SWE UCLA

Baxter Info Session: Resume Building

2011-11-27T22:06:00.000-08:00

This year, Baxter BioScience visited our SWE chapter for an infosession on November 15, 2011. Around 35 students were in attendance to learn about the full time opportunities that Baxter had available such as their Engineering Development Program. Industry representatives, Emily Tokeshi-Torres and Renee Gilmore, enlightened students on the work and company culture at Baxter especially at the Southern California locations. Following a presentation on Baxter and its products, Emily and Renee helped out the students in attendance by offering resume building advice including numerous “Do's and Don'ts.” Following the workshop, students were encouraged to talk one on one to either of the industry representatives in order to apply for positions or gain feedback on how to improve their resumes. It turned out to be incredibly useful for students and Baxter even offered their facilities for future tours to our SWE-UCLA chapter. Students were also treated to Enzo's pizza courtesy of Baxter BioScience.

Nadine Wong

EWI Co-Chair

Helping the Undecided: Major Fair

2011-11-26T01:33:00.000-08:00

The second annual Engineering Major Fair, hosted by SWE-UCLA, took place on Tuesday, November 8 and was a huge success! Undeclared major students, as well as engineering students considering changing their major, came out in packs to chat with student representatives from each engineering discipline and get the inside scoop on each field. Attendees were able to ask questions about careers they could choose in different engineering majors, classes they would get to take, course load, professors, and more! The SWE major chair committee did a great job organizing food for the event, publicizing, and talking to students. The event was co-hosted with TBP and ESUC. It was great to see some faces from these other engineering clubs too!

Amanda West

Membership Chair

Intel Info Session

2011-11-20T23:24:00.001-08:00

On November 10^th, SWE-UCLA hosted an info session for Intel with Dani Napier Harrison, Global Program Manager representing the company. She presented an overview of Intel’s various sectors of production, explaining the roles of various engineering disciplines, in particular, computer science, electrical, industrial, and mechanical engineering in the production process. After that, Dani talked about Etiquette with Employers, giving tips on the job hunting process. She also talked about various aspects of interview, including attire, types of questions, and follow-up. At the end of the infossession, Dani gave out a netbook by raffle.

Qiao Huang

Treasurer

Reaching Out to the Girl Scouts

2011-11-11T21:33:00.000-08:00

Trick-or-treating wasn't the only thing on one's minds during the Halloween weekend. On October 29th, 2011,SWE-LA Professionals and SWE-UCLA partnered up to volunteer and table at the Girltopia event, an event leading up to the big 100th anniversary of the Girl Scout Foundation. An estimated 12,000 girls attended Girltopia that day at the Los Angeles Convention Center making it one of the most outstanding expositions for young girls. Thousands of girls gathered to have fun, find adventure, speak their minds, and be inspired. Girls of all ages, from kindergarten through 12th grade, were encouraged to explore Leadership, Arts & Culture, Business, Environment, and most relevant to SWE, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM). SWE volunteers met thousands of girls and introduced not only them, but their parents as well, to the wonderful world of engineering and the many opportunities it has for them. Children were invited to play a small game, where they were introduced to a few basic concepts regarding circuits. In addition, girls were also invited to partake in the upcoming 2012 WOW, That's Engineering! Day. We can only hope that there will be enough space for all of the girls who expressed interest that day!

Christine DeSario

Outreach Chair

More Than Just a Potato Chips Company

2011-10-27T19:54:00.000-07:00

On Thursday, October 6th, SWE hosted a PepsiCo Frito Lay Interview Workshop and Infosession. The turnout was highly successful with over 50 sign-ins and a tightly packed room. The presentation started promptly after people got settled down with food and drinks, as popular music was playing in the background to set an energetic and fun mood. The two presenters, Tim Lin and Brandon Endress, got off to a quick start about the principles that PepsiCo Frito Lay are instilling within their company and consumers. Contrary to the junk food reputation many people connect with to the name PepsiCo FritoLay, the company has a mission to advocate healthy lifestyles and eating habits. They have made efforts to make their products more health conscious yet still with the same great taste. Additionally, they strongly advocate for environmental sustainability, as they enforce ways to more efficiently use the earth's natural resources in packaging all their products. The company presentation was followed by a brief presentation on how people

should conduct themselves in a behavioral interview. They gave out handy tips on how to prepare answers to tough questions under stress, as well as what to research about a company before heading in to talk to recruiters. The workshop was very interactive as it was conducted in a Q&A style and the presenters gave personal examples about their experiences. At the end, the recruiters stayed back and conducted a few mock interviews, as well as collected resumes from students interested in working for the company.

Priscilla Lok

Publicity Chair

National Conference 2011: Raising the Heights of Innovation

2011-10-20T21:53:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, October 12th, twelve of our officers arrived at LAX boarding the flight that brought us to the long awaited national conference in Chicago, Illinois. Our flight arrived at O'Hare Airport in Chicago at around 5:30 am on Thursday. Despite the lack of sleep and a long tiring flight, the group was excited to see Chicago, some for the very first time. We arrived at our hotel, Embassy Suites and delved into some hot continental breakfast and coffee. After an hour of eating, members of Team Tech quickly changed and got ready for their presentation practice at the conference center. In groups, we allmade our way to the conference center for check-in and registration and for the welcome luncheon that awaited us. After eating lunch, we started to explore the conference center and the various workshops that took place from 10 am to 5 pm each day of the conference. That night we had dinner at the "hospitalities suites" hosted by different companies that attended the conference where we not only enjoyed delicious food but also began our hunt for freestuff. We were glad to be in bed after a long exhausting day of adventure.

The next day was again full of enlightening workshops and most importantly the big career fair. All of the officers attended the career fair where we were able to talk to the many companies that were recruiting interns and full time employees. I was able to talk to the biotechnology companies that were there and even had a great conversation with one of the

representatives from Life Technologies. The career fair was definitely an eye-opening and great learning experience. We had dinner at one of Chicago's famous pizzerias and tried amazing Chicago deep-dish pizza.

On Saturday, many of the officers explored Chicago, after finally being able to catch up on some sleep. We walked around downtown Chicago, checked out shops on Michigan Avenue, as well as the many landmarks including the Bean which reflected the entire city of Chicago. As a part of the adventure, we were able to bond and get to know each of the officers more. That night, we attended our last event of the conference, the Celebrate SWE banquet. There, we heard encouraging speeches from the different keynote speakers and even got to experience Chicago's famous entertainer, Roxy Bellows. The conference came to a smooth close, and we traveled back to our hotel.

We were able to sleep in on Sunday for a little bit before we had to catch our flight at 1 pm back to Los Angeles. We were all tired after finally arriving back at LAX around 4:30 pm. All in all, I thought this was a very rewarding and valuable experience that I'm sure all of us officers would cherish for a very long time.

Tiffany Yeh

Historian

Bonding With the Alumni

2011-10-09T23:22:00.000-07:00

Every quarter, the executive board of SWE-UCLA meets up with SWE-UCLA alumni, all of who were previous officers for an Alumni Advisory Board Meeting. This fall, we met on Tuesday, October 4 in the Rice Conference Room on the 6^th floor of Boelter Hall. The purpose of this meeting is for current executive officers to network and gain insights from past alumni to continue to be successful and improve events held by SWE-UCLA. Furthermore, these meetings are to keep alumni updated with what is going on with SWE-UCLA.

At this quarter’s meeting, we had a recap of past events, including the success of Open House, Recruitment opportunities, and Mentorship events in the beginning of the year. We also discussed future events, including infosessions and Nationals. In addition to all the events that SWE-UCLA hosts, we also discussed our major project – Team Tech. This year’s Team Tech project was a phone charger; discussion for ideas for next year’s Team Tech is still in the works. We have asked alumni to give us input and ideas for our next Team Tech project. Although a bit early, we discussed Evening with Industry (EWI) company recruitment, and how to effectively get companies interested in our event. A speaker for EWI has already been chosen with a few backups so that the EWI Co-Chairs will not be rushing last minute to find a speaker at our signature event. Even further into the future, we also discussed possibilities for fundraising for our Regional Conference. This year, it will be held in Hawaii and our current funds are not enough to send all of our executive officers to this conference. Lastly, there was talk about our End-of-Year banquet. This year, SWE-UCLA is turning 40, and we’re excited to have alumni come together at this banquet to celebrate all the memories they’ve made with SWE-UCLA. Although still in the planning stages, we’re hoping to contact most alumni from the past and inviting them for a reunion at UCLA. In addition to inviting alumni to our events, we’re hoping to pair alumni mentors with student mentees. This program will encourage mentors and mentees to meet face to face at least once a quarter, and communicate actively online. Overall, the meeting was a success as the current executive board obtained advice from alumni on future events, and how to improve on past ones. We’re looking forward to next quarter’s alumni meeting as well.

Virginia Wei

Internal Vice President

Kicking off the Year with Mentorship

2011-10-09T22:34:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, September 28th, Undeclared Engineering mentees and mentors gathered in the Court of Sciences to kick start SWE’s first Fall Mentorship event (co-hosted with TBP and ESUC). Their mission? To explore the streets of Westwood and seek out its icons – the places every Bruin loves to go! Mentors formed partnerships and led teams of three or four mentees each. The teams snapped pictures of their treks from Diddy Reise to Mr. Noodle, from Mr. Noodle to the Village Center Theatre, and beyond. Spurred on by warning texts, all teams rushed back to Boelter Hall for their first check-in before the final one-minute alert was sent out. From there, they boldly went where few freshmen have gone before: the deserted “Dungeon” on the second floor of Boelter, the only elevator to SEL, and the Harry Potter Stairs. Half an hour later, everyone gathered in the Boelter Penthouse to enjoy some pizza and light refreshments. Clearly in the lead was Team Purple, who earned twenty-four points out of thirty-two. All other teams tallied at either twenty-one or twenty points. While Team Blank was in the latter category, they demonstrated a wonderful propensity for creativity that placed them as the runner-up for first place. Everyone received prizes, with the top four teams winning some UCLA swag!

