman in engineering?

Verena 

Yeah, so I think maybe pre Cornell, it wasn't, there wasn't too much going on mainly because I wasn't really an engineer at that point. Our high school didn't have too much in the engineering sense in terms of what things to do. But I think at Cornell, honestly, it's been very not stereotypical. I think the stereotype going around is that it's always like one or two women in a class of 100 men. And it's like, you always...

Teri 

Yeah.

Verena

hear about that stereotype and I think at Cornell that really doesn't exist. Maybe some classes are a little bit more heavily imbalanced to men over women, but I think they really strive to make sure that it's very balanced and you'll see the same thing on a lot of project teams where it's pretty evenly split between men and women from different backgrounds and you really have a lot of that diversity and it's very nice honestly to be so comfortable, to have so many people just from different backgrounds and of course having women is of course great and having that it's...

It's been very nice how much Cornell it does to make sure that there's as much of a balance as it can get between the two genders, between women and other people.

Ashley

I also think that they're like kind of to add on to what Verena was saying is that you're like, you're never alone as a woman in the room, especially at Cornell. You're never the only woman in engineering and you're never the only woman in this project team or in this class or acting as a lead on this project or any of that. Like I think like on my project team, we do our like admissions, gender or gender neutral. We don't actually like when we're discussing candidates, we discuss them as theys and we always get a split 50 50. And it's just like, I think it's a really amazing thing to be able to work in an environment where you don't see yourself as alone. You see yourself among people who are like you and you can… feel confident in speaking your mind and feeling like your opinions and thoughts are valued, both as a female and as a man. And it's just like, it's a really supportive environment. And even like for people who feel unsure or unconfident about their place in the industry, like we had, there's a club here that Verena and I are both a part of and are both like leadership on. It's called WOAA, which is the Woman of Aeronautics and Astronautics Club. And we basically just do events with other, either Cornell alum who are in the industry or just various speakers like, and just get their thoughts and advice and experience about being a woman in engineering, especially like times are getting better, but it's still not perfect for the split, especially in industry. Like all Cornell does a pretty good job of splitting it. And so just getting their experiences about standing up for yourself and really setting your foot down and getting your foot in the door as a woman in engineering and making yourself stand out has been really valuable through this club and just through Cornell overall.

Teri 

Yeah and I hope that those ripples continue to go through as you guys have more experience at these companies like SpaceX and you know, you are able to make that change in that wave. You know, we start maybe at your college, but that continues to go through the whole industry and mechanical engineering. This has been awesome. I have loved talking with the two of you. I've just learned so much. I've really enjoyed your stories and hearing your voice. So my last question is always the same. Tell me about your view of engineering and why girls specifically should explore mechanical engineering.

Verena 

I think that engineering is the field that works on designing everything around you, whether that be something from like vaccines or to like planes and cars, like we've been talking about to your buildings and houses and skyscrapers. I think engineering is just the design of everything that like majority of it isn't like natural in this world. So all these man made things like that help society and help people and help everyone around us. Like these things don't, not all of them exist in nature. And it's honestly like we're helping society through the work we're doing as engineers, regardless of what major you are. And for mechanical engineering specifically, I think that amongst all the different fields of engineering, I think mechanical engineering is one of those that is a little bit still more like male dominated, it isn't female dominated. I think there are some stereotypes when it comes to mechanical engineering and people who are mechanical and they're like, cars mechanics, like, that's a guy thing. 

Teri

Yeah

Verena

And I think there still is a little bit of the imbalance. And I think that it's like, of course, the more diversity we have, the more interesting perspectives we can bring to the team and to the projects. And that means better solutions and better ideas for things we can do that we haven't even thought of. And so I think it's so much more important that we just keep on encouraging and bringing in more women to pursue these different fields. And I think that if you're listening to this and you're a girl that you should definitely pursue mechanical engineering. It's a very interesting field and there's a lot you can do with it. Whether that be you want to work on cars and planes, or if you want to work as a biomedical engineer, you can do that.  Mechanical engineering is one of the broadest disciplines and you can really do almost anything with it. So if that's something you're interested in is trying out a bunch of different things, mechanical engineering really is the field that you can try it like a lot of different things and at like within one within one degree.

