Midterm Review

For the Upcoming Test:

Come prepared (be there early, with pencil and calculator.)

Skim through entire test before starting

Do the easy problems first

keep track of the time

Go for partial credit - don't leave anything blank - if you know it's wrong, explain that you know it is wrong, and write down your thinking process.
Show all of your work.
Don't erase your work - just put a single line through it (you might get more partial credit)

Check over your answers, and re-check them. Don't leave early.

Warning: To prevent cheating, multiple versions of the test will be used. Don't copy what your neighbor is doing - they have a different test than you!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Skim through all the notes!

Week #1:

http://intro1201.blogspot.com/2015/01/l1-engineering-method-heuristics.html

4 key components an Engineer must balance:

need for change,
limited resources,
determining what’s best,
dealing with uncertainty.

Heuristics – list of suggestions, hints, or rules of thumb to use in seeking a solution to a problem.

What is the difference between scientists and engineers? Engineering is applied.

Know The Engineering Method:

http://intro1201.blogspot.com/2015/01/l2-engineering-method-chapter-12.html

PGR.BAT.DCCR.

1. Identify the Problem/product innovation

2. Define the working criteria/Goals

3. Research and gather data

4. Brainstorm/generate creative ideas

5. Analyze potential solutions
6. Develop and Test models

7. Make the Decision

8. Communicate and specify

9. Implement and Commercialize

10. Perform post-implementation Review and assessment

Technical communication

http://intro1201.blogspot.com/2015/01/chap-13-technical-communication.html

Components of a technical Report

#'d Headings and Subheadings
Figures and tables with captions and headings
#'d equations
Reference section

What is a decision table?

Can you answer specific questions about the ideas your team came up with for the project, what your working criteria were, and why you chose to go with what you did?

What is a Gantt Chart?

Can you answer questions about your team's Gantt chart, what you have already completed for your project, what you are working on now, and what you will have completed by the end of the semester?

Teamwork and Project Management:
http://intro1201.blogspot.com/2015/03/teamwork.html

What is Synergy?
What is concurrent engineering?
What are Tuckman's 5 team growth stages?
List Qualities of a successful team.
What qualifies a project as being successful?

Name the people in your team, state your own and your team member's Meyer personality type, and what function they perform.

What is your team commitment statement?
(from timeline chart)

Midterm Team Evaluation: After you finish the midterm, fill out the first team evaluation. Hopefully we can catch, and resolve any issues that might be happening early on!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Circuits
Skim through the notes.
Practice each of the tables from the pre-lab:

series

parallel

combined

Given a picture of a breadboard, can you draw how to attach resistors in series, in parallel, or in a combined circuit?

how are the holes on the above board connected to one another?
draw an example of resistors connected in series to a power supply.
draw an example of resistors connected in parallel to a power supply.

Transistor:

Can you write out the truth table for a circuit with transistors?
http://intro1201.blogspot.com/2015/03/wear-top-10-excel-shortcuts-httpwww.html

Can you explain how transistors work?
http://intro1201.blogspot.com/2016/10/transistors.html
Given a picture of transistors wired together on a breadboard, can you identify which type of logic gate it is?

If there was a picture of a breadboard with a wiring mistake, could you identify what was wrong?

Engineering Majors:

http://intro1201.blogspot.com/2015/02/engineering-majors.html

Excel Meyers and Macros
http://intro1201.blogspot.com/2015/05/excel-vba.html

List the steps for recording a Macro
What does it mean to "use a relative reference"?
What programming language does excel use? (Visual Basic)

Explain what is happening in the below code:
ActiveCell.Offset(4, 4).Range("A1").Select
ActiveCell.FormulaR1C1 = "=RC[-3]+RC[-2]+RC[-1]"

Given an example spreadsheet and an if statement, can you explain what is being written out?

If Range("B6").Value > Range("B7").Value Then
Range("C19").Value = "E"
Else
Range("C19").Value = "I"
End If

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Let me know if there is anything you need help with, we're already half way through, with some fun labs and projects coming up!

Student Success

They followed a group of art students around - which students would produce the best art? which students would later become successful artists? Who would fail? Why?

Experiment to peer into the minds of students...
A room was filled with art supplies, and a table laid out with a buffet of objects for the artists to use for a still-life drawing: A velvet hat, bunch of grapes, brass hornm antique book, glass prism. Each student came into the room alone, and was told to examine, chose, and arrange the objects before they drew them.

The students were timed→how long did it take to pick out the objects? How long did they take to arrange them? How long did they spend fiddling, playing, thinking, sketching, and forming a plan?

Two distinct groups of students

Group #1: Those who began drawing immediately. They said they had only one concept, and stuck to it. "As soon as I saw the objects I had an idea of the final design." Instead of generating a lot of ideas, they spent most of their time executing their initial plan.