On the following Wednesday, October 5th, SWE held a workshop for undeclared engineers along with TBP and ESUC. After all the mentees and mentors grabbed some Socko’s sandwiches, Erkki Corpuz and three of his fellow academic counselors gave a very informative presentation interspaced with entertaining photos and startling statistics about all of UCLA’s

engineering majors. The Q&A session that followed saw many raised hands from the attending mentees who were able to voice their individual concerns to the helpful experts present. The mentees and mentors then formed teams and constructed escape plans from a

deserted island using all the items each engineer thought up of beforehand. The myriad of creative methods ranged from hilarious to thoughtful to bizarre. After each team shared their plans amidst general laughter and cheer, the mentees then spoke to their mentors about the latters’ experiences with their majors. The evening concluded with a raffle with prizes such as SWE t-shirts.

Both events had a great turnout and were a wonderful success! Every mentee and mentor who attended either event received an email of the contact list for everyone else who attended. They were both great ways to meet new friends – both from the mentees and mentors. Many mentees contacted their mentors after the scavenger hunt and workshop to further strengthen their mentor-mentee relationship.

Amy Lin

Mentorship Chair

Open House

2011-10-06T01:11:00.000-07:00

SWE-UCLA kicked off its first general meeting of the year this past Thursday, September 29^th at 6 pm in the Rice room in Boelter Hall. The meeting was a huge success with an overwhelming amount of underclassmen eager to join and become involved with SWE. The executive board had prepared a presentation for the attendees to properly inform them about all the SWE events, info sessions, projects, committees and much more! We started out with a general introduction about Society of Women Engineers and its background, the national chapter and organization, and its growing impact in engineering, industry, and society. We then provided valuable information about the best ways of getting involved with SWE: outreach events, mentorship programs, info sessions, socials, professor luncheons, Evening With Industry (the largest student run event in the school of engineering), career and internship opportunities, networking, workshops, etc. We then quizzed the students to see who was paying the most attention during our presentation and gave out SWEet prizes like t-shirts and cups to those that had the correct answers! Virginia Wei, our internal vice president, was kind enough to prepare signup sheets for students who were interested in joining committees (Evening With Industry, Mentorship, Major Committee Chairs, and Team Tech). Nadine Wong and Ariana Thaker, our EWI chairs, held a small info session after open house to recruit potential students that wanted to help out setting up for the event ahead of time since it requires a lot of preparation beforehand. Finally, we concluded our meeting with some SWEet treats (Diddy Riese cookies) for all the attendees. We hope to see you all at our upcoming events – it’s going to be a great year!

Ramita Sawhney

External Vice President

The Beginning of Yet Another SWEet Year!

2011-10-03T17:29:00.001-07:00

The 2011-2012 officers started off this new school year with our first event, the SWE Officers' Retreat. It took place on September 24th through the 25th, the weekend before school officially began. Bright and early on Saturday, the group headed to Sunset Recreation Center for a fun-filled four hours at UCLA's very own Challenge Course. The Challenge Course was indeed challenging as we were able to come face to face with our fear of height and were ableto learn the valuable lesson of teamwork. Through working together, we completed many tasks, one of them being Maui-to-Oahu in which the whole team had to get from one "island"

(wooden block) to another "island" only by the use of two wooden beams. After a long, rewarding experience at the Challenge

Course, we headed to our hotel for check-in and showers before dinner.

We had dinner at an Indian restaurant in Culver City, accompanied by Bill Goodin, his wife, and our faculty advisor, Professor Andrea Kasko. Over the course of dinner, we again got to know each other better and were able to have very interesting conversations with Bill, his wife, and Professor Kasko. After about two and a half hours of dining, the group headed back to the hotel to change and prepare for our next adventure, Moonlight Ice Skating! We ended our day after ice skating at 1 am. All of us were glad to be back in our hotel rooms to sleep and recharge for the day to come when our first executive board meeting would take place.

The next morning we got up at around 9 am to have continental breakfast provided by the hotel. Our first E-board meeting officially started at 10 am. We brainstormed and talked about the events for this upcoming quarter. After two hours of intense planning and discussion, we concluded our officers' retreat and headed back to UCLA in preparation for the SWEet year to come!

Tiffany Yeh

Historian

Gingerbread House Making Competition!

2011-01-02T15:57:00.000-08:00

As our last social event of the quarter, the Gingerbread House Making Competition was definitely a fun-filled event to remember. On Thursday, November 18th, SWE-UCLA members and friends were invited to participate in a competition that required not only engineering skills, but also our sweet teeth.
All building supplies and accessories were provided by SWE-UCLA for our very own architects, contractors and designers. Participants were given a little less than one hour to make their holiday creations. Hot chocolate was distributed to those in need of a warm and sweet sugar boost, although many of us chose to stick with licking the frosting off our fingers. As foundations were built and walls were put up, each participant's individual styles began to emerge – a balcony here, a front lawn there. When it came time to judge the gingerbread houses, there was a scurry for last minute additions and finishing touches.
Bill Goodin and Andrea Kasko, SWE-UCLA advisors, judged each person's houses fairly and carefully. After making their many rounds of observations and even witnessing the accidental destruction of one house, decisions were made and four winning houses were announced.
The popular event definitely set the mood for the upcoming holidays. All participants left for the night satisfied and a little bit sugar high. As always, the competition was a success. To all SWE-UCLA members, friends and family: Happy holidays and have a fantastic winter break!

Jenn Wang
Webmaster

2010 National Conference: Launching Innovation, Defining Success

2011-01-02T15:44:00.000-08:00

On the night of November 3rd, 2010, fourteen executive board members of SWE-UCLA made their way to the Annual Conference for Women Engineers, hosted in Orlando, Florida. We arrived at our hotel, Rosen Inn, around 7 am local time after a long (and shaky) red-eye flight. Needless to say, we were all cranky, hungry, and exhausted…only to discover that we had to check into the Convention Center for the Conference in a few hours! We quickly grabbed some breakfast, washed up, and got ready for the busy day ahead of us. We first checked in at the Convention Center, a gorgeous building conveniently located right next to our hotel, where we attended the Collegiate Welcome Luncheon with delicious sandwiches, pizzas, and drinks. At the luncheon, we met other collegiate members and listened to presentations by various speakers. This was followed by the SWE Region B meeting, where we were accompanied by other collegiate section members from Southern California, Utah, Mexico, Arizona, and Southern Nevada. We all split up into separate committees where we discussed with our groups what ideas and programs SWE Region B should work on and implement in the upcoming year. We then had some down time to go back to our hotel rooms and rest before attending the hospitality suites hosted by many big companies including Google, Dell, Boeing, Boston Scientific, etc. This was a wonderful opportunity for job seekers and students to informally speak with company representatives as well as enjoy delicious snacks and appetizers!
We started off our next day with a enormous career fair bright n’ early in the morning. Members not only had the chance to speak to big name companies but some were even called back for interviews the same day. For those uninterested in finding jobs, however, there were a huge variety of workshops going on throughout the day. These workshops included presentations about companies, interview skills, professional/business etiquette, outreach events, time management and much more. After a busy afternoon, we were ready to relax and explore Orlando. For dinner, we headed to Café Tu Tu Tango, a local Spanish tapas restaurant that not only offered delicious and affordable food but also had a vivacious and lively atmosphere, which included beautiful artwork and a live performance by flamenco dancers. Definitely a night to remember! The next day was our “day off” so we got to choose how we wanted to spend our free time; some of us decided to hit the mall and shop at the Orlando Premium Outlets while others headed to the theme parks to check out the brand new Wizarding World of Harry Potter. We all got back just in time for the Celebrate SWE! Banquet, where we enjoyed a delicious three-course meal while watching all the different SWE region representatives compete against each other during a spin-the-wheel contest. Additionally, we had the pleasure of being accompanied by the entertainer Roxy Bellows, the emcee for the event, who kept the audience laughing and chuckling the entire night. Soon after, the SWE staff presented various awards to honor individuals as well as professional and collegiate sections for their outstanding work and dedication to SWE. UCLA was proud to receive several awards, which included the Membership Retention Program Award, 1st place for the 2009-2010 Newsletter Award, and 2nd place for the 2009-2010 Website Award. Additionally, our very own counselor Bill Goodin received the Rodney D. Chipp Memorial Award, which "celebrates the work of a man or company who has made a significant contribution to the acceptance and advancement of women in engineering." Congratulations to Bill and to the SWE-UCLA executive board for making this possible.
All in all, the 2010 SWE conference was even better than we had hoped for & provided wonderful benefits and opportunities for all members. A special thanks to everyone who came out to Orlando, FL and was able to attend and represent UCLA. We can’t wait for another successful and amazing conference next year in Chicago!

Ramita Sawhney
Historian

Girl Scout Family Science Festival Outreach Article

2011-01-02T14:33:00.001-08:00

On October 3, 2010, SWE-UCLA participated in the Girl Scout Family Science Festival at Caltech in Pasadena, Ca. The day was aimed at sharing and spreading a love for science among girl scouts and their families. Numerous Girl Scout troops and universities participated, providing activities for the girls and sharing information about their organizations. SWE-UCLA members taught girls about physics by helping them make catapults with paint sticks, tape, and Dixie cups. Girls also had a chance to learn about fingerprinting by seeing their own fingerprints using lead and tape. Both activities were a real hit with all the kids, and we had many visitors at our booth. SWE-UCLA also provided information to parents and students about math, science, and engineering, encouraging girls to pursue their interests in these subjects. Many UCLA students shared stories with girls about their experiences in college and with engineering in their lives. The Girl Scout Family Science Festival was also a good opportunity for UCLA students to network with other groups from other universities and with companies, like JPL. There were many cool exhibits to look at, like a hydroelectric car from SeaWorld and solar panels that powered a blender.
There were so many things to learn and experience for Girl Scouts, college students, and parents. Overall, the day was very fun and productive, and all the volunteers really enjoyed the event. SWE-UCLA will be attending the Girl Scout Cookie Kick-off in January as well. If you are interested in volunteering, please contact Outreach Director Jasmine Shah at jasmine11@ucla.edu.

Jasmine Shah
Outreach Chair

T-Mobile Infosession & Resume Tips

2010-10-18T21:38:00.000-07:00

The SWE-UCLA infosession on October 14, 2010 was a huge success as students ranging from Computer Science Engineering to Electrical Engineering majors crowded into Boelter 5800 to listen to a representative from T-mobile speak about their company. The evening began with a short introduction reminding members of SWE’s upcoming events and the agenda for the night while members filled up on Baja Fresh. Next, Kaplan gave a brief presentation offering their test preparation services to the students. The T-mobile representative then took the floor and gave a very useful PowerPoint presentation on resume Do’s and Don’ts and tips on how to create an effective and interesting resume. This resume workshop outlined the guidelines for resume formatting and content and even warned students to be careful of their electronic resumes (i.e. Facebook or Google). Following the workshop was a presentation on how to apply to jobs and internships for T-mobile and how T-mobile’s main office in Seattle is a great place to work. Finally, the industry representative ended the evening with a Q&A session to review their resumes and answer any questions the students might have. Overall, SWE members came to a productive event, where they were able to improve their resumes and learn about the T-mobile company.

