Undercooled: A Materials Education Podcast

[MUSIC]

Hello and welcome to

another episode of Undercooled.

Today, we're going to hear from some,

one of our material

science undergraduates,

and I am really

excited about this episode.

So, Tim, why don't you introduce Alexa?

Sure. It's so good to have a

student on the show instead of

just old people sitting

around and having opinions.

So, this is Alexa.

I will ask her to talk a

little bit about herself,

but the first thing

I'll spoil is that she is

the president of our

student society and materials,

the Michigan Material Society.

So, I've done a lot of work with her in

that role over the last couple of years,

just getting our students

being part of a community.

So, we're here to get all her secrets

about how to make that happen.

Yeah, Alexa, welcome to the show.

Hi. Happy to be here.

I have a student perspective.

Yeah. Well, let's start just by

hearing a little bit about you.

Tell us about yourself.

Why did you become an MSE major?

Where did you come

from? Why are you here?

Yeah. So, I think my

journey into MSE was not

the typical journey, so to speak.

I actually started out in the College of

Literature, Science, and the Arts.

I transferred into the

School of Engineering

after my freshman year of college.

I went to high school

in Denver, Colorado.

I'm originally from there.

In high school, I

always knew I liked math,

I liked science,

particularly chemistry and physics,

were my favorite types of science.

I know I didn't want to do something like

bio or psychology, but I also was really

interested in doing things with people.

So, something like

law or policy was really

interesting to me because I really

liked doing a research style reading.

I liked reading a lot of things and then

making analysis on

those readings and talking

about my findings in that way.

And so, when I first

came to college, I was like,

okay, I'm probably going

to try to do this law thing.

But I didn't know

exactly what I wanted to do.

So, I was like, okay, maybe econ is a

math type law thing.

So, I was taking calculus and chemistry,

as well as some LSA

classes, and in conjunction

with that, as well as with COVID and

everything happening

my freshman year, I

realized that I didn't actually

want to take the law and

policy classes that I was taking.

I took Orgo, it was actually

one of my favorite classes.

And I thought math and doing

that type of problem solving

was really something that I was good at.

And so, I decided to transfer into the

School of Engineering.

I don't know, engineering

was never really something

that I had considered.

I just kind of fell into place.

I originally thought I wanted to do

chemical engineering.

So, when I transferred, I started in

chemical engineering.

- Of course.

- I feel like that's a

pretty typical sentiment

from the material

scientists, because I was like,

I like Orgo, I like chemistry,

this is probably what

I'm going to like doing.

So, my first semester in

the College of Engineering,

I took engineering 101

and then Mat Sci 220.

And I remember thinking

that my professor wasn't great.

We didn't really click.

- We won't name names.

- No, but then I was like,

I actually really

liked what I'm learning.

And so, because I

don't like the professor,

but I'm actually still so

interested in what I'm learning,

like I think this is

what I want to study.

So, it was like a good giveaway.

And I just didn't end up even taking

any chemical engineering classes.

And so, yeah, I just

ended up in material science.

It was like end of my sophomore year

when I had like fully declared.

And yeah, so it was kind

of a last minute decision,

but I'm happy to be here.

- And you've been one of us ever since.

- Yeah.

- So, glad to have you on the team.

Yeah, you know, that's something we hear,

I think quite a lot from students is,

I liked chemistry in high school.

So, I became a chemical engineer,

and then I found out I

wasn't doing chemistry

in chemical engineering.

And so, some of them find their way here.

- Chemical.

(indistinct)

- So, as I spoiled earlier,

one of your many roles in the department

is being the MMS president.

And can you also give the audience

a little bit of

background on what student life

is like here in MSE for that matter,

but particularly in MMS,

what students in MMS are doing right now

and how that connects

into plans that you have

for what the organization might do next.

- Yeah, so I think

particularly the material science

and engineering department at the

University of Michigan

is super tight knit.

I think MMS is a big part of that.