Group #2: Those who spent most of their time playing with the object instead of drawing. They looked through the prism, pet the velvet hat and tried it on, read through bits of the antique book, and when they started drawing they did so in an exploratory way - without a sense of the final outcome. Instead of coming up with one idea and executing it, they spent most of their time observing, discovering, improvising. "I let the drawing grow...I felt it alive until it was done"

Several panels of judges looked at the art, and picked the best pieces. Group #1 was given low scores. The judges loved the art created from Group #2. Later in life, the same students were tracked down to see what careers they had ended up with. Group #1 students had mostly given up being artists, Group #2 had become successful in their careers.

In short - the successful students spent far more time exposing themselves to new ideas.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/3335275.stm

I gave both lucky and unlucky people a newspaper, and asked them to look through it and tell me how many photographs were inside. I had secretly placed a large message halfway through the newspaper saying: "Tell the experimenter you have seen this and win £250."

This message took up half of the page and was written in type that was more than two inches high. It was staring everyone straight in the face, but the unlucky people tended to miss it and the lucky people tended to spot it. ...[Unlucky people] miss opportunities because they are too focused on looking for something else.They go to parties intent on finding their perfect partner and so miss opportunities to make good friends.

They look through newspapers determined to find certain types of job advertisements and miss other types of jobs.

I asked a group of volunteers to spend a month carrying out exercises designed to help them think and behave like a lucky person. One month later, the volunteers returned and described what had happened. The results were dramatic: 80% of people were now happier, more satisfied with their lives and, perhaps most important of all, luckier.

Here are Professor Wiseman's four top tips for becoming lucky:

Listen to your gut instincts - they are normally right
Be open to new experiences and breaking your normal routine
Spend a few moments each day remembering things that went well
Visualise yourself being lucky before an important meeting or telephone call. Luck is very often a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Staying up all night to study for a test? hmmm.......

Chapter 7: Succeeding in the classroom

Some random tips:

1. Learn from Failure, don't be scared off by it.

The only way you can really fail, is if you stop trying.

'The way you learn anything is that something fails, and you figure out how not to have it fail again.” ― Robert S. Arrighi, Pursuit of Power: NASA's Propulsion Systems Laboratory No. 1 and 2

2. It's ok if you don't know everything.
No one knows everything.

3. It's ok to be a little insane.... most successful people are.

4. Be a team player, and be the MVP.

5. Be patient, go with the flow, your chance will come.

Read through the 7 habits book - link
- this book is a best-seller for a reason!

Habit 1: Be Proactive

Take initiative in life by realizing that your decisions (and how they align with life's principles) are the primary determining factor for effectiveness in your life. Take responsibility for your choices and the consequences that follow.

Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind

Self-discover and clarify your deeply important character values and life goals. Envision the ideal characteristics for each of your various roles and relationships in life.

Habit 3: Put First Things First

A manager must manage his own person. Personally. And managers should implement activities that aim to reach the second habit. Covey says that rule two is the mental creation; rule three is the physical creation.

Habit 4: Think Win-Win

Genuinely strive for mutually beneficial solutions or agreements in your relationships. Value and respect people by understanding a "win" for all is ultimately a better long-term resolution than if only one person in the situation had got his way.

Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood

Use empathic listening to be genuinely influenced by a person, which compels them to reciprocate the listening and take an open mind to being influenced by you. This creates an atmosphere of caring, and positive problem solving.

Habit 6: Synergize

Combine the strengths of people through positive teamwork, so as to achieve goals no one person could have done alone.

Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

Balance and renew your resources, energy, and health to create a sustainable, long-term, effective lifestyle. It primarily emphasizes exercise for physical renewal, prayer (meditation, yoga, etc.) and good reading for mental renewal. It also mentions service to society for spiritual renewal.

7.2 Attitude
Ability is what you're capable of doing
Motivation determines what you do.
Attitude determines how well you do it. - Lou Holtz

7.3 Goals
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
Create a mission statement - define a standard, and strive for it.

7.4 Keys to effectiveness
Take time to study! 2 hours of study outside of class for every hour in class.

Go to class, keep up with class, participate in class, take notes in class.

Practice - read example problems, then solve a few problems on your own.

Study in groups

7.5 Test Taking

Come prepared (be there early, with pencils, paper, etc.)
Skim through entire test before starting
Do the easy problems first
keep track of the time
Go for partial credit - don't leave anything blank - if you know it's wrong, explain that you know it is wrong, and write down your thinking process.

Don't erase your work - just put a single line through it (you might get more partial credit)
Check over your answers, and re-check them. Don't leave early.

Go over the graded test - correct mistakes, study it for the next test.
- 7.6 Make the most of your professors / tutoring centers
  You paid for it - might as well use it!
  
  http://www.lonestar.edu/learning-kingwood.htm

1. Do your math homework.
2. Form good study habits.
3. Get to know your professors.
4. Work in a study group.
5. Get a life. Have friends, hobbies, recreational activities.