Debbie Duan
EWI Internal Co-Chair

SWE Open House

2010-10-17T23:14:00.000-07:00

6:00PM on Thursday September 30^th saw the ESUC lounge crowded with over 100 guests for SWE’s ‘10/’11 Open House. We kicked off with an icebreaker where everyone got the chance to learn more about their neighbors while munching their way through Subway sandwiches and drinks. A great prize awaited those who had the courage to then introduce their neighbors – a SWE t-shirt!
SWE-UCLA President, Carolyn Chuang, then formally introduced the executive board for this coming year and encouraged all new faces to approach these officers with any questions they may have after the presentations. Various events held by SWE – such as EWI, Social Events, Mentorship Events, and Outreach events – were then showcased via a slideshow. This was followed by signups for mentorship, outreach, and team tech. The response was far beyond what we expected! The committee sign-ups for Social Chair and EWI Co-Chairs were just as well-received. Following that, questions relating to the slideshow were posed to the floor, with cool little prizes for those who managed to answer. After the event, non-members were able to join SWE by registering online using prepared laptops outside the ESUC lounge. Overall, the event was a great success, with many newcomers and freshmen excited to be signing up for the various activities that SWE has to offer. Hopefully we’ll be seeing familiar faces in upcoming events!

Mentorship Kick-Off!

2010-10-10T16:22:00.000-07:00

On Monday, October 4th, SWE kicked off their first mentorship dinner of the academic year, hosted by SWE's mentorship chair, Ariana Thacker. There was yummy El Pollo Loco served, which included grilled chicken, rice, beans, and mashed potatoes. As an icebreaker, the group of about 60 mentees and mentors played "In Sync" where each table, divided by major, had to come up with their own synchronized movement for a prize of extra raffle tickets. This meet and greet allowed mentees the opportunity to build a rapport with their mentors and exchange contact information in a very social environment. Several raffle prizes were given: including t-shirts, water bottles, notebooks, and calculators. In addition to a very informational powerpoint highlighting must-know information and advice, the famous SWE mentorship folders were emailed to the mentees after the event, in an effort to go green. With raffles, free food, and good company, the attendees of SWE's Fall Mentorship dinner had a great time, with hopefully many more in our upcoming SWE events in the winter and fall.

Ariana Thacker
Mentorship Chair

The Beginning of a SWEet Year

2010-09-26T23:23:00.000-07:00

SWE Fall retreat 2010 took place the first weekend after school officially began (Nov 5-6) and it was definitely a great kick-off to the rest of the year with tons of interactive & fun activities. We started off our Saturday mornings with an intense four-hour challenge course at Sunset Recreation Center. This interactive course was designed to physically and mentally challenge all members in order to facilitate individual and group development. It included many team and individual challenges like building paths, climbing, jumping onto a trapeze, walking on rope hundreds of feet above the ground and group interventions after each activity to discuss personal obstacles and what helped us get past them. Personally, my favorite activity was called "The San Andreas Fault" in which we were split into two groups of five and had to act as if we were standing close to the San Andreas fault and had to construct a pathway with four pieces of wooden logs in order to get across the fault. This specific challenge required a lot of effective team work, coordination, and communication and I truly felt that we all stepped up to strategize, work together, and help each other out to cross over the fault. It definitely involved lots of courage, communication, and physical strength from all of the members and we successfully completed the activity!

Next, we headed over to a bowling alley with awesome disco lights and played a game of ten rounds. After a successful game of bowling (with the help of some bumpers), we headed over to the arcade to play some games. We played dance dance revolution, basketball, motorcycle and car rides, air hockey, and other games until we worked up a huge appetite for dinner. We dined at Lala's (an Argentinian restaurant) in Studio City close by the bowling alley, where we were accompanied by Bill Goodin and his wife!

Wej concluded our day with a beach bonfire at Dockweiler Beach by Playa Del Rey. We made yummy smores (though some marshmallows caught on fire), shared scary stories, jokes, and (nerdy) riddles while sitting around the warm fire. A couple hours later, we were ready to head back and sleep in before our first executive meeting the next morning. We gathered again the next morning at Carolyn's for a breakfast followed by a meeting, where we discussed and planned upcoming events for the academic year. All in all, it was a successful retreat that not only helped us form strong bonds but also allowed us to plan and prepare an exciting year for SWE!

Ramita Sawhney
Historian

A Black & White Affair--Saying Goodbye

2010-06-07T09:43:00.000-07:00

Over fifty guests filled the Red Baron room at the Proud Bird Restaurant near Los Angeles International Airport on May 22, 2010 to celebrate the achievements of SWE-UCLA’s executive board and advisors this past year, introduce the newcomers for next year, and honor three recipients of this year’s SWE-UCLA Lockheed Martin Scholarship awards – Tiffany Choy, Anna Kin, and Linda Wong. This year’s end of the year banquet was themed a “Black and White Affair,” and most guests arrived clad in their best black and white cocktail attire and ready to have a good time. Those in attendance included the SWE-UCLA incoming and outgoing executive board members, SWE-UCLA counselor Bill Goodin, SWE-UCLA Adviser Andrea Kasko, and representatives from Lockheed Martin, Johanna and Jessica Murabaki.

The evening began with h’orderves, followed by a delicious three-course dinner. Students, faculty, and honored guests were able to mingle and chat throughout dinner. Afterwards, the ceremonial portion of the evening began, with a speech by SWE-UCLA President Tiffany Tsao. Tiffany summarized the many achievements SWE has accomplished this year, including hosting a successful Evening with Industry which drew in over 300 attendees and multiple social, outreach, and Team Tech efforts. She continued on to thank the outgoing executive board, major chairs, and committee members for their contributions to the organization and then introduced the incoming board, wishing them the best of luck. Finally, Tiffany announced the winners of this year’s SWE-UCLA scholarships generously donated by Platinum sponsors Lockheed Martin Corporation. These recipients were chosen based on their academic success and involvement in SWE. The recipients – Tiffany Choy, Anna Kin, and Linda Wong – were all past active members of SWE-UCLA who embody the spirit of SWE. The evening closed by opening up the dance floor to all those who cared to join in on the fun. Overall, the evening was a huge success and a night to remember for all!

Linda Wong
EWI external co-chair

Lunch with Professors

2010-05-21T16:51:00.000-07:00

This past Thursday, 5/20, the Major Chair Committee from the Society of Women Engineers at UCLA held its second quarterly Professor Luncheon. One professor from each of the school’s seven engineering departments was confirmed to attend the event. While unfortunately two of the professors were unable to attend on the day of, the remaining five professors as well as our faculty advisor, Andrea Kasko, showed up to give valuable advice to the students. Overall, about 20 people attended the event. Students were seated according to their major, and got a chance to talk one-to-one with their professors while eating a delicious lunch from San Sai. Some topics discussed were: future plans, news pertaining to engineering technology, research, etc. In the future, we hope to make the event larger and encourage additional members as well as non-members to attend and interact with their professors.

Tina Zhou
Internal Vice President

Inter-Club Jeopardy?

2010-05-12T20:22:00.002-07:00

It was early evening on May 11, 2010 and four UCLA engineering clubs had gathered together in Engineering V for a showdown! Members from Society of Women Engineers (SWE), Society of Latino Engineering Students (SOLES), Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AICHE) competed in a jeopardy game hosted by AICHE. The game consisted of questions (100 – 500 points) from six different categories. In the first round, SWE faced off against SOLES. SOLES jumped out to an early lead, but SWE made a good showing and gave SOLES a scare near the end. SWE surprised people with their incredible knowledge of engineering questions, especially organic chemistry. Members from all clubs enjoyed refreshments and were able to socialize with not only members from their own club, but from other clubs as well. There was even a free raffle in between rounds, which gave away UCLA engineering T-shirts. Overall, the jeopardy event was a very enjoyable inter-club social that allowed people to relax while showing a little team spirit for their respective engineering clubs.

Debbie Duan
Social Chair

A Tribute to the Mothers of Engineers

2010-05-12T20:22:00.001-07:00

What’s a room full of glitter, colored paper, heart stickers, and markers galore have to do with a group of engineers? You guessed it! Students from all over (read: primarily Boelter Hall) convened in the ESUC lounge on the evening of May 6 for a night of merry card-making and drinking of yummy, hot chocolate. Hosted by SWE, this social event let students awaken their inner artist and create masterpieces to mail home in time for Mother’s Day. One student was notably observed painting a beautiful beach scene with glitter while another was busy constructing a card and envelope entirely from scratch. Who else could exhibit such serious, card-making magic? That’s right, just one of the many hidden talents of your typical UCLA engineer.

Grace King
External Vice President

Edwards Lifesciences

2010-05-05T22:11:00.001-07:00

Last Thursday, April 29th, the Society of Women Engineers and the International Society of Pharmaceutical Engineering hosted an infosession and a meet and greet session featuring Edwards Lifesciences, one of the leading companies in cardiovascular biotechnology. Five company representatives who were all hired within the last year, including one UCLA Engineering alumni, came to UCLA to present their experiences with Edwards and to mingle with the students. They held a variety of roles within the company and were able to provide students with valuable advice not only about the industry but also about the college-to-work transition process. Overall, the company representatives were excited to share their knowledge, and the event had a great turnout.

Tina Zhou
Internal Vice President

A SWEet BBQ

2010-04-28T23:25:00.000-07:00

It was a warm sunny afternoon on April 24, 2010, and the Society of Women Engineers came out to the Sunset Canyon Recreation Center to relax and barbeque. The event drew a variety of people including some brand new SWE member and several members of UCLA’s Linux User Group in addition to the regular SWE veterans. This allowed some of the inactive SWE members to become more involved. The main attractions of this barbecue social were free food, sunshine, friends, and a giant beach ball. The event was planned during the weekend between 4^th and 5^th week, which allowed members to relax either after a stressful week of midterms, or before the upcoming week of midterms (or both if they are extremely unlucky). Members gathered around the grill and talked of everything from what classes and professors to take or avoid to summer plans. Others grabbed the gigantic beach ball and attempted to play catch with it, which proved to be difficult due to the size and momentum of the beach ball once it got going. The burgers and hot dogs were delicious and the drinks (water and a variety of soda) were kept cool in a large bucket full of ice water. During the set-up, several members put their engineering minds to work and developed a plastic aqueduct to easily transfer water from the drinking fountain into the ice bucket. Overall, the barbecue social allowed members to escape from their academic pressures and enjoy good food and bright sunshine in the company of old and new friends.

