Final Blog Post

In Kayleigh's post she discusses how important it is to stay up to date with current technology to prepare for changes in your field. Rapidly growing technology is a huge part of the engineering field, and therefore it is very important to stay on top of it. I felt that this class gave us a basic knowledge of a handful of important technologies in the engineering field today. The two topics that we covered in this course that I feel will be most beneficial for me in my future career are BIM and databases.

While I know that the term is only 10 weeks long and it is hard to fit everything in, I agree with Gabrielle that I would have preferred if we could have spent more time on BIM. On almost every co-op interview I have been to, the first question they ask is if you have any experience with BIM. While I am no expert in BIM, I do feel that after this class I can confidently say I have a basic understanding of how BIM works. I felt that the project we did with creating a bookshelf and placing it in a small building was a great project to help students learn the basics. It not only showed us how to create a basic building but also gave students exposure to working with families.

For me, the most challenging part of this course was the creation of a database. Prior to this course, I knew very little about databases and how they were created. While doing the assignment, I constantly questioned myself on whether or not I was creating the database correctly. I think that more strict guidelines on what was expected may have been helpful for a technology that such a large portion of students are unfamiliar with. Overall, I found the experience to be very helpful because I felt that I gained a basic knowledge of how to work a program that I had never used before. I also feel that even if I am not able to create a detailed database, I at least understand the basic concept and would be able to further my knowledge, if needed, for my future career.

In summary, I truly thought this class was well structured and thought provoking. I agree with Maria that the class was setup in a way that allowed students to put as much work and time as they chose into it. I felt that the more you put into the course, the more you got out of it. I appreciated that the due dates for all assignments were given at the very beginning of the term, allowing you to work on things at your own pace, but I wish the due dates had been a bit more spread out. I would absolutely recommend this class as a professional engineering elective, as I gained a great deal form the course.