A13AnneGatchell

A13AnneGatchell

To-Do

Please Answer the following Questions: provide a brief rationale for your answer — not just yes/no answers

1. which classes did you take outside of your chosen discipline?
   1. how did you select these classes?
      1. based on interest
      2. based on requirements for your degree program
   2. did would you evaluate the “outside classes”?
      1. a waste of time
      2. okay
      3. an enrichment of your education
      4. if you had a choice: would you take more outside classes?
2. to be a well educated graduate in your respective discipline — what do you consider the most important objectives?
   1. did CU offer classes for you to meet these objectives?
   2. have you pursued these objectives outside of classes (in other settings at CU; outside of CU)?
3. what do you consider the most important impact of new media and human-centered computing on YOUR education?

which classes did you take outside of your chosen discipline?

During Chemical Engineering BS program I took:

-an Introduction to Social Psychology course, a Macro economics course Intro to Business, Business Ethics, Business Law, Visual Reality, Expository Writing, Education & Society, State and Society Relations in Modern India, Life Drawing,C Programming.

Have also taken:

Introduction to Engineering Management, Maya 3D Animation

how did you select these classes? (e.g. based on interest or based on requirements for your degree program)

During Chemical Engineering BS program I took:

-an Introduction to Social Psychology course (humanities requirement/interest),

-a Macro economics course (interest & humanities requirement),

-Intro to Business (interest),

-Business Ethics (interest),

-Business Law (interest… turned out to be not so interesting),

-Visual Reality (art course. was an interest course. I think it fulfilled a humanities req, too),

-Expository Writing (requirement),

-Education & Society (interest/humanities),

-State and Society Relations in Modern India (humanities requirement),

-Life Drawing (interest, may have counted towards humanities).

-C Programming (interest)

-Engineering Management (interest)

-Maya animation (interest)

how would you rate the “outside classes”? (e.g. a waste of time or an enrichment of your education)

During Chemical Engineering BS program I took:

-Social Psycholog: interesting, probably informs one about human interaction in a useful way for future work.

-a Macro economics course: an enrichment. Everyone should understand basic economics.

-Intro to Business: an enrichment. If you are going to work for a business, you should understand business. This knowledge helps me be more realistic about my expectations of employers.

-Business Ethics: Valuable

-Business Law: Valuable, probably, but too boring to stick in the brain

-Visual Reality: Valuable because I am an artist

-Expository Writing: Valuable because of the writing practice. However, analyzing literature for hidden meaning has never proven to be useful in my life. In my opinion, it is more valuable to learn to write in a concise and clear way.

-Education & Society: Valuable knowledge, because I am interested in education.Maybe not useful for Chemical Engineers.

-State and Society Relations in Modern India: Valuable because I learned about another country in depth.

-Life Drawing: Valuable because I am an artist, and had never truly explored the beautiful world of figure drawing before.

-C Programming: Valuable. All engineers should have programming experience. Also, it helped me discover my excitement about programming and my interest in computer science.

-Engineering Management: Very valuable because it was taught by a professor who had actually run companies. He knew what the real world was like.

-Maya animation: Valuable because I'm an artist.

if you had a choice: would you take more outside classes?

In undergrad, I would have wanted to stick with the business classes and art classes. I thought the other classes took away from the time to learn the very difficult and rigorous Chemical Engineering curriculum. I wish they had required programming early on and had more hands-on courses, as this would help those who love chemical engineering, and would have helped me decide earlier that it was not the correct path for me.

I generally have little interest in taking most of the humanities courses (literature, etc) because I feel they have little real-world application, as fun as they might be. I very much wanted to take the Digital Media ATLAS course, but it appears that it is impossible to get into. I would like to take a mixture of art and computer science and some cognitive science. I think business classes are always valuable.

to be a well educated graduate in your respective discipline — what do you consider the most important objectives?

Learning the computer languages they use in the real world. Learning to use the tools they use int he real world (ie. Eclipse for programming in Java and contribute to a collaborative programming repository. We should be learning all the things that are listed on a basic, entry-level job description.

We should also learn to program with others, since that is realistic. We should learn about business and how to learn to communicate with the other areas of business (ie. finance). In my working experience, the researchers had no clue about finance, and the engineers thought they were superior to everyone else. It was dysfunctional. We should know how look at a problem and feel confident in our ability to solve it or to find a way to solve it.

It is also useful to learn a little about human psychology, since so much of what we do uses this knowledge. We should be reading things like Dan Ariely books. I like the idea of the ATLAS program. I think it is useful to foster both creativity and technical knowledge.

did CU offer classes for you to meet these objectives?

I think Computer Systems is doing a nice job. There is a good balance of structure and 'sink or swim'-ness to it. I hear that we learn more languages in Principles of Programming languages. As of now, I am unqualified for more entry level jobs, as I have no knowledge of most of the skills they list. MySQL, etc.

There is a good amount of group work in the department's classes, and I have learned about Java and Eclipse on the fly for a project from group members. Human Centered computing addresses some of the ideas that are crucial to making a successful product.

have you pursued these objectives outside of classes (in other settings at CU; outside of CU)?

I have done most of my learning about the human brain and the way we think from books outside of school. (ie. Dan Ariely, brain books). I do a lot of self-development. The programming language problem, however, is one I hope to solve in school.

I plan to do internships, which are invaluable, and work with professors on some research.

hat do you consider the most important impact of new media and human-centered computing on YOUR education?

I can basically learn all that I want. When I am interested in a topic, I google it. I find groups who are also interested in it. I find books online and look at reviews by others. I go buy the books and read them. I join forums.

If I have a question about how to do something while programming, I can just Google it and find out how to do it. I cannot imagine life without the Wikipedia, Google, Facebook, and Google Chat. When I want an opinion on a topic, I can just post it on Facebook and immediately get a variety of answers. I can ask friend on Google Chat about some science concept that I don't remember.

Human Centered Computing addresses very exciting issues, because they are issues about all of our daily lives. Computing is such a helpful and increasingly ubiquitous part of our lives, that it is essential to examine its effects so that we can improve it. We also need to examine it to make it secure, so that we can continue to share with each other online in a safe way.