Debbie Duan
Social Chair

Northrop Grumman

2010-04-28T23:14:00.000-07:00

On April 15, 2010, SWE hosted an information session with Northrup Grumman. 29 students attended while 15 were SWE members. The objective of the infosession was to give students the opportunity to network with Northrup Grumman. Ben, the representative from Northrup Grumman, had a short presentation about Nortrup Grumman and what his involvement in the company entailed. The last half of the infosession was more interactive. Students wrote their questions on a sheet of paper and Ben answered the first nine questions with his best advice as well as giving away Quiznos sandwich gift cards . At least 10 students stayed after to hand their resume to Ben for internship and full time job opportunities. Overall, it was a successful infosession where many students gained a lot of knowledge and insight from Northrup Grumman!

Cynthia Ma
Treasurer

Dinner with your Future

2010-04-28T23:06:00.000-07:00

SWE hosted many events winter quarter but there is one event I want to highlight. I want to congratulate the success of the Third Annual Dinner With Your Future. It is a mentorship event where undergraduate students, (ranging from freshman to super senior status) come, eat, and enjoy dinner at the dormitories with fellow UCLA graduate students and alumni. This year, it was held in De Neve Private Dining Room during E-Week (April 6 to be precise). We had a great attendance! We had a grand total of 13 alumni and graduate students and 24 enthusiastic undergraduates.

From start to finish, the room was buzzing with conversations. Each table in the Private Dining Room had a different profession/concentration which ranged from all the majors, including law! Personally, I thought my table was the best. I sat at the law table and for the first time, I got to personally speak with Puya Partow-Navid (UCLA '01 - Computer Science), a patent lawyer. He talked to our table about his ups and downs while he was at UCLA, surviving the dot com crash, applying to law school, and finally contently working at his current firm. This mentorship event was definitely beneficial to me as a developing engineer because after talking to Puya, I felt that I have more career options than just a traditional technical engineer . I strongly believe that without Dinner With Your Future, I would not be able to have this opportunity.

Once again, I am congratulating the success with Dinner With Your Future! The event would not have been possible without the help of the other co-hosting engineering organizations: TBP, ESUC, AIChE, ASCE, MSE, UPE.

Cynthia Ma
Treasurer

E-Week at UCLA

2010-04-23T16:34:00.000-07:00

Engineers Week has been a long tradition at UCLA. This year’s 35^th annual E-week featured a variety of activities which took place during the day time as well as evenings. Below was the schedule for the week starting Monday, April 5 through Friday, April 9:

Monday: Free Ice Cream and E-Week Idol

Tuesday: Kids Day and Dinner with Your Future

Wednesday: Book Sale and Club Showcases

Thursday: Book Sale, Club Showcases, and Free Candy for Engineering Shirts

Friday: BBQ

Engineers Week was established to celebrate engineering and increase awareness of engineers on the UCLA campus. Traditionally, the Engineering Society of UCLA (ESUC) works with the engineering student groups on campus to organize the event. The Society of Women Engineers was one of the 16 clubs which helped put on the event. In addition to writing an article for the newsletter, we participated in a variety of activities throughout the week, including Kids Day, Dinner with Your Future, and club showcases on Wednesday and Thursday. Many SWE officers and members also joined in on the other fun activities.

People lined up for free ice cream in the Court of Sciences on Monday to kick off the week. That evening, our president, Tiffany Tsao, and EWI Co-chair, Linda Wong, entertained an audience at E-Week Idol with their MC act, where contestants performed a variety of talents.

On Tuesday, over three hundred 5^th and 6^th grade students from the UCLA lab school joined the engineering students in Wilson Plaza for fun science experiments with the engineering groups. SWE prepared a polymer activity for the kids, which involved mixing glue and boric acid to produce silly putty. The event turned out very successful because the kids were excited about the idea of making things on their own. This activity was very popular in SWE’s past outreach events, and will continue to be a favorite among the kids interested in science. Other clubs such as ASCE and SOLES also prepared activities like concrete bowling and an egg-drop experiment, which the kids had a chance to perform during their rotations. Hopefully the clubs that participated on this day played a role in shaping future scientists and engineers.

Wednesday and Thursday featured numerous engineering club showcases in the Court of Sciences along with a book sale by ESUC. Current and future SWE officers volunteered to table and represent our organization, providing other students with information about our club. We also laid out flyers, newsletters, and posters to let the general public know about the events and activities that SWE hosts throughout the year. On Thursday, people who wore engineering shirts (including the SWE officers tabling on that day) also received free candy bars courtesy of the Engineering Society. The festivities continued on Friday with a BBQ sale in the Court of Sciences.

Overall, SWE was very exited about participating in E-week, and will continue to promote engineering, especially women in engineering, among the students here at UCLA.

Tina Zhou
Internal Vice President

Calling All Incoming Freshmen

2010-04-18T22:05:00.000-07:00

Every year in spring, HSSEAS hosts Engineering Freshmen Open House which aims to attract and capture the attention of prospective UCLA Engineering students. Thousands of admitted high school seniors and their families attended the event held at the Royce Hall Auditorium on Sunday morning, April 11th. The event started with the welcoming speech by Dean Dhir, and it was followed by the departmental speeches given by the dean of each engineering department. SWE UCLA alumni, Jacq Leong, spoke of her experience here at UCLA and SWE’s role in making her UCLA experience so memorable. Our SWE Internal Vice President, Tina Zhou also gave a speech on different engineering student groups on campus, including SWE and ESUC.

Numerous SWE members participated as volunteers for the Open House. We started the morning by distributing informational packets to the arriving students and families. After the general session, each prospective student was lead to their departmental meeting base for their major. After the department meetings, students had the option of attending housing tours and campus tours.

Every year, Engineering Open House serves to introduce students to the inspiring environment of being a Bruin engineer and the exciting four years to come. SWE’s involvement every year allows us to introduce our organization to prospective students, giving us the leverage to build our membership as we start the next school year.

Yin Seo
Publicity Chair

Dumpling Mentorship

2010-04-18T21:28:00.000-07:00

The mentorship event on Tuesday, April 13th was a success! Aside from the usual executive board, there seemed to be many new members that attended as well. We discussed their plans for this quarter and their expectations for SWE in the coming months and next year. In terms of food, whoever thought of having dumplings for the social is a genius! They were delicious and there was a good variety of flavors. It was great seeing new and current executive members working together in preparing the dumplings! We finished the night with a raffle with many members walking out with various prizes, including a few SWE t-shirts!

David Liu
Webmaster

Elementary Outreach

2010-04-18T21:13:00.001-07:00

This past Saturday, April 17, SWE hosted an outreach event with elementary school kids at the Felicia Manhood Senior Center. The main purpose of this event was to interact with elementary school kids from underprivileged areas. Along with four of SWE’s executive board members, many adult volunteers were also present to help out with the kids’ activities. As soon as all the kids arrived, they each picked a book of their interest and paired off with a volunteer to help them read it aloud for the next hour. Not only was it a great bonding experience, but as a volunteer it was also very rewarding to help out the kids with their reading skills. After reading, we took a snack break with yummy crackers and cuties. We took this opportunity to formally introduce the SWE committee to the kids and tell them about Engineering and its applications in the real world. We then followed up with an “engineering” activity that involved making rocket balloons (with strings, straws, balloons, and tape), which turned out to be a big hit with the kids. Hopefully, they will be successful engineers of our next generation!

Ramita Sawhney
2010-2011 Historian

Elections 2010

2010-04-13T06:59:00.000-07:00

The UCLA Chapter of the Society of Women Engineers recently had their Executive Board Elections and Committee Chair Elections on April 1st and April 8th, respectively. We had a great turnout for both events, and we're all excited to see what the new board will do with SWE next year. Congratulations to the SWE officers of 2010-2011!

President: Carolyn Chuang

External Vice President: Tiffany Choy

Internal Vice President: Ashley Jin

Secretary: Ian Rustandi

Treasurer: Virginia Wei

EWI External Co-Chair: Aleksandra Mstowska

EWI Internal Co-Chair: Deborah Duan

Publicity Chair: Sophie Yang

Social Chair: Amber Nicholson

Mentorship Chair: Ariana Thacker

Outreach Director: Jasmine Shah

Team Tech Director: Nadine Wong

Historian: Ramita Sawhney

Webmaster: Jennifer L. Wang

MSE Major Chair: Renee Lau

EE Major Chairs: Derek Liu, Emily Cheung

ME Major Chairs: Jennifer L. Wang, Jennifer H. Wang

Congratulations to Cynthia Ma for being elected one of next year's Region B Region Collegiate Representatives (RCR)!!

For those seeking to become more active members of SWE, be sure to keep an eye out for elections in the fall! Carolyn Chuang, the incoming President, will be hosting elections for the Team Tech Committee and Outreach Committee.

Tiffany Tsao

President

Engineering Mentoring--The Journey by Vu Pham

2010-03-30T17:37:00.001-07:00

On March 4, 2010, SWE-UCLA hosted our last general meeting of winter quarter. We had the fortunate opportunity of having Vu Pham, a senior scientist from Boeing, speak to our members about five steps to a better engineering career. They are:

Understand the implications of your choices
Choose positions and develop skills
Understand the implications for choosing a company (large vs. small)
Understand the implications of choosing a career path (technical vs. management)
Take action!

Mr. Pham made the presentation very energetic, entertaining, interactive, and insightful. One of the presentation highlights was that to simulate the product life cycle, Mr. Pham had the members join in groups of four; each team member was responsible for a different role in the product life cycle of building a paper airplane (requirements, design, fabrication, and test). This gave us a hands-on perspective on the responsibilities and advantages/disadvantages of working in various positions in a company.

Mr. Pham discussed many of his own experiences and those of other engineers he has worked with to help make us more informed and aware for when we enter our own careers. The hope is that we will be able to make better decisions after hearing his talk, and that we will seek future mentors of our own to continue to help us in our careers and/or lives.

