My high school career ended on a very high note. I completed the sisyphean effort of VEX robotics after an 8 year tragedy. In a last hurrah, my team and I placed 5th overall in the final round robin. More about this in another blog post. Normal life (i.e. completing IB exams post-worlds championships) seemed light and simple. After my last exam, I took a 1 month trip to Ladhak, India + weekend trip to the Elfin lakes with a christian youth group(?) + a family trip to Kawaii. I felt settled by September. I was eager to pick up the pace. I yearned to build upon what I had accomplished.
I made two minor mistakes in this first term. First, I got a part-time job as a dishwasher/server at Tractor Foods. This was motivated by (1) wanting some independent spending cash, as I had none after the summer. Although the real motivation was a (2) minor guilt about not having a job throughout high school. I wanted to prove I could. Big mistake, the few thousand dollars I made wasn’t worth it. Time would have been much better spent making friends at UBC. Mistake #2 was living at a smaller, private dorm called Carey Hall. The dorm itself was excellent, filled with ~40 student of which ~20 were actively social. Many good times and friends were made. The better option would have been to live at a larger UBC dorm. The larger groups and greater exposure to people are worth the chaos and roomates risks.
Enough context, onto the courses.
Introduction to Engineering I
Section 101 - Peter Ostafichuk - 85% / 77% Section Average
This is your classic intro to engineering design course, the 1st year flagship the UBC Eng administration rallies around. I was luckly enough to get Ostafichuk, the lead instrcutor of the course. Like many young 1st years, I put considerable effort into the cardboard chair and claw group project. Both turned out with good ENG sex appeal. I’ll never forget speed drawing cubes, spheres and bicycles at 8am to Goldfish’s Fort Knox.
Introduction to Computation in Engineering Design
Section 101 - Paul Carter - 93% / 75% Section Average
APSC 160 is the first taste many engineers have of code. The course itself was very simple, just basic concepts like loops, ifs, primary data types, some basic DAQ (all in C). Students who haven’t thought about programming before were the only ones that struggled. A handful of exams questions were sematically tricky, thus my 93%. Probably should have read the questions and aced this course.
Strategies for University Writing
Section 101 - Rebecca Raglon - 86% / 78% Section Average
ENGL 112 was one option for the UBC “Strategies for University Writing or Engineering Communication” requirement. I had a great time in IB English SL, so this wasn’t too painful. Course consitent of small writeups on scientific literature, with a final larger essay on the book “Silent Spring”. The analysis of Watson and Crick’s “A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid” will stick with me. The world of predatory journals was also absorbing to learn about.
Differential Calculus with Applications to Physical Sciences and Engineering
Section 109 - Nguyen LAM - 80% / 75% Section Average
MATH 100 was my first taste of university level calculus. Coming from a IB Math HL background, I have confidence that I could handle the material - just simple limits and derivatives right? Wrong. I had the option to skip the course with my IB credits - I’m quite glad I didn’t. The difficulty ramp of the course was surprising. Many concepts like taylor series and the Mean value theorm were actually covered (not just mentions in passing in IB). The math problems of high school were paltry by comparison. My grade of 80% is quite embarassing looking back. I’ll justify it by saying I made some read-the-question-stupid mistakes on a few too many quizes.
Introductory Physics for Engineers I
Section 101 - Donald Witt - 90% / 77% Section Average
PHYS 157, a classic of 1st year engineering. Many hated the 8am lectures in the hard seats of HEBB, I didn’t mind it. The course covered the basics of the thermodynamic laws, thermal expansion, simple harmonic motion and waves. Content was quite refreshing given my interest in physics at the time. The first midterm tripped me up with a constrained multiple material thermal expansion question - quite annoyed I didn’t get it. I remember also thinking the prof looked like comic book guy in the Simpsons. Someone made a meme comparing the two.