Ashley

Yeah, and I think, honestly, mechanical engineering is just this amazing opportunity to turn the craziest ideas and the craziest thoughts into reality. Kind of like what Verena was saying, like everything you see around you, like a few thousand years ago, it was just rocks. And someone had to think of this crazy idea to make a building or to make a plane or to make a car or to make anything that you see around you. And those are engineers and a great majority of the mechanical engineers, people who made these mechanisms and these physical structures and kind of all these innovative ideas you see around them, that comes from engineering. And so I think like regardless if you're like a female or male or someone, if you find engineering interesting if you find that you want to you have this crazy idea you want to pursue you want to make something new you want to change the world as you see it like I think in mechanical engineering is something you should try to pursue and i and if you think and if if you're a female listening and you're scared of just this idea or this daunting idea of being the only one like you or just being like like a small minority or feeling ignored or or just seeing this dauntless task ahead of you just, just know there are people out there who are just like you. There's Verena and I. There's so many people who are out there and will support you along the way. And really, don't be afraid of this industry. I think if anything, the world is getting better every single day as we know it in this split of having females and males equally represented in this industry. And so if it's something that you find interesting, if you find working with mechanical things interesting, pursue it.

Teri 

Awesome. You guys said that so wonderfully. I loved, Verena, how you said that it's not just cars or space, that it can be, you know, biomedical. Like you take, you take the mechanical, engineering practices and you apply it to fields that need problem solving, environmental engineering, chemical engineering, you know, all of these things that you can take these, these practices and put it in and mechanical engineering is so widely needed. It's universally used in engineering. So that was a great point to make. I think you guys did a great job explaining your experiences, but also why mechanical engineering is such an awesome field to get into. So thank you so much. I really appreciate both of you coming on.

Verena 

Of course, thank you for your time and for talking with us. This has been great.

Ashley 

Yeah, thank you so much. This was a great experience. And I hope some people out there got some awesome insight into Cornell and just like mechanical engineering. So.

Teri 

I think they did. I think they absolutely did. Thank you guys.

Admissions Segment

Teri

Hey Scott, how are you doing?

Scott 

I'm good, Teri, how are you today?

Teri 

I'm doing really well, thanks. I was really excited to hear from our mechanical engineering students. I think they're doing incredible work and I think their future is pretty bright. So I was excited to hear their conversation.

Scott 

Yeah, mechanical engineering is one of our, well, it's our largest major and it's one of our most, I guess, ubiquitous majors. There's just so many different directions you can go in mechanical engineering and the students are wonderful in that department.

Teri 

Yeah, absolutely. All right, so our question today, we're going to have a little bit of fun with our question today. And I'm just curious about what your favorite Cornell tradition is.

Scott 

Oh traditions. Cornell is full of traditions, honestly. They're all over. There's two that really stand out in my mind, though. When people usually ask about traditions at Cornell, the one that jumps immediately to mind for most people is Dragon Day, which is over 100 years old. And it's where the architects will build a very large dragon out of all kinds of different materials in the spring, right before spring break usually, and then they march it across campus to the engineering quad, and it's sort of a friendly competition between the engineers and the architects. And it's been going on for 100 years. It's a lot of fun. It's like some cross between Halloween, Mardi Gras, and just a big party that involves the entire campus. So it's pretty cool. That's actually not the one I would focus on though. The one that I like the most, honestly, is… the students, when they first arrive at Cornell's first year, students always learn the alma mater very quickly. And at any major public event, it usually ends with the students singing the alma mater. And it's just one of those really interesting, really nice traditions. It's sort of unifying. It's this moment in time where all the students come together. And oftentimes, if they're faculty and staff, there too they'll join in, but if you see a major event at Cornell, it usually wraps up with the alma mater. And I go to the hockey games in the winter and the students will sing the alma mater at that. And it's kind of stirring to see that. And then at graduation, when they finally conclude their undergraduate time at Cornell, they'll sing the alma mater as sort of a closing statement. And it's actually quite moving to see the entire class singing the alma mater all together. So for me, you know, Cornell's got a whole grouping of different traditions that are pretty neat, but, the alma mater is, is the one that I always enjoy the most, I think. I think it's the most moving out of all of them.

Teri 

Yeah, that's a really beautiful community moment, right? It's so special to be a part of the Cornell community and to be able to all come together and have that in common. And you have four years, five years, however long you're here, that's such a special moment in time for you. And I like that they do that at the graduation, too. It's like the one last time that you can come together in that special period of your life.

Scott 

Yeah, I think so. You see, you know, when we're in the Schoellkopf Stadium and the students are, you know, going through that final motion of commencement and you get 3,500 students singing the alma mater in unison and they'll have their arms wrapped around each other and they sway back and forth. It's, I dare you to not tear up when that happens. It's a really kind of moving moment as a community, as you say.

Teri 

Yeah. Yeah, I like when the chimes play it as well. That's always really nice. It's such a like a hauntingly really beautiful version of it. And when you hear it on like a really nice day and you're walking through campus and then you know, you hear it as well through the chimes. It's really beautiful.