To read more about Mr. Pham’s talk, you can take a look at the meeting minutes from our website for some great advice!

Good luck to everyone on finals, and have a spectacular spring break! See you next quarter!

Carolyn Chuang
Team Tech Director

Valentine's Day Card-Making

2010-02-23T01:07:00.000-08:00

Over 25 people attended this year’s Valentine’s Day Social, including many SWE members and a few new faces. There was a good mix of young and old members, which allowed members of different years to get to know one another better. The participants used a variety of paper, glitter, glue, stickers, and hearts to create Valentine’s Day cards for their loved ones and friends. Near the end of the event, people compared their cards each believing theirs to be the prettiest and most imaginative of the bunch. The event took place on Thursday, February 11, 2010 at the end of week 6, which allowed the participants to unwind after their first round of midterms. While they were making cards, everyone snacked on Diddy Riese cookies and hot chocolate, which helped warm the cold February evening. Overall, the Valentine’s Day Social allowed members to relax and get in touch with their soft side before the most romantic day of the year.

Debbie Duan
Social Chair

Professor Luncheons

2010-02-11T23:15:00.000-08:00

On Wednesday, February 3rd, SWE UCLA had the great pleasure of hosting professors John Villasenor (Electrical Engineering), Carey Nachenberg (Computer Science), Ann Karagozian (Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering), and Tatiana Segura (Chemical Engineering) at our first ever SWE Professor Luncheon! Participating students were given a valuable chance to ask questions ranging from the personal to the professional as well as get to know their professors better over an informal, casual Mr. Noodle lunch. With over 20 student attendees, the ESUC lounge was filled with continuous conversation and intriguing discussions.

Thursday's Professor Luncheon was also a success. Material Science & Engineering's professor, Esther Lan, Civil Engineering's professor, Shaily Mahendra, and Bioengineering's professor, Andrea Kasko, came out to join approximately 15 girls who were interested in learning more about their professors. Discussions topics included research, each professor’s background, what classes they were teaching, and why they enjoy teaching at UCLA. After the hour was over, students continued to discuss with the professors after the luncheon. Everyone had a great time, learned a little more about these professors, and gained valuable information from the event. Overall, both students and faculty were pleased with the event and expressed interest in seeing more luncheons in future quarters.

Ashley Jin and Virginia Wei
Major Chairs

HP Infosession

2010-02-10T23:06:00.000-08:00

On January 27th, one day after our biggest event of the year EWI 2010, we hosted an Hewlett Packard Infsession. UCLA alum Kristine, an R&D Software Engineer and Ken, the University Recruiting Program Manager, gave a presentation on "How to get a job in this economy – How to make yourself standout." Kristine gave some insights, some of which included Google-ing your name, a list of notable job search websites, and other routes of getting into the company other than applying to full time. She stressed how important it is to perfect the resume because that is what will land you the first interview. Kristine also gave tips on how to interview. A lot of times, students stress over the technical aspect of the interview, but in fact, most companies look for a prospect with a personality. It is way more important to be honest and passionate about the job than it is to be entirely technology savvy. Other than the helpful tips from Kristine, Ken also announced some of the open positions at HP and the background of the company. One of the highlights of the night was the mysterious grab bag that only students who answered questions correctly got the chance to pick an item out of!

To learn more about the company and the presentation, check out the minutes that will soon be posted on the SWE Website!

Yin Seo
Publicity Chair

Region B Conference

2010-02-07T16:23:00.000-08:00

On January 29th, 12 SWE UCLA members flew off to Phoenix, Arizona to start off the year at the annual SWE Region B Conference. After checking into the Sheraton, they headed downtown to Sam’s Café for a welcome dinner where they enjoyed delicious Tex-Mex and had a chance to talk to SWE members coming from schools in Utah, Nevada, Arizona, and California.

Saturday was the focal point of the conference, beginning early in the morning with breakfast and speeches by the keynote speakers, Tauny Woo and Siddika Demir, who encouraged the audience to take advantage of all that SWE has to offer and shared their experiences of success when working hard and setting goals. Breakfast was followed by a full morning of workshops on topics that were geared to help women better understand their workplace and on how to improve their careers. This included everything from making decisions about graduate school to leading and managing projects. One of the workshops in particular, titled “Emotional Intelligence,” gave pointers on how to control one’s own emotions and also observe and respond correctly to others'.

Lunch was set up as a networking event where SWE collegiates and professional members mixed it up and sat interspersed at different tables. It was a unique opportunity to ask questions, learn from one another and form relationships. Before the tiramisu was even able to be digested the career fair was opened and all conference participants were invited to talk to companies as large as Intel and the Air Force to smaller, private companies, based in Arizona. In concurrence with the career fair was another session of afternoon workshops covering topics such as “How to Build Awareness,” “Staying Up to Date and Technical,” and “The Joy and Art of Communication.” All SWE collegiate members attended the collegiate meeting where the Region Collegiate Representatives led a discussion on SWE goals and ended with each chapter sharing its “best practice,” an activity that was particularly successful.

The day ended with dinner and an exciting raffle. Keynote speaker, Joan Koerber-Walker, gave a motivational speech on how she got to where she is today and the obstacles she had to overcome in the process. She stressed that sometimes she simply had to follow her gut instinct, and she never let anyone give her "no" as a final answer. She gave advice on sticking to what you believe in and finding others who value those convictions as well. Dinner concluded with the much anticipated raffle where at least one person from each table generously received a prize hidden under the table, and our own president, Tiffany Tsao, won the coveted iPod nano!

This year’s SWE Regional Conference was a great opportunity to build the network that SWE so highly promotes, especially among women engineers, and reminded all participants of the purpose and goals of the organization. SWE is pushing forward with higher levels of communication between professional and collegiate members, outreach events for young girls to stir up interest in engineering, and fundraisers for scholarships. Hopefully, those of us who were able to attend can continue to achieve these aspects of SWE here at UCLA and have a great time doing it!

Renee Lau

Secretary

Evening with Industry 2010

2010-02-07T16:03:00.000-08:00

On Tuesday, January 26, 2010, engineering students from the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Sciences student body converged under on eroof to dine with company representatives in the 33rd annual Evening With Industry (EWI). Hosted by SWE-UCLA, this sold-out event consisted of an elegant three-course meal where students were able to enjoy dinner with company representatives from all across the engineering industry. Following dinner, the students were able to attend a career fair exclusive to EWI attendees to scope out the many other companies that were present that night.

Evening With Industry took place once again in the Covel Commons’ Grand Horizon Ballroom, and its success was the outcome of many months of planning. Prior to the date, the EWI Co-chairs, Linda Wong and Sophia Lin, worked to enhance company and student participation and meticulously planned out the event to ensure a great experience for both students and companies. While initially, there was concern that the economic downturn would negatively affect company attendance at EWI, it was not the case as thirty three companies decided to partner with SWE-UCLA that night. In addition to attending EWI, the Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Abbott Vascular, Blizzard Entertainment, T-Mobile, and Xerox even went on to generously sponsor SWE-UCLA. Many companies also went out of their way to donate raffle prizes ranging from company-sponsored grab bags, backpacks and gift cards to IPods, netbook computers, and a DirecTV system.

Active student recruitment for this event also took place in the form of flyers, emails, Facebook invites, and word of mouth during the weeks leading up to the event as all the SWE officers and committee members worked to publicize this event to the UCLA engineering student body. The dedication and commitment paid off as the event sold out at 252 students with some students needing to sign up on the waitlist. The student participants of this event came from not only all departments of the engineering school but also those outside HSSEAS, including physics and computational studies. The students included undergraduate students, graduate students, as well as recent UCLA graduate. EWI was a great opportunity for students looking for internships and full time jobs as many of the companies who came were hiring. The companies were also presented with a resume CD that contained the resumes of the EWI student attendees.

These enthusiastic students not only had the opportunity to interface with industry representatives in both an intimate setting, but they were also able to listen to the keynote speaker, Vinita Gupta, President and founder of the company Quick Eagle Networks, talk about entrepreneurship. More specifically, Gupta spoke about her journey from being a student immigrant from India to the CEO of Quick Eagle Corporation and what she learned about herself and others through her journey.

Evening With Industry proved once again to be a highly successful and well-received event by both students and companies. For many students it was their first time going to a recruiting event of this nature and this helped ease them into a professional setting. Feedback was very positive and EWI 2010 resulted in an increase of membership and publicity for SWE-UCLA.

Sophia Lin
EWI Co-Chair

Etiquette Mentorship

2010-01-23T02:46:00.000-08:00

The SWE Winter Quarter Mentorship Event was held with one thing in mind: prepare the mentees for SWE's annual Evening with Industry. Since Etiquette Dinner was not held this year, the Winter Mentorship Event became an etiquette dinner of sorts. Mentees (and mentors) learned formal dinner etiquette in an interactive way in which they had to perform a skit in front of the audience. Some of the topics that were covered included: how to properly use forks and knives, retrieve things from across the table, eat meat and bread, and consider noise-making while eating. While the event was meant to be educational, there were many humorous moments thanks to the creativity of the actors/actresses. Cookies, milk, and hot chocolate were provided to help make the event even SWEeter. A raffle at the conclusion of the event allowed a few lucky winners to take home SWE T-shirts, mugs, aluminum water canteens, and a tote bag. Thanks to everyone for coming and best of luck at EWI!

Andy Kung
Mentorship Chair

Kaplan Infosession

2010-01-09T23:22:00.000-08:00

It's our first week back from a much-needed Winter break, and on Thursday, January 7th, SWE had Kerry Walters from Kaplan Test Prep give a presentation on preparing for the GRE and graduate school. Kerry's amazing powerpoint not only informed the crowd about the GRE, but it also contained a lot of useful information about the graduate school application process. She emphasized things like planning out a schedule, choosing recommendations from people who know you well (and not just for their titles), having your essays read and reread by countless peers, and really highlighting your accomplishments on your resume.

Once Kerry got on the topic of the GRE, she gave some statistics about average scores on the GRE for various majors. She also talked about the format, and most importantly, she mentioned that the GRE will change dramatically in 2011! The new GRE will have double the reading comprehension, so if reading comprehension is not one of your strong points, be sure to take the GRE soon!