We obviously have a really small major

and everybody kind of

gets to know everyone,

especially junior year

when people are taking

thermodynamics, kinetics,

and then the two lab classes,

everyone's taking them

all at the same time.

And so, MMS is kind of like

the social pairing to that.

We do a lot of different social events

and then as well as weekly luncheons

so people can kind of

take their classroom learning

and hear from industry speakers,

kind of as an idea of like,

okay, I'm getting this MSE degree,

like what the heck do I do

with it after I graduate?

It's a really good

perspective for students.

So I would say that

generally is what MMS is there for

and kind of the reason

that I chose to get involved

is when I joined MSE my sophomore year,

I really was deciding

that I wanted to fully commit

to this new community

that I was a part of

and I thought if I ran

for a board position,

that would be a really

good way to get involved.

My junior year I was

the outreach chair of MMS

and then I ended up

becoming president this year,

my senior year.

And so after joining MMS,

seeing like the way that it run

and understanding kind of the role

that it has in students' lives,

again, being like a social outlet

so people can know each other,

not just in a classroom setting,

but also in a social setting

and then also like being

kind of one of the key ways

to connect classroom

learning to real life.

I decided to like take those things

and I was like, okay,

how can we create things?

How can we create

different offerings to students

that are going to enhance the reasons

that a student might wanna join MMS?

- That's great and I really,

I tried as much as I

can to go to MMS lunch

and I really enjoy it,

but I'm very impressed with the speakers

that you've been bringing in this year.

You bring in many people from industry,

most of them are usually alums

and sometimes you even bring alums

who aren't gonna hire people

but just have really interesting stories.

So maybe you can talk

about some of the people

that you've brought in

that you're kind of the most proud of.

- Yeah, I'm definitely very proud

of a lot of the speakers we've had.

It's hard because

there's just been so many.

Yeah, we've brought in several alums.

Recently we had Rossalyn Quaye

and she has had like such a cool career.

She does law and policy

in the utility industry

after completing dance schooling.

So that is so cool and

just such a unique path

that I thought students

could really learn from

because we've had a lot of industry

speakers in as well.

So we've had General

Motors and General Electric.

- And General Mills,

just to finish out the general trilogy.

- General Mills, General

Mills, my 482 project sponsor.

- Nice.

- Yeah.

- And you have a tape

company coming in tomorrow.

- We do.

So I thought that would

be kind of interesting

for people to get more

in the consumer goods

because we haven't done a lot of that.

We have NASA coming this semester.

They haven't come in like years.

So that's really exciting.

People are really excited for that.

And Apple also is coming.

Nike.

We do try to like hit the big name brands

and then like obviously

some smaller things too.

We had like a couple

of like heat treatment

or we've got Medtronic coming in.

So like kind of the

medical devices as well.

Yeah, just all sorts of things.

We also had like our department chair,

Professor Holm, she came

in and like gave a talk

about counterfeit money.

And so that was really cool

because she's brand new to the department

and we wanted to give her an opportunity

to like speak to the student body.

And so that was a cool luncheon as well.

- Yeah, a lot of students get internships

just by going to MMS

lunch and staying after

and talking to the people.

So I think it's like

every week is another job fair

and material science.

And it's all because of the

hard work that you've done

and the rest of your team.

And so, as a faculty

member, as the advisor,

I am very, very

grateful that our students

are getting more and

more opportunities for,

you know, summer internships

beyond just our regular job fairs.

But we also have our own MSE job fair

that I think you guys run as well.

Is that right?

- So the MSE career fair

is run by MMS students,

but it's not particularly

like a board opportunity.

This past year, Haley Whelan

and Sabrina both planned it.

- Yeah.

So there's so much great

stuff that we get to enjoy

on the receiving side of MMS.

Here's these speakers,

here's these lunches,

here's these professional

development opportunities.

But on the inside, I'm

sure you've had to do

some heavy lifting to make this happen.

So, you know, without getting

too into the weeds, I guess,

were there any particular challenges

that you've

experienced as a student leader

in this sort of setting?

Because I'm sure anyone out there

who's tried to

organize more than two people

has found out that

that's not always easy.