Scott 

Yeah, that's a great point. I hadn't thought of that, but yeah, the McGraw Tower is just up from the engineering quad and you can hear it all over the engineering quad when they play the alma mater on the chimes. It is, it's wonderful. You're right. Good point. Love that.

Teri 

All right, so what kind of advice do you have for us today?

Scott 

Very sort of quick advice, but maybe some of the most important advice that we can give. And so learning about colleges and universities is, it takes a lot of work. It's a pretty active endeavor. You know, in the old days, there was like the Barron's Guide to Colleges and the Princeton Review, and those were sort of the go-to sources of information for any college or university. But now we have, you know, with the internet and social media, there's just all kinds of sources of information out there. And many of them are not all that accurate or the quality is not as good as it might be. So I was going to point folks to different sources of information that I think are actually quite good and will give sort of data -based information about institutions and also what I think is really good, accurate information about institutions, so nothing against Reddit or College Confidential, but I don't look at them as very wonderful sources of information about colleges or universities. So let's walk through four that I think are particularly good. Most colleges and universities have what's called an institutional research and planning division embedded within it, and it's basically anything that has to do with data around the institution, and they'll have all sorts of information about enrollment figures and statistics. And those are incredibly accurate, and they're also updated very regularly, multiple times a year usually. And so if you're looking for individual institutional data that will give you all kinds of good gold mine kind of information, look for institutional research and planning units. They're usually called something very similar to that or that directly, so they're not that difficult to find. I also, this will maybe surprise people a little bit, but I also think US News and World Report does a pretty good job of accumulating and disseminating information about different universities. They classify them across a different set of categories that make it sort of easy to understand them. And they also provide a whole bunch of really good data about various universities and colleges. The rankings aside, and I know that's controversial and all that, but US News does a pretty good job of putting good data out there that's useful. One other one, I'll give you two more. One is, this will sound odd, but the Bureau of Labor Statistics has a section, it's a federal organization, and it has a section called the Occupational Outlook Handbook, and it's less about colleges and universities, but more about different professions and what projections are for those professions across time, and it's an excellent way to learn about all the different professions that are out there, and then you can go backwards from there and sort of reverse engineer the information to try and learn about different majors and disciplines within colleges and universities. So what leads to X profession? Well, it's maybe a major set of majors here. But the information is excellent. And it's called the Occupational Outlook Handbook. And it's just a really good source of information. And then the final one for engineering specifically, there's the American Society of Engineering Education, and they poll all the undergraduate engineering institutions across the country annually, both two year and four year, and also PhD granting and non -PhD granting, and they collect a whole group of data about these various institutions, and they make that publicly available. There's Engineering By The Numbers, which is one of their publications, and they also have a number, publication that's more topical about engineering called Prism Magazine. But they have really, really good information that's current and up -to -date annually. We submit for Cornell Engineering. We submit a whole bag of data each year. They request it usually in the spring. We submit it over the summer, and then they make it publicly available in the late summer, early fall. And that's just really good information. It's good sort of statistical data -driven types of information that will help. Students find sort of a taxonomy of different schools and what their populations are like and what they offer academically. And it's accurate and it's up to date. So those are four really sort of, I think, good boilerplate sources of information, institutional research and planning, U.S. News and World Report information, the Occupational Outlook Handbook, and then the American Society of Engineering Education and some of the publications that they produce.

Teri

That's a great range too, being able to look at all of those and compare between them to see what you're looking at. Might I add that also we are always happy to answer questions and to ask us to send us emails, to go online and look at our websites. We're always happy to answer any questions that you may have as well.

Scott 

Yeah, that's absolutely true. There's nothing like going to the source. As we talked about in earlier issues of the podcast, we're decentralized at Cornell. So for our unit, the engineering admissions office, we're embedded directly in the College of Engineering. So we were actually experts in a lot of different things that are very specific to Cornell engineering. So if students have, or if their families or counselors have questions, we're available. We can help navigate things and provide good accurate responses so people can make really good informed decisions and at the end of the day is what it's about.

Teri 

Yeah, that's our job. We're here to help. All right, thank you. Yeah, exactly. Thank you so much, Scott. So we have come to an end of another episode of VIEW. I want to sincerely thank our amazing students Verena and Ashley. Thank you, Scott, for always answering our questions about admissions. And finally, thank all of you for listening. I hope you learned something today. And maybe it was that you're an engineer.

Closing:

Teri

VIEW, Voices of Incredible Engineering Women Is a podcast produced and written by the Cornell Engineering Admissions Office. Please remember to like, follow, subscribe and share our podcast and help us bring engineering to the ears of young women everywhere. To find out more information about Cornell engineering please visit our website visit.engineering.cornell.edu.