Jackie Koo
Historian

Turner Infosession

2009-11-29T20:06:00.001-08:00

On November 19th, SWE hosted an inforsession with Turner. Melissa Yee, a UCLA alum, Vince Quinones and Brent Nikolin gave a brief presentation on projects that Turner has recently been involved in, including many schools, sports coliseums, and some of the tallest buildings in the world. After they each shared from their personal work experience with the company which involved all difference perspectives from a newly graduated collegiate entering into the working world to a senior vice-president who has been with the company for over two decades. For the large turnout of students that attended, they received great advice about how to approach company representatives at career fairs and what interviewers are looking for. As an added bonus, Turner had a surprise raffle at the end to introduce their new bio friendly, bamboo USB flash drives! To learn more about the company, check out the posted meeting minutes from the night.

Renee Lau
Secretary

Put Your Skills to the Test: Gingerbread House-Making

2009-11-19T03:48:00.000-08:00

This year's gingerbread social was very successful with over 30 old and new members attending. The event took place November 17, 2009 during week 8, which gave those who attended the social a relaxing break from studying for midterms. While competing to see who could make the sturdiest, prettiest, or largest gingerbread house, attendees appeased their sweet tooth and indulged in the pounds of candy that used to decorate the houses. There was a good mix of upper classmen and lower classmen, which was another plus because the upper classmen were able to give the lower classmen advice in what classes to take next quarter. We were also able to recruit some new members into SWE, which was a goal of ours in hosting this event. Overall, the gingerbread social seemed to uplift people's spirits from a gloomy and stressful week of midterms and provided a central location where everyone could enjoy each other's company.

Debbie Duan
Social Chair

Wow! That’s Engineering!

2009-11-17T01:51:00.001-08:00

On November 7, 2009 SWE-UCLA and SWE-LA chapters hosted one of the SWE's signature three "Wow! That's Engineering!" events in the country. Thanks to joined forces of SWE-LA professionals and SWE collegiate members from UCLA, Cal Poly Pomona, and CSULA, over 130 young girls, ages 12-14, and 40 adults were introduced to the exciting world of engineering. Wow! That's Engineering! was a half day event, during which attendees were able to participate in some exciting hands-on activities, like building an electric circuit, plane, or solar panel car, which allowed them not only to practice their creativity, but also explore what it truly means to be an engineer. Parents and educators who participated in the adult program during our event, had a chance to satisfy their curiosity by having their various questions answered by engineering students and professionals as part of an informational panel. The event was concluded with the keynote address by Robert Silverstein, a professor of introductory engineering classes at UCLA. All the participants left the event with new knowledge about engineering, new skills, and a goodie bag filled with gifts and materials encouraging them to continue exploring the vast field of engineering.

Aleksandra Mstowska
Outreach Director

Engineering Awards Dinner

2009-11-08T22:50:00.001-08:00

The Annual UCLA Engineering Awards Dinner was held this year on Friday, November 6th. This event takes place every year in the beautiful Beverely Wilshire hotel. Due to our reputation as a very professional student group, SWE is the only engineering student organization that is asked to help out at the event every year. It is a most prestigious gala with tickets at $300 a person, so it is a great honor for SWE to always be involved.

Volunteers arrive early to help greet attendees and register people. Everyone is dressed in fine cocktail attire while volunteers are required to wear conservative yet dressy clothing. As volunteers, we were also invited to stay for dinner after our pre-event duties were fulfilled. There were many professors and alumni, as well as company representatives and UCLA sponsers. Before the event officially began, people socialized at the open bar and were served hors d'oeuvres such as bite-sized spring rolls and steak pasteries.

Finally, the five-course dinner started at 7pm. On the menu was a pear and walnut salad, creamy mushroom soup, a fish fillet and steak entree, as well as coffee and a rich chocolate dessert. After dinner, awards were presented and there were a variety of speakers including Engineering Dean, Vijay Dhir, and UCLA Chancellor, Gene Block. Also, a special guest was NASA Astronaut, Megan McArthur, a UCLA alumnus from the class of 1993.

The evening finally wound down at around 10pm, and everyone headed home after a long night.

Jackie Koo

Historian

Schlumberger Resume and Interview Workshop

2009-11-08T22:31:00.000-08:00

On November 5, 2009, SWE-UCLA hosted a Schlumberger infosession. The star of the night was Angela Morris, who has been with Schlumberger for 6 years. Angela briefly went over the company history, services, and people. She also showed a video where the audience got to see a little bit of Schlumberger's operations. Afterwards, Angela went into resume and interview tips. There were several tips that would hopefully help out the underclassmen in the audience. Things like how to approach recruiters at career fairs, what to say and what not to say are all important because that's the recruiter's first impression of you. As for the resume portion, I learned that it is important to put specific details into the work experience section instead of just listing the job. Some of the information might seem obvious, but there are things that people just don't think about, and that's what made this infosession so useful.

Andy Kung
Mentorship Chair

Edwards Lifesciences Infosession

2009-10-29T02:14:00.000-07:00

On October 22nd , SWE-UCLA hosted an infosession for Edwards Lifesciences with Tara Horvath, Senior Engineer, and Scott Steinberg, TDP Engineer , representing the company. They prepared an interesting presentation explaining the goals of their company, its products, and the various opportunities it offers to its current and prospective employees (including college students). The large group of students who attended the event had a chance to view computer simulated videos of Edwards Lifesciences products, including their transcatheter heart valve technology and videos with reviews from their satisfied customers. After the presentation, students were able to ask the representatives numerous questions while all the guests enjoyed Enzo's Pizza. If you missed this great opportunity but would still like to learn more about Edwards Lifesciences, please contact SWE-UCLA.

Aleksandra Mstowska
Outreach Director

SWE 2009 Annual Conference

2009-10-29T01:26:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Long Beach, California, the host of this year's SWE Annual Conference! This huge event took place from Monday, October 12th to Saturday, October 17th. With thousands of attendees from across the United States and some even from overseas, the SWE Annual Conference has one of the most impressive congregations of women engineers.

The members of SWE-UCLA arrived for the Conference on Thursday, October 15th, in time for some of the more exciting and relevant activities of the whole convention. Friday started off with a massive career fair constituting over 200 companies, all with many eager representatives to match the eager engineers searching for jobs. Companies in attendance included: Boeing, CIA, Chevron, Dell, NASA, John Deere, Genentech, Ford, Facebook, U.S. Airforce, and Turner Construction. This job fair provided a great chance for students to get their resumes out to companies and even land interviews on-site! This was also one of the best opportunities for our Evening with Industry External Co-Chair, Linda Wong, to recruit company attendees for EWI 2010.

The next day, Saturday, was filled with infosessions and workshops. There were various topics from professional development and SWE leadership to outreach and innovation in technology and business. In the afternoon, there was a break for the student collegiate luncheon which was sponsored by Northrop Grumman. It was a three-course sit-down lunch, and attendees were randomly seated in order to encourage networking with students from other collegiate sections. Northrop Grumman also had a panel that consisted of three past SWE National Presidents: F. Suzanne Jenniches, Alma U. Martinez Fallon, and Michelle Tortolani. In addition, the current SWE National President, Nora Lin, gave an opening speech. After lunch, a few SWE-UCLA attendees stayed for more infosessions and workshops while the rest headed back to the hotel for some much needed rest.

Saturday night's big event, Celebrate SWE!, was the most anticipated part of the Conference. Celebrate SWE! is a three-course banquet for all the SWE sections to gather with their SWE Regions to show spirit and support for their fellow engineers. SWE-UCLA is proudly part of Region B, the Sonora Region, which includes Arizona, New Mexico, Southern California, Southern Nevada, and Utah. The night is meant to honor outstanding individuals as well as exemplary professional and collegiate sections. This year, SWE-UCLA was awarded second place for its 2008-2009 Newsletter and the Silver Award for Outstanding Collegiate Section! Congratulations to Yin Seo for creating the winning Newsletter! SWE-UCLA is very proud of these achievements and hope for more in the future!

Not only were SWE-UCLA members active participants in the aforementioned activities, they were also a big help behind the scenes. Almost 30 members signed up to volunteer at the Conference, performing duties such as monitoring speaker rooms or collecting tickets for luncheons and banquets. Volunteers are important components of such a large event. Without these volunteers, the SWE Annual Conference would not run as smoothly.

Thank you to everyone who attended our SWE 2009 Annual Conference, and hopefully, there will be even more people in attendance next year in Florida!

Jackie Koo

Historian

Accenture Infosession

2009-10-15T20:21:00.000-07:00

October 8 marked the date of SWE-UCLA’s first company infosession of the 09-10 school year! We had about 20 students in attendance who were eager to learn about the exciting, yet foreign, world of consulting with Accenture. Four Accenture representatives walked us through their powerpoint presentation, stopping at almost every slide to answer audience questions and share some of their case experiences.

Some of the major points that were covered that night:
Consulting firms leverage their expertise to help companies solve problems and improve performance to raise the company’s value. They do this by promoting “best practices.”

The assets of a consulting firm are its employees: the power is in the people!

Consulting is a good fit for engineers who want:
More than just technical work
Exposure to different companies
See the entire project lifecycle
Working with clients face to face
Team work
Travel and experience different places
Accenture hires from a variety of different majors, from the different engineering disciplines to economics.

For anyone interested in applying for full-time positions with Accenture:
Complete an application on BruinView
Complete an online application at www.careers.accenture.com/jobs.
Search for job number: 00078978

Deadline: Friday, October 23RD, 2009

David Liu
Webmaster

Mentorship Kick Off

2009-10-14T15:00:00.000-07:00

SWE's Fall Mentorship Event was held on October 7th in the Boelter Penthouse. At the beginning, it was quite chaotic, but the good thing was that there were tons of people in attendance! Though it was difficult for participants to find their mentors or mentees, eventually, everyone got settled in. At that point, everyone was welcome to dig into the food! There was Thai Fried Rice with beef, Pineapple Chicken Curry, Beef Pad Thai, and Tofu Pad See Ew. Once everyone found their mentor or mentee, the room’s atmosphere became a lot happier. The rest of the dinner was pretty uneventful as people were engaged in conversations with their mentors, mentees, and peers. In the middle of the dinner, SWE counselor, Bill Goodin, made an appearance and introduced himself to the freshman and transfer students. Towards the end of the dinner, our lovely president, Tiffany Tsao, helped raffle off three SWE t-shirts and two SWE mugs to the audience. She then attempted to give a closing speech before she was interrupted by Kanye West! The crowd jeered Kanye, but Tiffany was given an opportunity to finish her speech. Overall, it was quite a successful dinner considering how hectic the evening started out.