So what are some of those situations

that have come up in MMS

and how did you handle those?

- Well, I think that the

first thing that I realized was

I really need to trust my board.

My initial thought process

about running a board was like,

oh, I wanna be really chill

and I want it to be low activation energy

to do the work.

And then I realized that's actually

not what I want at all.

Like this is a community

that I really care about.

And so the first week

that I was president,

I had each person write

a one page document to me

saying all of the goals

that they wanna accomplish

the year, things that they need from me,

what they think their idea of

success is within their role

and specifically what they

want MMS to work towards,

like what they think that

our goals should be towards.

And then from there, I

really give them autonomy

because they know what their goals are,

they know what they wanna accomplish.

And then it just really

lets me like trust my board.

Like it's consistent.

Like I know the weekly

email will go out every week.

Like I know Laura is

doing like outreach stuff.

I know like someone's

gonna be at the open house.

I know that things are

gonna get taken care of.

And so that could only

ever happen by having a board

that I trust, that I

let feel like they have

the opportunity to make a difference

in the way they wanna make a difference.

And also that by extension,

like they can bring things up to me.

I'll take it, I'll listen to it,

I'll kind of adjust what I'm doing

based on feedback that they have.

And so that initially definitely helped

when it came to coming across issues.

But of course, like as a board,

there's also been a lot of issue,

like just things come up

in general, it always will

if you're trying to run a student org.

So like for example, we tried to plan

like a pretty big DEI event

and there was like a lot of issues

with the room reservations.

We got a bunch of speakers first semester

and the room didn't

work and following up,

we couldn't figure out how to exactly

target who we wanted.

We wanted like

freshmen engineering students,

but we didn't have like high signup.

And so we had to move it

virtual like two days before.

And that just was really frustrating

because it just didn't quite

turn out the way I wanted to.

But it was something where like,

when I just really

was stuck and I was like

still marketing it and

still like trying my best.

Like it was like my

board members who were like,

okay, like let me give a suggestion,

let's do it virtual.

Let's do this.

We can move to make

an in-person experience

like next semester or next year.

Like I think just having

those people to rely on

is really helpful because it's like,

they know how much I care about things.

They know I would never

ask them to do something

that I wouldn't do myself.

And so like that also kind

of builds trust there too.

- Yeah, it sounds

like the internal dynamic

is really productive, really good.

Everyone having a role,

everyone having ways to contribute.

Is MMS doing anything externally

with other student societies?

Is there any like collaboration there

that gives you opportunities

to reach a broader audience?

- So we've had a couple of social events

with some of the other

student orgs on campus.

We had a volleyball

tournament for semester

with three other student orgs

that are kind of like the MMS equivalent

for some of the other departments.

We participate in the

SWE engineering games.

So that was kind of a way to meet a lot

of other student orgs

and participate in their event.

And then additionally,

there's been a lot of

stuff behind the scenes.

So we've reached out to

student orgs like BME and SWE,

and we've talked to

them about doing things,

but it's just kind of like

building those relationships

and then we'll just see

what kind of comes from it.

- Very good.

- Yeah, so you also are

planning trips to industry.

You also have

incredible social gatherings

like your bar crawls,

and you also go to

some national conferences.

Can you talk about some of those things?

- Yes, absolutely.

So we're doing a trip to the

Cleveland Cliffs Steel Mill

in March in Dearborn,

and we're getting funding through AIST,

which is one of the

national organizations.

And that's really exciting

because I actually got to

pair with one of our faculty,

Professor Marquis,

and she's making it a

requirement for her class.

So we're gonna have

really good attendance.

- 470?

- Yes. - Good.

- But I've also, before I planned it,

I really was like,

"I don't wanna plan this if

people don't wanna do it."

So I asked my board members,

I was like, "Would you guys go to this?"

I pulled some of the juniors.

I was like, "Is this

something that people

"would actually go to?"

And I got a lot of

feedback that they would.

And so we're working on transportation

and food for that now.

So that's kind of exciting.

