Leaving Ohio, Heading to Work

Sam Williams,
Senior, Computer Science

Athens, OH 23 April 2013 – It’s down to the wire: we’re all facing the last two weeks of school this year. For me and many others, this is the last stretch of undergrad ever. This is both exhilarating and terrifying. On the one hand we’ll be moving on to bigger and better things, like grad school, jobs, or year-long breaks traveling the world, to name a few. But on the other, we’ll be leaving behind friends and experiences we may not ever have again.

Personally, I’m headed into the workforce. My job search was long, bumbling, and more often than not, hair-fall-out-ingly stressful. I made all the newbie mistakes. I made my portfolio too big, unorganized, made my resume too wordy, and shotgunned out applications with barely enough time to make sure I hadn’t insulted my reader by mixing up company names.

I also did some things right. I started working on my portfolio, resume, and general web presence in October, giving myself plenty of time to attend to mistakes and revise my image based on classmates’ feedback. I also kept all my professional content true to myself and my goals. I didn’t try to be anything I’m not.

After a lot of hard work and mistakes, I finally landed a pleasing offer at Sunstorm Games in Las Vegas, Nevada. I’ve just signed on with them and I’m very excited to start working with them this summer. There, I will be helping their art team make mobile children’s games, a job that will put my major to perfect use! I’m looking forward to having my own place, earning money, and working with a group of people who treat me like a valued friend and comrade.

I’m wishing luck to all other graduates, no matter what their plans may be. OU, Oh Yeah!

Classes at 5000 Feet

Grant Rhue,
Junior, Aviation

Athens, OH 20 April 2013 – As I look back on this semester’s courses, one course stands out because of its challenging and interesting content. That course is Commercial Aviation (AVN 4200). It is a commercial flight training course that provides an introduction to complex aircraft and flying
for hire.

Completing this course feels like another milestone in moving toward my career in flying. In the OU commercial training fleet, we use the Piper PA-28 Arrow—200 horsepower engines and retractable landing gear. It flies about 40 miles per hour faster than the smaller Piper Warrior and has new systems to learn.

It was strange to take your hands away from the controls and let the plane fly itself. Unlike the earlier flight courses, there were more opportunities for practicing maneuvers. Some of the maneuvers included chandelles (180 degree turn with a climb) and lazy 8’s (speed and altitude change throughout flying in a figure eight pattern), and these are more demanding in terms of skill and focus. These maneuvers help a pilot to develop a feel for the varying forces on the plane during the different patterns and demonstrate the aircraft’s performance.

I did only one cross country flight this semester and that was from Athens to Huntington’s Tri-State Airport. It was a clear and sunny day with excellent visibility, and you could literally see for miles. The rolling hills and the rural landscape made for a scenic ride, although flying the faster aircraft made it seem like a shorter flight than usual. Overall, this was a good semester, and as I reflect on it, I am surprised at how much I learned.

ME Controls Project: Controller Design

Scott Kostohryz,
Junior, Mechanical Engineering

Athens, OH 19 April 2013 – As the semester winds down, projects I have been working on are coming to a close. I have just finished my Capstone for ME 3012 and will be presenting my findings with my partner. It has been a great exploration into controls, controller design and vibration analysis. I find it very exciting to be done. The use of Matlab and Simulink have been very helpful, and I am glad I have learned how to use these tools.

The above graphic is an example of our ball on a beam system for our Capstone. It was taken from the University of Michigan/Carnegie Mellon/University of Detroit Mercy controls and Simulink tutorials. For our project we are analyzing the system and designing a controller to keep a ball level on on a beam and balancing it. The general Idea, is we want to have the controller move the beam from an unstable position and bring the beam to a level position. This is done by taking the mass of the ball, length of the beam, angle and other parameters to account. I have found this class to be very fun, and to be able to have this project to show off is rewarding. The use of Matlab has been helpful in validating our findings.

I would like to take this knowledge and do something with controls for Senior Design next year. It is a very exciting topic. It is great to have this broad knowledge in so many subjects. I have no idea where I will be come this time next year with my Senior Design project. I am sure glad that I have this background because if my senior design requires a controller, I have the knowledge I have taken away from Dr. Bob’s ME 3013 Controls class here at Ohio University.

