Writing on the Field: My Work in Writing for Engineers
Why would engineers need to take a writing class? Exactly the question I was asking myself when I saw the course Writing for Engineers as a requirement for my curriculum. I was expecting to be taking math, science, and physics. I was not sure why learning engineering required a writing course. These questions were answered during the first lecture. The answer was simple: “all engineers write.” Although, not sophisticated articles like journalists or essays that I was previously exposed to, engineers wrote about many aspects in the workspace. Whether that be through emails or written evaluations of job sites or problems that have occurred, writing was an important factor within the engineering field. I was able to understand all the reasons for writing within my field, civil engineering, when I had completed the Informational Interview. This course has not only allowed us to learn from professional engineers about our field but also determine what our goals are for the future and set us on a path to obtain them through the writing an effective resume and cover letter. Other assignments that helped us to progress further towards our goals were the lab report, proposal, and technical description. Other help with grammar was also provided to further enhance our writing so that we write professionally within our field.
The first major assignment that was held for Writing for Engineers was the Informational Interview. My experience in completing this assignment from finding a civil engineer to writing the paper had been very informative and eye opening. When finding a civil engineer, I did not have any problems as my father who works in the construction industry had a few people in mind. These people also included one of my relatives who I’ve had the pleasure of knowing for four months. From this part alone, I was able to see the number of civil engineers in the field and they all had jobs. Sabharwal had stated that this field is very extensive and finding work as a civil engineer would not be difficult. During the interview, I was able to learn a lot; information that I had already known and other that was very new to me. Some information that I was reminded of was that in order to succeed, I need to have extensive knowledge about the field and be able to step up when problems need to be solved. As my interviewee had stated, he was called for a meeting to fix a specific problem. As no one could figure out a method to solve it, he was able to provide a solution. This solution was very effective and when companies within that meeting saw his experience and knowledge through this one solution, he was offered positions in their companies which were higher than the position he was currently working in. Another fact to note is that Sabharwal was an immigrant who had completed his course in civil engineering in India, so having to travel to New York and starting his career was tough. Also, I am not an immigrant and life will not push me around as much as it did for Sabharwal, I still expect many challenges ahead when I work towards my career. Knowing that obtaining my goals will come with obstacles, is the first step in crossing them.
During the easier months of this course, we mainly focused on our career. Therefore, creating a well-developed resume and cover letter was a step towards to our professions. We discussed in class the various components of a resume and what information should be placed in each component and the information that should be disregarded. The resume is usually the first document that the employer sees prior to informing the applicant to attend an interview. Thus, the resume should provide adequate information about you as a person and other important information that will be important for the employer to know about your education and accomplishments. Being specific within your resume is also very important; you do not want your resume to be general in which the employer would usually disregard your application. Organization of the resume is also very important; the employer can simply read through the details that he thinks are most important and if organization is one of your skills, having the resume organized backs up your statement. Otherwise, you portray yourself as a hypocrite or a liar. The cover letter follows the same information but more specifically focuses on writing a brief description of yourself to further expand on the resume and explain why the employer should hire you. For both the resume and the cover letter, the audience and purpose were critical to keep in mind. Since you are writing a professional document, being professional is important. This include, no grammar mistakes, use of appropriate words, and portrayal of appropriate information. The audience is also critical. Since you are writing for a employer who will pay you to work for him in the instant that you get hired, you want to explain to the employer why hiring you would be beneficial for the company.
The lab report was also a helpful assignment for us to learn how to best write a report using other resources as evidence for our own research. Depending on the field of engineering that you strive towards, writing a comprehensive report about your work and comparing it to other work done by other professionals is important so that you can document your findings and also provide information for other professionals in the field to help one another achieve greater advancement in the future. We did not write a lab report on a topic that was groundbreaking, but rather focused on how to best write a report. The professional format for a lab report is as follows: title, abstract, materials and methods, results, analysis, and conclusion. As most of the lab report focuses on completing our own experiment for our research, the analysis section of the report is used to combine information from various sources that we used to back up our experiment as well as better explain the outcome or result of your experiment. There are many sources on many search engine (such as google) that have information regarding any specific topic. However, these documents or articles might not be as specific or correct as information that you will find using the CCNY’s online database. This database provides many resources that are best for students to follow as they are ensured to be correct and many are peer-reviewed for evidence that the information provided will not contain false information.
One advantage, or some might perceive it as a disadvantage, within the engineering field is group work. As my Structural and Site Planning Professor Diane Reid had said, “one person cannot build a building, you need a team.”(Professor Reid). Similarly, being social and working with a group of people is needed in the field. Through this course, we were able to also able to experience working within a group when we had done the Group Proposal. When I first started this project, the class had to pick groups. I had come information about some people in this classroom and I used that to help me decide who I will be working with. Therefore, I didn’t have hard time finding a group. Since one person in my group had decided to work on sprinkler systems with my consultation, we looked for people who were vocal and hardworking since my peer already had knowledge of HVAC. Afterwards, everything fell into place and we all knew what we were going to do. Thus, the process of the report went smoothly. Coming into the day of presentations, we had good information to present and adequate research. As a result, we were confident and decided to present first. The most stressful part of the whole process was that the internet was not working for us and we weren’t able to fully show our slides. However, we were able to get the important information across to our audience. Overall, this assignment was very informative in regard to the process of working within a group and that problems will arise that would be out of our control so we should always have a backup plan.
The technical description played multiple roles in this course. One, it helped us to learn a little about the field we were going into by researching a topic that related to our field. I decided to concentrate on suspension bridges because that relates to my field when though I am not going to transportation engineering. However, I was still able to learn a significant amount from simply researching brief information regarding suspension bridges. Another role that this assignment played, was to teach us about presenting a topic to an audience. In the field, we will be having many meetings in which we will have to explain a topic to an audience which might either be a client or other fields. This assignment also was done through the use of CCNY’s database because there were many articles that are peer-reviewed to ensure the quality the information. One part of the technical description presentation consisted of answering questions from the audience. This also simulates a meeting in the work field in which the audience will have questions and you should be able to answer them to show your knowledge on the subject.
Other minor assignments that we had completed were the two-minute elevator pitch in which we quickly portrayed ourselves to a CEO of a big company who was in fact a peer. Through this assignment, we had learned how to be concise when talking to someone who doesn’t have a lot of time, but you still want all the important information to be portrayed. We also worked on grammar and sentence structure which was a major help as a lot of my writing is poorly done with a ton of grammatical mistakes.
In conclusion, the Writing for Engineers course help me to learn a lot about the field that I will be making my career in and to be better prepared for my future. Each assignment not only helped me to continue writing, but also learn what I will be doing as an engineer and why writing will be important as a I progress. Assignments such as the group proposal also give life lessons on working within a team and how to best prepare yourself when things do not go as expected.