And then kind of in terms

of some of the other things

you mentioned, our social events,

we had a food progressive Thursday night,

a couple of weeks ago,

and actually the

following luncheon the next day

was the highest

attendance luncheon we'd ever had.

- Great.

- So we were all out super late

at the food progressive together,

and then we all were there

the next day at the luncheon.

- Managed to wake up by

noon and show up for lunch.

- Yeah, I think something about like,

you being like, "Oh my gosh, everyone,

"thanks for coming, welcome to my house.

"Such a fun time

getting to know everyone,

"and I will see you all tomorrow."

And it worked.

So that was pretty good.

And then, yeah, like social events,

the industry tour is different.

Something also new that we did this year

was the MSC undergraduate orientation.

So we did that in fall and winter

where all of the new

declares from the past semester

got together, we gave them food,

talked to them a little bit about MSC,

the insider perspective, so to speak.

These are the electives you could take,

like these are the

classes you could consider.

This is what you might

wanna consider for your career.

Prospects, we got

feedback first semester,

directly implemented it into the second

semester orientation.

And it's been a good way,

like the sophomores have been

coming more to the luncheon.

They've been

interacting more with the juniors,

who have been

interacting more with the seniors.

I've seen a lot more

interaction between the classes,

and then I've had more

attendance at the luncheon

by extension from

those two groups as well.

- That's fantastic.

I do have to ask off script here,

but as part of the food prog,

were people required to apply

the structure

processing properties paradigm

to their culinary creations?

- Not a requirement,

but highly encouraged.

- Okay, well, we'll

work on that for next year.

- On the other hand,

I think that one of their next events,

you have to come dressed

as your favorite element.

- Yes, the bar crawl coming up,

dressed as your favorite element,

wigs are encouraged.

- I'll have to figure out what a

molybdenum wig looks like.

All right, yeah, of course.

- So what about actually going to

national conferences?

Because I know we've been

able to send a lot of people.

I even saw you at MS&T.

- I was able to attend MS&T.

I was able to present my research.

Actually, the coolest part about MS&T

is I went to the chapter officer workshop

and I got contacts for the

other material advantage chapters.

We haven't really touched on this,

but MMS is also a

material advantage chapter.

So I'm technically the chair

for Michigan Material Advantage.

But I got to meet

people from other schools

and figure out what they'd been doing.

And we got to talk to them about

things we had been working on,

the way that they get funding,

the events that they put on.

And so that was really cool.

Plus the ability to present research.

And yeah, MMS has funding to do that.

And we're also sending one

student to TMS in Orlando.

I believe it's Orlando.

- Orlando.

- Yeah, this semester.

So yeah, we really have, I'm so grateful.

Like we have the connections

that we do in the department

and with again, the

different societies, ASM, TMS,

all of them.

So yeah, that allows us to get funding.

And then on top of that, you know, COE,

the like SOFC, which is the student

funding through COE.

But yeah.

- And I think a lot of

our alums also contribute

to be able to send

students to conferences.

- It's a super great opportunity.

I think conferences, like obviously

they're kind of coming

back new off of COVID.

So I would say like the

attendance at the conference

aren't as high.

Like I remember going

to MS&T and like,

there were some schools that

brought like 20 plus students.

- Wow.

- Yeah, it's crazy.

- So this is actually a

perfect segue to my next question.

As your, as students are

going to these conferences,

meeting more people in

MSE from other schools

and in professional societies,

you start to get a sense

of what is special about MSE

as a field, as a community.

And I'm wondering if there's anything

on the student organization

side that you think is special

about MMS as a group of MSE

students that makes it different

in some way from maybe more generic

or more broadly reaching student orgs.

- So are you talking

about MMS in comparison

to other material science student orgs

or just student orgs in general?

- Just in general, like

you've mentioned working with SWE,

for example, and they

have this huge umbrella,

for all engineers essentially,

whereas MMS I think is a lot more focused

in who it's trying to reach.

And so I'm curious if you

think there's something different

in that experience of having a more

like narrow audience in a way.