Group Discussion:
1. Think about a time when you struggled in either a class, or at a job. In hindsight, if you could go back and change something that you did, what would you change?

2. Think about your classes and work load this semester. What is your biggest challenge? What are you doing to meet that challenge?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iADTpgRXYrk

ENGR Disciplines Paper

Engineering Disciplines Paper

Engineering is a broad field that offers many disciplines, each with different specializations. Identifying the specific disciplines and specializations you want to pursue is essential in planning your academic and professional career. Does Mechanical Engineering appeal to you? What about Civil, Electrical, or Industrial?

Not required, but it might help to organize your thoughts to create an outline and set everything up in technical format (numbered sections, lists, figures) outlining your life plan.

Section 1: What are your top 3 engineering discipline choices?
Some majors are more competitive than others, if you can't get into your top choice, consider alternative possibilities.

What is more important to you - your major or your university?
If you are flexible on what university to transfer to, you can keep the major you want.
If you are flexible with your major, you can get into the university you want.

Read through and watch the youtubes on:
http://intro1201.blogspot.com/2015/02/engineering-majors.html

Don't just pick something because you happen to be familiar with it! Become familiar with all of the disciplines so you can make an informed choice.

What is the job outlook in your chosen fields like? What are similar occupations?
http://www.bls.gov/ooh/Architecture-and-Engineering/home.htm

Section 2: What are your goals in this field? What specializations would you like to go into? Which of the below squares describes what you want to do?

Section 3:
What are the top 3 universities you would like to transfer to?
What classes do you need to take for the program you want into?
What is your plan for paying tuition? What scholarships are you applying for?
Make sure the program is ABET accredited or your degree will not be worth as much!!
Be specific! List which classes you will take which semester, list the specific scholarships you are applying for, look at the department and research group you want to join. What open house events are you planning on attending? Visit the university before you transfer there!

Visit university websites for up-to-date program information:

http://best-engineering-colleges.com/

http://www.supercollege.com/

http://www.finaid.org/

http://www.lonestar.edu/scholarships.htm

Engineering societies also all have good scholarships:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_engineering_societies

Section 4: Where are you sending resumes to for internship opportunities while you are in school? What career fairs do you plan on attending? What are the top 4 companies you would like to work for when you are done, and why?

NSF: http://www.nsf.gov/crssprgm/reu/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_in_Houston

Start by opening up a google map, and go directly to the websites of the companies near your home!

http://www.lonestar.edu/career-services.htm

http://www.lonestar.edu/career-fairs.htm

Include references at the end of the paper.

http://www.bls.gov/ooh/Architecture-and-Engineering/home.htm

http://www.acinet.org/

http://www.careercornerstone.org/

http://www.census.gov/eos/www/naics/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_in_Houston

Trouble?

Turn in what are able to get through - and I will send you links, and additional resources for anything you are missing. This is not just an assignment to trudge through - this kind of thoughtful planning will make the difference between reaching your goals or not!

Sorry for the long copy and paste, but you need to know the trends going on right now... consider K-12th grade → you have already been in school for a few years... you can last a few more years!

Stats of incoming college students...
https://www.citylab.com/work/2017/02/why-millions-of-americans-never-finish-college/517713/

How can millions of Americans be out of work or stuck in low-wage jobs, while employers leave millions of jobs unfilled each year? A big reason is the nation’s college completion crisis—something that is just beginning to get the national attention it deserves... In fact, less than half of America’s college students ever graduate. And the numbers are worse at community colleges, (**it's ok not to get your AS degree - just so long as you transfer!!) which are the primary providers of education and training for the 29 million middle-skill jobs that pay middle-class wages.
...
Community colleges serve close to half of all American students, enrolling 10 million students each year, but just under 20 percent earn an associate’s degree within three years....(Ask yourself, do you really want to be going part-time? How long is it going to take you to get through this degree going part time??)

Dismal as these numbers are, they don’t reflect the full extent of the problem, since the statistics exclude students enrolled part-time and those who “stop out”—take a break from school to work or care for family and later return to college. There is anecdotal evidence that completion rates for these students are even lower. (resist the urge to "take a semester off" you will lose your momentum, waste time catching up, and get way behind. Endurance! Just keep plowing through it!!) This means that a large swath of America’s potential workforce isn’t getting the education and training they need to support themselves and their families and climb into the middle class.

There are two central reasons that students don’t complete college:
a.) inadequate preparation (Get a D in something? retake it, get the foundation you need from the start or you will be fighting it the entire time through. That is just fine to take a semester or two to get through leveling courses.)

b.) difficulty navigating college (Talk to Nicole - know what classes you need, and what you do not need. Plan ahead so you can register the first day registration opens - choose a path, and stick with it!)

