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Students venture into the “real world” on northside
REAL WORLD ADVICE:
Fifty alumni returned to campus on February 2 to share career
advice and wisdom with engineering students at Real World
Engineering 2006. One of the highlights was the opportunity
for one-on-one discussions between students and alumni. Here,
Marilee Brooks (foreground, M.S.’88 ChemE), an independent
consultant who has also worked for Chiron as a manufacturing
process engineer, speaks with a ChemE senior about the pros
and cons of pursuing a doctorate. Brooks was one of four
alumni who spoke on the BioE panel. Students asked the panelists
about everything from startup companies in China to getting
bored in a job. On Ph.D.s, Brooks told the group, “The
more your career moves away from school, the more it’s
about the abilities and skills you’ve gained in the
workforce and less about your degrees.” About 250 students
attended Real World this year. (Rachel Shafer photo)
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On Fridays at 6:10 p.m., the distinctive bells at the top of Sather
Tower, better known as the Campanile, ring out over campus. The songs
float through the air, rising and falling in sweet or melancholic or
rousing harmony. They can reach listeners over a mile away. Despite
a popular misconception, the music isn’t automated (only the
hourly chimes are). It’s a live performance by a small, select
group of Berkeley carillon students. One of those is ME/MSE senior
Justin Kaderka.
“It’s a good conversation starter,” he says, laughing. “I’ll
tell people, ‘I play the bells,’ and they say, ‘You
what??!!’ I explain it to them and they think it’s really
cool. It is so cool. It’s very unique to Berkeley.”
This year, only 14 students successfully auditioned for the privilege
of playing and studying the carillon at Berkeley, considered one
of the finest among the 116 concert-class carillons in North America.
To be chosen, says Kaderka, you need a strong musical background.
He
took piano lessons for 11 years and credits the experience with giving
him an edge into the class. [FULL STORY]
In November, California Engineer put out its 83rd volume. The glossy magazine
publishes engineering undergraduate research from across the UC system.
As for this issue, “I’m really proud of it,” says Lori Chen,
an ME senior and the magazine’s editor. “We’re working to
make it more reader-friendly, with technical papers that anybody would be
interested in.”
It seems Chen’s strategy is working. The cover story features the work
of CEE students Laurie Choi, Manish Dalia, Zylah Doria and Harry Tam,
who researched possible solutions for Memorial Stadium’s seismic retrofit. “Nestled
amongst the lush pine trees of Strawberry Canyon at the foot of the
picturesque Berkeley hills, California Memorial Stadium has been the subject
of controversy
since its beginnings in the early 1920s,” the article begins. It
goes on to compare the technical challenges and finances of rehabilitating
the
current stadium versus leveling and building anew. [FULL STORY]
The first thing you see when you walk into Matt Fritzinger’s
office at Berkeley High School is a mountain bike resting against the
wall. Fritzinger (B.S.’95 ME) is executive director of the NorCal
High School Mountain Bike Racing League, a non-profit organization
he founded in 2001 that is now the largest youth cycling program in
the country. The league includes 20 teams and 300 riders from Northern
California.
“I never imagined that I could turn a hobby into something full
time,” he
says. “Never.”
Fritzinger began racing in track and road cycling competitions as
an eighth grader. At Cal, he rode with the Cal Cycling Team. “Some
of my best college memories are from the cycling team,” he says. “I
met almost all my good friends there. I’m still really close
to some of them today.” [FULL STORY]
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