- I feel like we have

a stronger community.

I think SWE, like the way

that they get a lot of attendance

is they have to

incentivize people with points

and with kind of flashy things.

Whereas like a lot of the

MSC people I've talked to,

they're like, I'll be there.

Like it doesn't need to be,

like obviously we offer

food, we offer like things,

but people will just be there

because their friends will be there

because their community will be there.

And I think particularly

our student organization

is really good at

being like, I don't know,

building each other up.

We're not competitive with each other.

We're all super, super

helpful to each other.

Like Steve was talking

about the luncheons are,

you can literally find an internship,

going to the conferences,

there are so many talks

by different professors.

If you were looking for a

PhD person to be your PI,

if you were to pursue a PhD,

there's just that culture of support

and that culture of like,

we're all taking the same classes,

we're all in this together.

We're not competing for jobs.

You can do anything with an MSE degree.

There's no competition.

There's no, we are

competing for a grade or for a job.

We're all just trying to help each other.

And people, I guess,

showing up to the MMS events

is like kind of a way to do that.

And so I think that's

a super unique thing

about our department that, yeah,

is not the same as other student orgs

at our school or other schools.

- That's really great to hear from the

student perspective.

It's something that I want

to believe that I'm seeing

from the faculty

perspective, but I want to see it.

So is it real?

It's really great to

hear students feel like

they're having that experience

of we're building each other up together.

- That's certainly one of

my priorities when I teach

is how to be as inclusive as possible.

And the best way to

be inclusive is to work

with the students so

they help each other.

How can you get even

more inclusive than that?

So it is awesome that all

of our faculty are also,

have all bought into this idea.

We don't grade on curves.

We want everybody to get

an A if they possibly can.

And so there shouldn't be any competition

and it is really

wonderful to hear from you

that you don't feel

like there's competition

because there should not be

competition in our program.

This is all about helping everybody

be the most they possibly can.

- Absolutely.

- Definitely not.

It's so collaborative.

Honestly, like MSE is like

Michigan's best kept secret.

Like people are so, so

collaborative and so helpful

and so friendly.

The community is just,

that is the best part about this

department for sure.

- All right.

Well, hopefully we blow

the lid off that secret

and get some more faces around here.

As we move into the

second half of the show,

I want to switch gears a little bit.

Now that you are a

person with experience,

almost done with school, congratulations.

You probably have some perspective

on the last couple of

years and what you've learned,

but also I think there's

some really good advice

that you could have to

offer different people

in the audience just based on the

experiences you've had.

So first, we'll go straight

to the most spicy question.

Faculty are not always

necessarily entirely aware

of what student life and student

perspective is like.

So if you could choose just

one message to get across,

what's that one?

I wish faculty knew that

this aspect of student life

is what it's like so that

we can understand better

what you're experiencing

and where you're coming from.

- I do think the biggest

thing is I wish faculty

kept the student

perspective in mind when,

designing curriculum, assigning homework.

Students want things that

will encourage them to learn.

They want to feel like,

you have to remember

the reason they signed up

for the class in the first place

because they thought that

this topic was interesting

and they probably want

to hear about the topic

in the context of

what they can do with it

after they graduate.

And they want to learn about the topic

in the context of a

really cool research paper

or a really cool way you can apply it.

That's maybe not something

you would think of initially.

And then that goes the same

with homework and assignments.

It's like everything

should have a purpose.

I think that's like the biggest thing.

Like every group assignment, every like

homework assignment,

like the goal should be,

I want them to learn

this concept from this.

I want them to

understand like this aspect

of group work from this.

And I think like when you

have a purpose like that

to like what you're

doing, what you're teaching,

it's a lot easier to

get the students excited

about what you're teaching them

and what you're assigning them to do

because they can see beyond

the grade, beyond the class.

- That's wonderful.

Takes me back to good old days

of some of our physics problems of,

now we're going to

solve the hydrogen atom.

Why?

Because it can be done.