I can't wait to see everybody when Winter Mentorship Event rolls around!

Andy Kung
Mentorship Chair

Open House

2009-10-12T20:00:00.000-07:00

SWE Open House was a great success! We had our first General SWE Meeting on Thursday, October 1, 2009, and the Engineering Society lounge was packed with over 60 attendees! All of the Executive Board officers introduced themselves to the audience, and Aleksandra Mstowska, our Outreach Director, told everyone about our large outreach program as well as two upcoming events: a bake sale social in which the proceeds go to an orphanage and the "Wow! That's Engineering" Outreach event for 12- to 14-year-old girls, hosted with SWE-LA, other collegiate chapters of SWE, and the UCLA Engineering student group. Linda Wong, the other co-host of this meeting and the current (External) Evening with Industy Co-chair, showed a clip from our mentorship video and gave a very engaging presentation on the top ten reasons to join SWE. Andy Kung, the Mentorship Chair, then talked about the mentorship program in further detail, recuiting mentees as well as mentors. Carolyn Chuang, the Team Tech Director, spoke about the new Team Tech Program at UCLA this year, and Debbie Duan, the Social Chair, advertised for the AIAA joint-BBQ coming up on the weekend and the SWE Annual Gingerbread Social. After the presentation, we had food from Mr. Noodle, while the officers branched out in order to get to know everyone. Thanks to all the officers for making this event a blast!

Tiffany Tsao
President

SWEeties in the Sun

2009-10-11T21:00:00.000-07:00

On October 4th, SWE attended a joint barbeque social event with the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). This three-hour event, which took place a Sunset Recreation from 11am-2pm, allowed SWE members to interact with members from other engineering clubs and bond over ice-breaker activities. These activities began with one where everyone had a note card with the name of a fictional character taped to his or her back. Participants had to go around asking “yes or no” questions in order to figure out who their character was. This allowed everyone to open up to each other by giving them a collaborative activity to work on as the barbeque was heating up. While some people ate, others also engaged themselves in the human knot game. Engineering related games also took place such as a paper airplane folding competition and a "who can build the tallest stable structure out of marshmallows" game. We ended the day with a game of Ninja and a quick thanks to those who came out. Overall, the event was successful with new friendships formed and old friendships strengthened.

Debbie Duan

Social Chair

A Letter from our President

2009-10-10T20:19:00.003-07:00

Hello fellow engineers, and welcome to an exciting new school year! My name is Tiffany Tsao, and I am a 4th year Materials Science and Engineering major. I switched from Pre-Business Economics on my first day of school, so I have been devoted to SWE since my freshman year. The following two years, I became even more involved in SWE, as Social Chair and Internal Vice President. For these past three years, SWE has given me opportunities to learn a lot about the engineering industry, to network with individuals, and to make lifelong friends. I wish to share all of my experiences with you all, and I hope that you will also build your own personal experience with SWE.

This year, due to a high level of interest from members, we have implemented two more committees this year – the Outreach Committee and the Team Tech Committee. The Outreach Committee is an extension of our current Outreach Program and the Team Tech Committee will work under the lead of our Team Tech Director. Team Tech is a national SWE competition in which a team of students will partner with a company to solve an industry-related issue and present it at SWE Societal Conference (formerly known as National Conference).

I am very enthusiastic about being your 2009-2010 SWE UCLA Chapter President, and I hope to get each and every one of you involved in the Society of Women Engineers, whether you be male or female. Please feel free to contact me by email (tiffanytsao@ucla.edu) or just flag me down in Boelter Hall. I’d love to get to know you!

Tiffany Tsao
President

Meet the Executive Board

2009-10-10T20:18:00.001-07:00

Grace King
External Vice President
4th Year, Electrical Engineering

I first heard about SWE-UCLA at Engineering Welcome Day way back in freshmen year. I was an eager freshmen who came to UCLA knowing no one, so I was in desperate need of good company! I attended the Open House meeting the following week and immediately signed up to be a part of the mentorship program. And ever since then, I’ve been a SWEetie :D.

I attended almost every general meeting that I could – not for the companies (since I was clearly not ready to think about jobs or internships yet) – but to have an excuse to hang out with some really great people. It was such a fantastic break from the week to see the familiar faces of the SWE officers and other general members like myself. The people I’ve gotten to know through SWE have truly been the best people I could ever have hoped to meet in college.

Plus, by going to all these infosessions so early in my college career, I inadvertently gained a lot of experience in networking with company representatives and learning about the different industries out there.

So for all the freshmen and sophomores who might read this – first, don’t think the meetings are just all about company infosessions. The people of SWE are A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. so at least come to get to know all of us! We’re the best support network you’ll find while you pursue your degree. And on top of that, it never hurts to start thinking about your career options early (and get free food just for coming to the events!).
All the best :)

Tina Zhou
Internal Vice President
4th Year, Bioengineering

I got involved in SWE at the end of sophomore year because many of my friends were also involved in it. Last year, I was the SWE-UCLA treasurer. Since it was my first time as an officer of a club, I was nervous about doing my job properly. However, everyone in the club was very friendly and welcoming, and I really enjoyed hanging out with the girls. At the same time, I was able to develop my leadership and communications skills. In this way, SWE has helped me both professionally and personally.

I like the fact that SWE has a variety of events, ranging from outreach to socials to professional development. My favorite event, as well as my first SWE event, is Evening with Industry. I was very nervous to sit down and havie dinner with a company representative, but through EWI, I realized that company representatives are very easy to talk to, and they are eager to share their advice. This year, since I am the Internal Vice President, I hope to get the word out about SWE as much as possible through the weekly emails in order to promote younger students to join the club, and have another enjoyable year with the executive board.

Renee Lau
Secretary
2nd Year, Materials Science and Engineering

I'm from Danville, California, where there's not too much to do besides biking around town or hiking up the hill, both of which I love doing! Even though I'd always rather be in the great outdoors, becoming an engineer at UCLA has been an adventure as well. I joined SWE as a freshman and fell in love with the club, its supportive community, and its great networking opportunities. Some of my favorite events include helping Girl Scouts to gingerbread house-making and of course getting to know other engineers!

Cynthia Ma
Treasurer
3rd Year, Chemical Engineering

Before being a part of SWE, I never formally planned an event which includes reserving rooms, preparing sign ups, and using a large budget for food and drinks. I never realized the time and commitment needed in hosting a successful event. You definitely can not do all of this by yourself and having such events made me realize that delegation is a necessity. Just realizing you have to split tasks amongst a group and being very clear in directions has been extremely valuable to me.

One of my favorite moments was: during the 2008 SWE National Conference in Baltimore, Maryland, three of the girls and I stayed up to chat for the first time together of things unrelated to SWE! It was a good bonding time for all of us. It made us realize that all of us were different in terms of where we are in life and our endeavors, but we were all united because of SWE! I definitely felt a lot closer to them afterwards..

Linda Wong
Evening with Industry External Co-Chair
4th Year, Materials Science and Engineering

Hello, my name is Linda, and I am getting old. I cannot believe that this is my last year as a SWE Collegiate member. The past 3 years have gone by so fast, so I am going to try to stretch this year. I feel so fortunate to have joined SWE early in my college career and had the opportunity to grow so close to an organization and a group of girls who have significantly shaped my life here at UCLA. From the numerous career-focused activities to the fun retreats and socials, SWE has pushed me to become a better engineer, a better leader, and a better version of myself.

Sophia Lin
Evening with Industry Internal Co-Chair
4th Year, Chemical Engineering

I got involved in SWE my second year at the urging of the current president, Tiffany! I thought that SWE was a great place to meet other girls in engineering, and currently many of my closest friends at UCLA are in SWE. My favorite events include the Engineering Awards Dinner and the SWE socials--especially the gingerbread-making one. Some advice I would like to give to freshmen is to get involved--everyone is very nice; you'd be surprised at the different types of people that you'd meet. School is a lot more fun (and stressful, but it’s a great adrenaline rush) when you have extracurricular activities. Also, keep your grades up! They do matter. A little more about myself: I really like noodles, shoes, and black coffee. When I'm not doing homework or SWE, you can find me in lab!

Yin Seo
Publicity Chair
4th Year, Electrical Engineering

I first got involved in SWE during the Regional Conference in my second year. I had just switched into engineering at that time and knew nothing about it. SWE really helped me expand my vision and gave me more motivation to become more involved. Through SWE, I gained valuable experiences on networking with company representatives, creating a better resume, and building better leadership skills. However, SWE is not all about your professional career; it's also a lot of fun. I loved almost every single mentorship event and social event I've been to. Those events really helped in building long lasting friendships between SWE officers and members. I know that when I graduate, these SWEeties will remain life long friends, and I am glad I got involved in SWE or else I would've missed out on a lot!

Deborah Duan
Social Chair
3rd Year, Civil Engineering

I first got involved in SWE by attending many community service events because I wanted to do some volunteering. SWE was able to provide opportunities to volunteer and work with young girls, and I loved that I was able to be a role model to these young girls. As I got involved with the club, I developed friendships with the girls here, and they've been so sweet. My advice would be to get involved in SWE or any club for that matter because it enhances your college experience with productive fun.

Andy Kung
Mentorship Chair
4th Year, Chemical Engineering

I really thought I could avoid joining SWE. No, seriously, I was serious about the previous statement. So the story goes like this: One fateful day during the fall quarter of my 2nd year at UCLA, I walked into a tech fair held in Covel Grand Ballroom. As I walked past the SWE table, I glanced at the table and thought, hmmm, I've seen this girl somewhere. It turns out, "this girl," was none other than our lovely president, (or queen, as I call her) Tiffany Tsao. It took me a moment, but I eventually realized that she looked familiar because she was in my physics class. So as I casually walked away, I heard an authoritative voice say, "Hey you, come back!" And that's when everything went downhill...

