My internship is going to be at an engineering firm named KPFF. As KPFF describes itself it is a "multi-office, multi-discipline engineering firm. We’re driven by a commitment to our core values of Excellence, Trust, Relationships, Stability, and Passion; defining our professional practice, how we are organized and our commitment to our clients and employees". My mentor during my time here will be Steve Spence. Steve obtained his bachelors of science in Civil Engineering at Santa Clara University and then his Masters of Science on Structural Engineering at UCSD.
What I hope to gain from my time here is to see what it is like to work in the structural engineering profession. I hope to be able to get my hands on some sort of program or real life application as well as assisting people around the office in whatever way they need. To be honest I am not very worried about much because I don't really know what to expect to see when I get there. More than anything I am really exited for this opportunity because I have been in classrooms for a very long time and getting out of them and observing a professional work space will be super interesting.
Week one of my internship is over and I am super happy that I decided to come here. The office has a very friendly feel to it, it is not super competitive or cut throat but instead it seems that everybody works together to reach a certain goal. In that sense it feels similar to High Tech High because of the project type work they do. The staff here have been super welcoming and friendly towards me. I have been working on a new program called RAM Modeler and going through the tutorial for it. It is definitely a different program than Final Cut Pro for example but it the manual it comes with is super helpful. I have been confused at some parts of it but Steve has been there to clear questions up for me and it has been going pretty smoothly.
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The hardest part of making this model is just learning to use the RAM Modeler program. Once you get far enough though the shortcuts and basic understanding of the program start to settle in and you get more comfortable. It is pretty cool to see your building come together in the end when you look at the 3D rendering of it. It's like digital Lego bricks in the sense that you make your structure floor by floor and in the end you stack them all together in the end.
I recently had the opportunity to interview Steve. I asked him all about his experience while working to get to where he is now. To me it is very important to ask questions to people that are in places you would like to one day be in because they can help you understand not only what they did to get to that point, but also help you understand what to avoid or do better.
Although some of this internship has been me getting some hands on experience with programs and other things, I am an intern that still has to contribute to the workplace. So far I have been working on taking in state and out of state engineering licenses, placing them in folders and then scanning them to place them in digital folders as well. I have also been helping move and reorganize the game and meeting rooms. The office has also been switching from 2D CAD modeling to 3D IBM modeling. Basically the 3D IMB modeling lets engineers and architects work in the same space, this makes it easier to identify conflicting designs in the structure. My task has been to review general structural notes from the two different programs and make sure that they are the same. Lastly I have been working on a little project to cover up a small AC unit that is in the supply room with an IKEA cabinet.
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It is interesting to think back to school and how a real world workplace compares to it. One of the first things I noticed was that many times in a busy environment like this one people are not going to hold your hand through tasks. In school the teacher is very closely watching what you are doing and if you are doing it right. Here I was reminded back to one of my last projects at HTHI. My engineering teacher assigned us a task in a program called character animator. The program was relatively new so it had some bugs but the hardest part about it was that nobody knew how to use it and we had deadlines to meet. Many people(including myself from time to time) would complain about how the tasks assigned were too crazy because nobody knew how to to them. Fast forward to my internship with KPFF I was faced with a similar situation, I had been thrown into a program called RAM Modeler and had no idea how to use it or what it did. I was on my own and had to figure it out just like I did with Character Animator this was a scenario that reminded me a lot about how my school experience gave me some real world lessons.
Here is an "AHA!" moment that I had while working on a small project in my internship.
From my time here I have made a quick mind map on what I see being a structural engineering as. In my next video I will explain the different points I wrote down.
Everything in my mind map is made up of things that I have seen during my internship. Engineers and drafters work together to design a product so that reminded me a lot of HTHI because in our school we work together to create a final project. Engineers do have to deal with clients unlike students at HTHI. That is where it can be challenging because some clients may be easy to work with and some may seem impossible to work with. That is why communication is key specially when making a design as important as a structure where people are going to be in and if done incorrectly may result in an accident. Patience is there because I see that engineers need a lot of it. Many times they have to call clients and clarify many beliefs the client has that are wrong or explain why they have to take a certain step. On the left hand side of my mind map is what I have seen while working in an office. Whenever I think of a work space like this one I think of a super boring job that people get stuck in. Well in my time working here I realized that yes people work long hours and deal with stress from deadlines and the job may seem possibly repetitive, but it is not the work space that makes the job boring or exiting it is the actual tasks you are carrying out. From being here I can tell that many engineers really do like structural engineering and work long hours while loving it. That is my biggest concern in college I want to make sure that when I get a job it is in something I honestly like and care about, if that is the case then I will want to work long hours and enjoy doing so. On the bottom left is what I have seen from the people of the work space. Many of these people work very hard for long periods of time but they are people not computers. During my time here saw the community that is held here at KPFF and it is very enjoyable to be a part of. The people here have a pool table and a ping pong table, and although that may seem like a silly game for kids the truth is that during lunch I see people play a couple of games of ping pong or pool. This keeps the mood happy and fun in the office. It also makes the employee feel less like a robot and more like a human. People here also have a recreational volleyball team and from what I have heard it is very cool. I even got invited to swim the La Jolla Cove with a group of swimmers in the office. All in all I am still very interested in structural engineering because it has been such an awesome experience observing what it is like to work here at KPFF.