And because I solved the hydrogen atom,

so now you're going to

solve the hydrogen atom.

- Yes, but you're glad

that they had you do that

instead of the helium atom

because that's very,

very much harder to do.

- Yeah, that's a story for another day.

- Yes.

- On the other side of

the experience continuum,

what would you say to like

a freshman or a sophomore?

You know, someone

who's closer to the start

of the college journey and

it's the classic sort of,

if you could talk to freshman you, right?

What do you wish she had known

that you could pass on to someone

who's just getting started?

- I think that freshman year,

the most important thing is

to take care of yourself first.

Make sure that you're

making time to do things

that will keep you in check.

Save time to study and to do your laundry

and to make friends and

don't overwhelm yourself.

Don't feel like you

have to do it all at once.

And make sure you're

keeping the end goal in mind.

So like for me, I knew I really wanted

to do research in college

and that was something I

knew I really wanted to do.

And so I got involved in

UROP and then I didn't love it.

And then when I joined MSE, like I got

involved in research

but it wasn't like, I felt like I had

to do everything all at once.

I mean, I kind of did, but that mindset

just like didn't help me.

I felt like I was behind or like,

I just had to do everything.

It's not like high

school, you can't do everything.

Like it's much better

to prioritize things

that make you happy to make sure

that you have like things in your life.

Like everything has a specific thing

you're leaning towards

because college is

again, not like high school.

You can do everything.

There's so many opportunities for you.

So you really have to

like be introspective

and understand what's important to you

and how to spend your time because yeah,

like college can go by really fast.

And so you need to know

what skills you want to gain

and what specific

experiences are most important

and prioritize those.

- That's great advice.

I should apply that to my own life.

We'll see if that helps

me out with a few things.

- So I was wondering,

I've been experimenting

with using instructional aids

and it's actually given me great insight

into our undergrads

because I get to experience them

in a very different way

than when they're in my class.

And I've been

absolutely amazed at how smart

and how passionate our

students are for material science.

And I'd like to try to

get more students involved

in being in IA where we

actually pay you 18 bucks an hour

for doing something.

It was probably the first

time in these students' lives

that they're actually getting paid

for what we just taught them.

So it's a little payback.

And so does that sound like something?

Am I only seeing a tiny

part of the student body?

Or is this something that students

would like a wider access to?

More students being able to do it?

- I think, I guess first of all,

I think instructional

aids are a great way

to get your students interested in MSE

because like you said,

these are the people that

recently went through it.

They're getting to very

newly apply what they learned

to teach others.

And that's a good way to,

I guess, get involvement

or gain interest in the department.

And then by extension,

I think a lot of people who are my age,

like upperclassmen,

are excited to share their experiences

with the underclassmen

because we like our department.

We are very proud to be

part of the community.

We like what we're learning.

And so I think that is a fun experience.

I'm an engineering 110

department ambassador,

which just means I

teach a discussion section.

And I feel like I get to do that.

And I love talking about MSE.

Like I joined the SWE

University Showcase Subcommittee

because I just wanted to represent MSE

to the high school students.

That's why I was

originally outreach chair.

Like I just liked doing outreach

and I feel like I've

heard a common sentiment

among a lot of other students.

- One of the other things

about the casting a wide net

for IAs that's so

important to remember is,

some students will

have this perspective of,

oh, I didn't get an A plus in the class.

I don't know anything.

I'm not qualified to do this.

And for us, on the

instructional side to say,

it's usually the B students

who are the best teachers,

they know the struggle.

They actually understand

why this stuff is hard.

They had to work for it.

That can really make a difference

when connecting with

someone who's trying to learn this

for the first time.

- I've had some of my best IAs

where B minus or even C plus students

because they really understood

what was difficult.

But, you know, A students are good too

because they know the material.

And I think it's good to have a mix

so that one IA isn't responsible

for just one set of

students, but we rotate around.

And they get to see, you know,

it's nice for the

students who are learning,

but I think it seemed

better for the students

who are the IAs

because they start to realize

that they actually know the material

in a deeper way than they

probably never even realized.

