Engineering as a Southern Belle by Emily

Engineering as a Southern Belle by Emily - September 2017 Scholarship Essay

Heat, mosquitos, sweet tea, late summer nights, and plenty of time to visit, welcome to the South ladies and gentlemen. Here you won't meet a stranger, you must remember your manners, and your home is often open for supper to visitors. I was raised a southern belle, I love soft cotton fabrics, I always say "yes sir," and the beverage of choice is ice tea and of course it must be sweet. However, part of this southern belle always looked outside the box. What makes the boat motor run? Why do the lights flicker like baby lightening bugs caught in a mason jar? I was always creating small projects as a young girl, and as I grew older, my inquisitive mind only seem to grow closer to the engineering side of life. I re-built my daddy's 1972 Ford pick-up truck right along side him. It is this initial start in life, that gave me just a glimpse into my future educational path of engineering.

I pursued my interest, majoring in electrical engineering at Liberty University, in Lynchburg, VA. Quickly immersing myself in the engineering field as marketing coordinator of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), to Vice President of SWE, my sophomore and junior year of college. However, it was my freshmen year, I discovered my elective course, Robotics. This course proved to be a life changer for me. I didn't just like Robotics, I fell in love with this niche in my coursework. I found myself meeting the deadlines of my other courses early to allow greater time to be spent, wiring, programming and creating the perfect VEX machine. It is in the preparation for the VEX Robotics competition in La Plata, Maryland, that I realized my mind, my hands, my thoughts, and the businesses of connecting tiny circuits is a treasure for me. Engineering makes me complete. It is the one thing in life I pursue with passion, giving me a drive to succeed in this career field far more vast that what my mere words can describe. Through my investment in Robotics, I now have a stronger desire to solidify this life as a "woman in a mans' world." I am looking forward to my future as a woman in the electrical engineering field.