Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) at Iowa State University

Last Monday, we had professor Mani Mina give IEEE a presentation about his background, and adversities in the engineering education environment. We'd like to thank Dr. Mina for giving the audience such an engaging and exciting conversation about the world of engineering and electromagnetics. We also had some delicious tacos from the local Ames restaurant Rinconcito Hispano, which everyone very much enjoyed. We hope you'll join us for future IEEE meetings.

We'd like to thank Taren Reker from Collins Aerospace for coming in last Monday to talk to our members! She shared interview preparation tips, resume guides, and gave other helpful advice to everyone in preparation for the career fair at Iowa State. A special thanks to all of our attendees who got to enjoy an Ames' classic, Jeff's Pizza. Join us next Monday, 2/10, where we will have a workshop dedicated to showing off the features and benefits of using LinkedIn.

At our last meeting, we had professor and mathematician Steve Butler teach IEEE about the mathematics of juggling, while enjoying Chick-Fil-A. As it turns out, there is more math involved than you might think. Specializing in graph theory, Steve Butler connected juggling patterns to directed graphs and graphical structures, as well as other numerical patterns, making for a fascinating talk that greatly interested our members. We'd like to thank Steve Butler for coming and presenting the lecture to IEEE, and we'd like to thank everyone who came to our first meeting, which has been our most successful meeting to date. Be sure to join us for our next meeting on 2/3, where Collins Aerospace will host an interview and career fair prep, as well as providing Jeff's Pizza.

Have you ever wondered what goes on inside the mysterious Iowa State Power Plant? This semester, our members got to find out by touring the plant and learning about how it functions to provide electricity, heating, and cooling for campus. A highlight of the tour was looking into the burners and seeing flames as natural gas burned to harness energy. We enjoyed seeing a real-time application of electrical and power systems engineering and look forward to doing more tours in the spring semester!

Last semester, IEEE hosted two Iowa State ECpE professors to present to our members while they enjoyed Chipotle and ice cream! We first hosted Dr. Daniels, who specializes in cyber infrastructure and secure computing, followed by Dr. Dalal, who specializes in microelectronics and photonics. Dr. Daniels gave an energetic presentation about the cybersecurity field, starting with how basic ciphers encrypt messages and going into more advanced ways that web traffic is secured. He also explained the details behind commonly used algorithms like SHA-256, which companies rely on for authentication and data integrity. Dr. Dalal focused on the increasing demand for renewable energy around the world and emphasized the importance of solar energy. Members got to learn about the technology and engineering behind solar panels and how important it is for the US to prioritize research and development in this area. We want to thank Dr. Daniels and Dr. Dalal for presenting, and we invite all ECpE students to attend our Steve Butler guest lecture on January 27th, where we will be providing FREE Chick-fil-A!

Recently, we hosted Bayer to talk with our members about their company and internship opportunities for undergraduate engineering students. Bayer is a global leader in healthcare and agriculture, and we learned all about their impressive seed facility local to Iowa. They also provided an overview of many resume best practices, followed by a one-on-one resume review for anyone interested. Our members enjoyed hearing about Bayer and exploring new ways to work towards their professional aspirations! We thank Bayer for offering this great opportunity to connect with IEEE!

We were very excited to welcome EPI Power to speak to our members and share their insights on engineering careers within the electrical contracting and construction industries. We learned about the impressive boom in data center construction and EPI’s role in providing meticulous engineering while upholding safety standards to build them. Members also heard about their hands-on approach to engineering which involves engineers, interns, and HR staff working on-site and seeing their contributions in real time. We thank Kehau Allessi, SHRM-CP for providing this informative and engaging experience to our members!

Our officers recently had the opportunity to attend the Scholarships and Awards Banquet hosted by ISU’s ECpE department. We are grateful for the accomplishments the team has made this semester and were happy to see them recognized at the banquet. We also got to hear about the great things being accomplished by other student organizations. We extend a big thank you to the ECpE department for showing us support and putting on this great event.

Recently, we had the pleasure of hosting DISTek Integration, Inc. to talk to our members about their engineering opportunities as well as how to be successful as a software engineer. One piece of advice that stood out was that it is important to showcase your personal interests in interviews in addition to your technical skills. Also, defending your ideas by disagreeing professionally and providing reasoning and experimentation leads to innovation and can help improve your soft skills as an engineer. In addition, our members learned about finding a passion within their jobs and what it’s like being a long-term engineering consultant. We thank DISTek for speaking to our members and providing many valuable lessons.

Recently, we welcomed Western Digital to talk to students about their experience being innovators in the data storage industry. They shared about the abundance of engineering and precision that goes into each device's software, firmware, and hardware. For example, many of their hard drives are sealed with helium inside to increase the lifespan and decrease vibrations and power consumption. They also emphasized the importance of optimizing software as it becomes more challenging to make hardware smaller. After the info session, members got to discuss any questions they had with engineers who helped build this technology. We thank Western Digital for joining us and sharing so much great knowledge!