I didn't get that experience

until after I graduated from college.

I thought when I got my first job, oh no,

I'm gonna get my butt kicked.

And I go into my job and then I was just

unbelievably appalled

at how dumb the other people were.

And I'm like, oh wow, I must

have gotten a good education

because I wasn't any

smarter than those people,

but I was better prepared

because I went to a school that cared.

And so I think that

happens when people become IAs,

they become much more self-aware

that they really did

actually learn something.

And I think that's a

wonderful thing so much so

that I almost wonder if we

shouldn't be able to give

any student who wants to

have an activity like this

the opportunity to do it.

I don't think we need to mandate it,

but what you're saying being an

ambassador to Engine 110

or any of this, you'll get

the same experience that,

wow, I actually

understand some of this stuff.

I just think that's a very

important thing to happen

along your way while you're learning.

- Yep.

As long as we're

congratulating each other

on everything that we

know and have learned,

on the student org's front, Alexa,

you've, as you said,

learned a lot of things through trials

and tribulations of leadership.

But if there's someone

out there who maybe is at an

institution that doesn't have an MMS,

doesn't have a MSE student society,

what could you offer them

for tips, tricks, advice

to get something like that started?

If you wanted to build

this from the ground up,

how would you get students

to rally around the concept

and make it happen?

- I think a lot of the

reason that we can do what we do

is we have such

strong department support.

So I think the first thing

would be to figure out who

is on your side in your

corner and would support you

to do something like this.

Because we have Kristin

who helps us with picnics,

a lot of the department stuff.

Tim, obviously you're our advisor.

Obviously our department

chair came and spoke at our

luncheon, Patty helps reserve rooms,

which is so, so helpful.

Those types of connections are invaluable

for starting a student org.

So I think you need to

start talking to some of your

professors, seeing who would be

interested in helping

back you for this.

And then also we have a

pretty big presence at the

undergraduate committee

meetings, so we can advocate

for ourselves to the faculty.

And so having that

avenues first and foremost.

And then the second thing is

once you're actually starting

the student organization, I

think you have to actually

look for problems.

You have to look for

something where it's, you don't

realize like it's a huge

problem because you don't have it,

but you could see a need for it.

Like for example, my

junior year, I realized,

I was just thinking like about it by

talking to a lot of my

friends in engineering.

And I realized we were one

of the few departments that

doesn't have like

T-shirts for new declares.

And so like I emailed Katie

the next day and I was like,

can we do this?

And so now we have free

T-shirts for all like the new

declared students.

And like, that was the

same with like the MSE

undergraduate orientation.

I was like, we don't have a

way for like the sophomores to

meet each other really until

like junior year when they're

all in the same classes.

And so like, it was

something I was like, is this even

possible? I'm going to email people.

I'm going to see what happened.

Like for every situation

that I'm telling you to,

there were like three

situations that I thought there

was need for. And I tried,

but like I just

realized it wasn't feasible.

And so you just need to like,

really like not everything's

going to work out,

but like it's important to

kind of see what resources you

have, see who on your team

would support you in doing these

things.

Like I, before I do anything like this,

I bring it up to the board meeting.

I'm like, would people

be interested in this?

Would anyone be willing to help me?

Is anyone really

passionate about like starting this?

And again,

just realizing who's in

your corner because it's,

it's a lot of work.

You can't do it alone.

- That is great advice.

Steve, did you have any last

questions you wanted to ask

before we start to wrap things up?

- No, I, but what's,

I think I know some of

what's on tap for the rest of this

term, but what's going to

happen near the end of the term?

Any, any wild, crazy things to,

for the, your, your last.

- I would,

I would like to do some

sort of like graduation event,

like a graduation picnic or a seniors,

do some sort of like casting

or pictures or I don't know.

So that's kind of in the works,

but in terms of the rest of the semester,

we've got, you know, some social events,

obviously our industry tour.

We're doing our first ever MMS formal.

So that'll be really exciting.

- That's exciting.

- Yeah. It's, it's very exciting.