The second reason students don’t earn a degree is the difficulty of combining college with other commitments or navigating the higher education system. Close to two-thirds of community college students work to support themselves and their families while in school, and they may be facing homelessness and hunger. Many are single parents, and more than a third are the first in their families to attend college—both factors that can pose major obstacles to graduation. (It's just fine to live with your parents, use FAFSA, take advantage of organizations like HAAM - talk to career services about part-time on-campus jobs, carpool, take online classes to minimize your comute)

Fundamental principle in engineering project management:
The earlier a needed change is recognized, the more control you have, and the less costly the change is. As you progress towards the end goal, the cost to change becomes very high, and you lose freedom for making changes. In other words, make up your mind early on what your end goal is and what your path is - then stick to that path or it will cost you! Extra effort early on planning everything out is what makes for a successful project.

Wikinomics.com

THE 7 HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE
HABIT 2: BEGIN WITH THE END IN MIND - HTTPS://WWW.STEPHENCOVEY.COM/7HABITS/7HABITS-HABIT2.PHP

So, what do you want to be when you grow up? That question may appear a little trite, but think about it for a moment. Are you--right now--who you want to be, what you dreamed you'd be, doing what you always wanted to do? Be honest. Sometimes people find themselves achieving victories that are empty--successes that have come at the expense of things that were far more valuable to them. If your ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step you take gets you to the wrong place faster.

Habit 2 is based on imagination--the ability to envision in your mind what you cannot at present see with your eyes. It is based on the principle that all things are created twice. There is a mental (first) creation, and a physical (second) creation. The physical creation follows the mental, just as a building follows a blueprint. If you don't make a conscious effort to visualize who you are and what you want in life, then you empower other people and circumstances to shape you and your life by default. It's about connecting again with your own uniqueness and then defining the personal, moral, and ethical guidelines within which you can most happily express and fulfill yourself. Begin with the End in Mind means to begin each day, task, or project with a clear vision of your desired direction and destination, and then continue by flexing your proactive muscles to make things happen.

One of the best ways to incorporate Habit 2 into your life is to develop a Personal Mission Statement. It focuses on what you want to be and do. It is your plan for success. It reaffirms who you are, puts your goals in focus, and moves your ideas into the real world. Your mission statement makes you the leader of your own life. You create your own destiny and secure the future you envision.

http://spacefem.com/quizzes/engineer/

ENGR advisor:
Nicole Foley, Nicole.D.Foley@lonestar.edu

Please set up an appointment and create a degree and transfer plan with Nicole. You will need to bring in your transcript, and know your top choices of what schools you would like to transfer to.

Degree curriculum - link
You will need to decide where you are transferring to, and use university transfer guides - not just the LSC AS curriculum!

Engineering Majors

Review

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Engineering Disciplines

•major basic branches of engineering

– Chemical engineering
Biomolecular Engineering
Materials Engineering
Metals, Ceramics, Polymers
Molecular Engineering
Process Engineering
Petroleum Engineering
Reservoir, Drilling, Production
Plastics, Paper

–Civil engineering
Environmental Engineering
Ecological, Fire protection,
Sanitation, Urban
Geotechnical Engineering
Mining, Foundation
Structural Engineering
Earthquake, Wind, Ocean,
Architectural
Transport Engineering
Railway Systems,
Highway
Water Resource Engineering
Hydraulic, River,
Coastal, Groundwater

–Electrical engineering
Computer Engineering
Software
Hardware
Network
Electronic Engineering
Controls
Telecommunications
Optical Engineering
Power Engineering

–Mechanical engineering
Acoustical Engineering
Manufacturing Engineering
Thermal Engineering
Vehicle Engineering
Automotive
Naval
Aerospace

There are 30-40 different fields of engineering.

For a quick list and description of them, read through the wiki:

link - List of engineering branches

http://www.bls.gov/ooh/Architecture-and-Engineering/home.htm

http://www.careercornerstone.org/

http://www.tryengineering.org/

http://spaceflightnow.com/tracking/

United States Air Force Academy - Colorado Springs

Example Aerospace project:

Design winglets to decreases drag and increases energy efficiency.

Nuclear news:

South Korea bans fish imports from Japan coast affected by leaking Fukushima nuclear plant

Nuclear power in France: link

If you are unfamiliar with one of the above fields, get on youtube, and do a search to find out more about it!

Choose a major
Talk to an adviser, make sure you are taking the needed classes:

Basic programs of study (consider adding on a minor when choosing core electives)
http://www.lonestar.edu/engineering-dept-kingwood.htm

Core Curriculum requirements - link

Engineering majors in particular have the highest median earnings out of college.

According to a recent report from Georgetown’s Center on Education and the Workforce, science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (aka STEM) majors still have the best overall job prospects.