Celebrating National Engineers Week - featuring SWE

It’s National Engineers Week, and Capitol is pumped to highlight some of our awesome engineers! Check in with us throughout the week as we cover stories featuring Capitol student engineers, engineering clubs, and professors.

To celebrate the week, Capitol’s branch of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) has rallied together the other clubs on campus for a week packed with fun and informative activities for our students on campus. We talked to SWE club president Kimberly Brandenburg about the week to come and what’s next for SWE:

SVH: So Kim, what made you want to get this week’s events together?

Brandenburg: Well, one thing I was a little disappointed with after transferring to this school was the lack of club and organization activity. There were clubs, but the only one that really did any school wide functions was S-LAB.  Though now clubs are becoming much more active with the help of our new Director of Student Life, Brandi McKee, I still wanted to create events that could become staples within the school and bring our own club forward as a driving force within the club/Engineering community.  Plus, it's National Engineering Week, if Engineers don't celebrate it then who will?!

SVH: Can you talk to me a little about the Society of Women Engineers at Capitol?

Brandenburg: SWE is actually the first (and only) club to have a Canvas 'course'.  Sheldon Bryan from Distance Learning was, and continues to be, such a huge help with that. He's kinda my hero (She laughs). The page allows us to keep in contact about all that's going on with our club and also allows us to post events to member's canvas calendars.  It's been vital to our success so far.

Also, recently our member, Zalika Dixon, was a winner in the Grace Hopper Celebration computing competition. Last fall she received a scholarship and cash prize for her idea! We're so proud, and intend to do that same competition again this year! 

SVH: That’s awesome! Is there anything else on the horizon for SWE?

Brandenburg: Yes. Later in the semester we will be hosting a panel of industry professionals to talk about their experiences, give advice, and answer questions.  It will be exciting for the whole school because we are choosing speakers from each of the main majors of our university, and each with a very different background. Some of them are even alumni!

SVH: What motivated you to join SWE?

Brandenburg: So actually, I helped re-establish SWE at Capitol. The last time SWE was active at this university was 2011. In February of 2017, my classmate Christina and I decided we wanted more recognition for females in this field (and in the school, since there are so few of us). And we wanted to create a community where we help each other set ourselves up for successful futures. So we brought SWE back. 

SVH: And we are glad to have you active again. What would you say your favorite part of SWE is?

Brandenburg: Well, not only do we get to participate in school events like Engineering week, we also get the opportunity to go to networking events, join in project competitions together, and attend conferences among other opportunities.  Each member of our collegiate club also has the support and opportunities provided by the national SWE organization as well, which offers great connections, local events, scholarships, and employment information for their members.

MORE ON THIS WEEK’S EVENTS:

Starting on Monday, SWE will be hosting a scavenger hunt and prize wheel event. Tuesday will see Capitol’s branch of the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) present a mainstream movie featuring female, African American engineers.

On Wednesday, Capitol’s Fusion Lab, run by our astronautical engineers, will hold a “Find the Pi Challenge.” The engineers of the Minecraft Club will hold a project demonstration on Thursday.

Finally, on Friday the Robotics Club has paired up with IEEE, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, to present a Robotics day. There will be demonstrations, industry speakers, and a few surprises for attendees.

All events will run from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. in the student center for those interested in attending.

Students interested in joining the Society of Women Engineers at Capitol can email kabrandenburg@captechu.edu for more information and access to SWE’s Canvas page.