It's kind of like,

instead of the bar crawl,

this will be a way to like

include the underclassmen

because you don't have to

be 21 to go to a formal,

but you can still like have

fun and make a night out of it,

as opposed to a lot of the

other events we've been limited.

So that's really exciting.

And then obviously when it comes to

wrapping up my term as

president, I'm really, really,

really focused on

continuity of the organization.

So I'm going to have all of the board

members rewrite their

transition documents or at least add

things to update their

current positions,

because there's a lot of things in the

transition documents

that just don't really apply anymore.

We've all kind of taken our roles and

like added things to

them. Like for example,

Laura being outreach and doing merch,

that's not necessarily in

her role on the transition

document, but that's like a

really big part of her role.

And then like a lot of

things don't apply anymore.

So like right now the

treasurer is technically in,

technically in charge of

like napkins and plates,

but our secretary is in

charge of the silverware.

So Andy just does all of that anyway.

So we just, we really want to make sure

continuity is important.

I've been really trying

to do that just in general.

I've been taking notes at every luncheon

on how many people we have,

how much the food costs.

I've been writing down all the emails of

every single speaker,

the dates I contacted them,

the dates they got back to me and notes

on whether or not the speaker was

good,

which is something new I implemented

because I was looking back at Katie's

stuff and I was like,

there's nothing that says whether or not

these speakers were even good.

And I've got a lot of feedback that, oh,

this speaker wasn't that good.

And I'm like, oh my gosh,

like the next year's president would

probably want to know that,

like to not invite them back.

So yeah,

that's kind of my thought process when it

comes to wrapping everything up.

That's great.

And I just want to say how much I'm

impressed by what our students

do collectively.

Of course, it's you,

your board and all the other students.

Incredible imagination,

innovation and awesome organization.

And it keeps getting

better every single year.

And I think Tim

deserves some credit too for

very little.

Alexa's the heavy lift.

I'm just hiding in the background,

but it's really impressive

what you've been able to do.

And

hopefully potential employers,

people you're interested in working for

are going to listen to this.

And see how incredible you are.

Not only as a material

scientist and a researcher,

but as a organizer and somebody who

really knows how to get things done,

solve problems.

And that's worth a lot.

Thank you, Steve.

Yeah, couldn't say it

better myself on that note.

We always like to give our guests a

minute or two at the end,

just for shameless self-promotion.

So if you have anything

at all you want to plug,

whether it's

availability on the job market or

how amazing the MMS

formal is going to be,

whatever it is,

this is your chance to say what's

happening next and

what to look forward to.

I mean, of course, the MMS formal,

I would say in terms of job stuff,

I do have a job that

I'm planning on doing,

but obviously I have no idea where my

career is going to take me.

So I would say in

terms of self-promotion,

I think my personal best skills is I

really try to advocate for people.

I really care about understanding what it

is that people want.

And then advocating for it,

I consider myself like a problem solver

and someone who likes

to relate to others,

sees opportunities and then

tries to do something about it.

So I think that's my

my biggest self-plug.

But yeah, I'm graduating.

It's going to be crazy.

I'm excited and nervous

about what comes next.

But yeah, I'm really grateful to the

material science department.

And I feel really

proud to close this chapter

because I feel like I've

accomplished a lot in college

and I feel like I've grown a lot as a

person and I've learned a lot.

And I feel like I'm leaving

a mark on this department.

And I feel really proud of that, too.

I completely agree.

It's it will be sad to see you go,

but you've really built something

excellent with MMS the

last couple of years.

It's much stronger, I

feel, than it used to be.

So let's do a good job

with elections coming soon

and make sure the next batch of officers

keeps the, you know,

the train going and getting

even better than it already is.

Yeah. So thank you so much for being on

our podcast with us.

I've really enjoyed hearing hearing you

talk about all of this.

And it's just great. So

thank you very, very much.

Thank you very much.

Such a pleasure. All right.

All right.

Into the audience out there.

We'll see you next time on the next

episode of Undercooled.