Over the next 1.5 years, I dodged, avoided, and evaded Tiffany's "invitations" to join SWE. I thought I could just go to random events once in a while as a way to keep Tiffany happy, so I did that. And oh, I always promised her that I would join, I just never remembered to. You know, men and empty promises. It works pretty well on you ladies for some reason. However, as I went to more SWE events and got to know the wonderful personalities in SWE, I started to get brainwashed..err..like the club. Also, having Tiffany as my mentor in my third year led me to want to be a mentor myself. Those things plus Tiffany's constant bombardments of "join SWE" *evil look*, finally convinced me that I should join SWE for the benefit of my personal network, personal growth, and personal safety. Oh wait, forget the safety part, it wasn't as if I can't handle the queen if she came after me—I did beat her in arm wrestling after all. So to sum it up, I joined SWE because it was one of the most involved engineering clubs on campus, the ladies in the club were dynamite, and I wanted to be able to help a younger student out so that she would have an easier time adjusting to UCLA. Yes, I always tell people that the current president forced me to join SWE, but really, I joined it on my own free will. I mean, I could have just dished out more empty promises like they were worth diamond rings.

Currently, I am the Mentorship Chair for SWE (remember I said I wanted to be a mentor? well I took it up a notch), and I just hosted a mentorship dinner this week. It was chaotic and hectic in the beginning, but by the end, I think my minion of mentors bailed me out because I saw that everyone was talking to someone and most importantly, almost no one left early! So to improve SWE, I would have to improve my organization for the next mentorship event so that I can keep the future of SWE (mostly 1st and 2nd years) happy. As for my favorite event, I would have to say it was the Valentine’s Day Social because, quote a famous someone, "At first I thought engineering was all work, no love, but after the Valentine Social, I learned that there can be love in engineering"-(author unknown).

This message was paid for and endorsed by your Mentorship Chair at the UCLA Chapter. Thank you for reading.

Aleksandra Mstowska
Outreach Director
2nd Year, Chemical Engineering

Hi everyone! My name is Aleksandra, and I've been involved in SWE since my freshman year at UCLA. Why did I join in the first place? We all know how it is: week 0, Enormous Activities Fair, Engineering Welcome Day, people stalking you all around campus trying to get you to sign up for their club... I started participating in various clubs, SWE being one of them. As the school year progressed, my class work became more time consuming, so I had to decide on which after-school activities were really worth my involvement. SWE was definitely one of them. I found it to be not only an AMAZING (that's right, not just amazing; it is AMAZING!) networking opportunity and a great link between college students and professionals working in industry, but also a great place to give to my community, expand my horizons, meet new people, make strong friendships, find help with my class work and college career, and much more! With all the outreach events with Girl Scouts and middle and high school girls, infosessions with companies from a wide range of industries, mentorship events (there is nothing better than eating crepes with your friends, while working on your resume and getting useful tips on your undergraduate career--> SWEet and productive!), and social events, where we got to know each other better and met people from other engineering clubs, SWE truly has made my college years some of the best years of my life.

Carolyn Chuang
Team Tech Director
3rd Year, Chemical Engineering

About Carolyn:
Hometown: Cupertino, CA
Birthday: February 14, 1989
Siblings: 1 older brother, 1 younger sister
Favorite Color: Green
Favorite Sports: Running (Cross Country Pride!), Soccer
Favorite Food: Ice cream, Chocolate, Nutella
Favorite Animal: Giraffe

Hi Everyone!

I hope you enjoyed the tidbits about me! Here's a little more about myself than just the things you cared about when you were in 3rd grade. :P

Just a little about me - I first got involved in SWE by attending meetings and social events as a freshman. As I learned more about the organization, I realized that SWE was the perfect organization that I wanted to get more involved in. It covered all the bases that were important to me - networking opportunities, community outreach events, and social events—all in one place! Because of this, I ran for and was elected Outreach Director my second year. Many of my favorite experiences in SWE have been at outreach events—being able to inspire younger students to be excited about science and engineering is definitely a heartwarming experience! This year, my new role on the SWE executive board is to head up a technical project as Team Tech Director.

I believe SWE is a great and tremendously beneficial organization to get involved in, and I am passionate about reaching out to more engineers to motivate them to participate in and take advantage of the resources of the organization. This year in particular, I hope to successfully lead Team Tech, a project where we partner with a company/professional organization to work on a technical project, and enable valuable experiences and relationships for the SWE members that join Team Tech.

I encourage everyone to join SWE (and Team Tech!)—it is a great way to grow and develop, make friends, and boost your professional career!

Feel free to contact me if you ever have any questions or just want to talk!! :)

Jackie Koo
Historian
4th Year, Physiological Science

Hi! I know it says I’m a Physiological Science major, but that wasn’t always the case. I first got involved in SWE when I was a young freshman majoring in chemical engineering. I soon discovered the wonderful benefits SWE offered, and thus decided to run for Publicity Chair for my sophomore year. And the year after that, I was elected Social Chair. My switch in major is only a recent installment, and the fact that I’ve remained a part of SWE despite this is a testament to the strong bonds of friendship I’ve made in SWE and the amount of enjoyment SWE still brings to me through the mentorship program, outreach events, and socials.

SWE means so much more than just a society of engineers who are women. Clearly, we are a diverse group that incorporates different disciplines as well as members of the male variety. Many people fail to realize that SWE is open to anyone and everyone. I highly suggest taking advantage of what SWE has to offer. Not only will it help your career by strengthening your interviewing skills or helping you improve your resume (which apply to all majors), but through SWE you will also meet some of the most caring, hard-working, unique, supportive, and innovative individuals, people who will quickly become your friends for life.

This is what I’ve learned through the years, and that is why I wouldn’t give up this club even after changing my major. And if you do have any questions about changing majors (into or out of engineering), please don’t hesitate to ask me!

David Liu
Webmaster
4th Year, Chemical Engineering

I got involved in SWE because I have been going to SWE events since I was a first year. The main reason I went was for the free food, but the infosessions were pretty fun, as well. I finally decided to join with the convincing of my friends in the club and my mentor. I really enjoyed all the events SWE hosted and how all the executive members worked together to bring so many exciting events for the engineering community. It was something I wanted to be a part of, so I ran for webmaster when the opportunity came. I chose to become a webmaster because I felt it was a great way for me to learn more about HTML. I wanted to be an officer of the club because I wanted to develop my skills in working as a team and meet new friends. I would suggest freshmen who are interested in SWE to become active in the club early and have fun. A way SWE can improve could be to have members decide on what type of events SWE hosts.

This is the SWEet Life

2009-10-01T23:09:00.001-07:00

Fall Retreat 2009. It was quite an epic weekend. It started off with a couple of games of laser tag at Ultra Zone in Sherman Oaks. We were the red team, and we had to take on some unruly minors. Many of us were very inexperienced with this type of combat as compared to the kids, but despite it all, we were able to hold our own, winning the battle by quite a large margin. I'm so proud to say that two of our team members even ranked in the top three shooters: David Liu and myself. We're a tough crowd, and we shoot to survive! Go Engineers!

Our next stop was the flea market in downtown LA's Fashion District. The streets and sidewalks were packed full of vendors selling all kinds of things: purses, hats, shoes, clothes, perfume, food. You name it, they had it! It was almost too overwhelming. A good time was had by all, browsing and purchasing various items.

After a couple of hours of wandering around the crowded streets, we reconvened to check in at our hotel: Marriott's Springhill Suites in Manhattan Beach. We unloaded our overnight things, and headed off to our dinner destination. We arrived in an outdoor mall that was teeming with cars, but food was the only thing on our minds. Our dinner reservation was at a lovely Mediterranean/Lebanese restaurant called Open Sesame Grill. Here we feasted on hummus and pita, lamb, beef, chicken, and roasted potatoes. For dessert, there was baklava and almond ice cream! With our bellies full, we took a walk around the mall area in an effort to exercise. Despite the couple hours spent at the flea market, we were all somehow captivated by the wonderous sales going on at the local CVS. It was just too difficult to leave without making a purchase! But finally, we made it back to our hotel for a night in.

Come morning, we rose early for a continental breakfast in the lobby. Shortly after, we began our three-hour meeting. It was time to get down to business. Our meeting consisted of a quick "training" of new officers; advice was exchanged and ideas were tossed about. Some other things we discussed were personal goals, swe goals, and upcoming events. Soon, the meeting came to a close, and we headed tiredly back to UCLA, concluding another successful SWE Fall Retreat!

Jackie Koo

Historian

Engineering Leadership Conference 2009

2009-09-23T19:02:00.000-07:00

Today, the Engineering Society of UCLA (ESUC) hosted their first ever Engineering Leadership Conference (ELC) in the Ackerman Grand Ballroom. There were nearly 200 student leaders from various engineering organizations in attendance! And SWE had a great presence there!

The event started off with registration during which each student received a name tag labeled with the organization they were representing as well as the position they held on board. In addition, packets full of helpful tips were passed out.

Tiffany Tsao, President of ESUC, introduced the event, and Bill Goodin of the UCLA Alumni Association followed up. Next on the agenda were a series of speakers, seasoned officers who were here to give their advice:

President: Sarkis Khachatryn of ACT
Corporate Outreach: Grace Evita King of SWE
Secretary: Tiffany Tsao of ESUC
Treasurer: Tina Zhou of SWE
Publicity: Tarang Lal and Bert Liu of AIChE
Historian: Linda Wong of SWE and MRS
Webmaster: Gimmy Kim of IEEE
Professors: Dr. Daniel Kamei of BMES and Dr. David Smallberg of UPE
Projects: Sharon Liu of ASCE and Gaurav Bansal of AIAA
Community Outreach: Jesse Diaz of SOLES
Mentorship: Cynthia Ma of SWE
Socials and Membership: Alyssa Dunford of Phi Sigma Rho
Banquets: Christopher Arakawa and Soma Lari of BMES

The conference lasted a good four hours, but there was a short break midway. During the break, participants were invited to partake in refreshments (sandwiches, cookies, and water). Meanwhile, everyone was encouraged to mingle with fellow engineers to meet new people, and more importantly, learn new things about their current positions on their respecitve executive boards.

Overall, it was a very sucessful event, and we look forward to attending it again in the years to come.

Jackie Koo
Historian

Welcome!

2009-09-22T22:38:00.000-07:00

Dear SWE Members,

Welcome to the SWE UCLA blog! This is a brand new addition to our SWE website, and we are very excited to utilize yet another mode of modern communication!

You may be wondering what this blog will entail. Well, this is where you can check up on SWE events you may have missed, see pictures, post comments, and submit articles! For those of you who want to take SWE to the next level, this is the place to do it! So don't hesitate to speak your mind because we're open to all kinds of submissions!

Just email your ideas to us at swe.ucla@gmail.com.

Also, don't forget to check frequently for updates or subscribe to our feed!

Jackie Koo
Historian