ISE Senior Design: Kroger

Paul Barina,
Senior, Industrial and Systems Engineering

Athens, OH 18 April 2013 – Our senior design project was in coordination with Kroger Corporation, which is one of the nation’s largest grocery chains, at their store right here in Athens. We are focused on the front-end operations, which deal with the checkout process. We as a team are in charge of making this process more efficient. Making things better is the heart and soul of Industrial & Systems Engineering.

We spent countless hours in the local Kroger grocery store collecting valuable data. This data provided the foundation for our project, where we applied Six Sigma methods. Six Sigma is a tool used by Industrial & System Engineers used to reduce variance and promote efficiency. It can be used in tandem with Lean Manufacturing which reduces waste within a given process. These efficiency tools helped us find areas of improvement within the front end of Kroger. When we find these areas of possible improvement, it is then onto improving the process. This is where the real fun begins. With our suggestions there are millions of dollars at stake to be saved.

These projects create a great opportunity for students like me to get out into the real world and work for real corporations. This is something I plan on putting on my resume and remaining proud of the work I have accomplished with the rest of my team. Senior design is a great way to end my journey here at Ohio University as an undergraduate student. I will use the lessons I’ve learned for the rest of my life.

Planning for My Last Year

Kelly McCoy,
Senior, Aviation

Athens, OH 15 April 2013 – It’s almost May, and that means one thing: graduation! As a senior I have watched as my friends fuss over getting resumes in order, finding a job, and moving their things out. However, I have none of these worries; after much deliberation, I decided to stay a fifth year.

I was skeptical at first, thinking that I needed to stay on track and graduate in four years, but there were so many reasons to stay! The biggest factors in my decision were my desire to complete 2 minors–Spanish and Meteorology–along with taking advantage of work opportunities that the Aviation program offers.

I minored in Spanish because I like the language and the culture, and it gives me another career option should I ever not be able to fly. A minor in Meteorology is very helpful when paired with my flight training; as pilots we are constantly affected by the weather and always need to know current conditions and be able to analyze data to predict future conditions.

I also plan on flight instructing for the university next year. As a Certified Flight Instructor I will be giving students the necessary training they need to get their Private Pilot Certificate and Commercial License. While instructing, I plan on applying for the position as co-pilot of OU’s King Air 350. This plane is used by Ohio University’s Air Transportation Service and provides transportation for employees.

And I am also excited to continue as an Engineering Ambassador for another year!

Steve Burns,
Senior, Industrial and Systems Engineering

Athens, OH 10 April 2013 – This semester two other ISE students and I were involved in an international computer simulation competition. The competition was a two month long project, put on by IIE (Institute of Industrial Engineers). We were given a problem statement about 2 months ago and along with some basic guidelines to follow. The top three teams from around the world, decided by a group of judges, get to travel to Puerto Rico to show off their projects with a chance to win first prize.

The problem statement was about a coal company’s coal shipping operation from three cities in the United States to four cities around the world. The overall goal of the project was to see if the current operation was successful and if not, then to provide a solution that will produce the lowest overall shipping costs for the company. The way we could change the operation was to change the number of ships that the company was using, and also route the ships differently around the world.

Animation was a big part of the judging for this competition. Below is a snapshot of the animation of our project. You can see some ships traveling from city to city, and the smaller screens are the individual cities where you can watch the ships coming into the shipping harbors.

This project was a lot of fun to work on. The problem statement was full of small details that could greatly influence the outcome; such as weather causing shipping ports to close or the cost it takes a ship to travel through different canals. It also gave our team a chance to participate in the student expo here at the university, where students from any discipline across campus come and show off projects they have been working on throughout the year.

ASCE Concrete Canoe Competition

Joe Cook,
Junior, Civil Engineering

Athens, OH 8 April 2013 – It floats!!! That was the big news for the members of the Ohio University student chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers. This past weekend our student organization, which I am currently president of, competed in the Ohio Valley Student Conference in events such as concrete canoe, steel bridge, environmental engineering, surveying, and technical paper competitions. We competed against other ASCE student chapters in the Ohio Valley region such as Ohio State University, Akron, University of Cincinnati, University of Kentucky, Youngstown State University, Pitt, Carnegie Mellon, Western Kentucky University, and Cleveland State University, the conference host this year.

Our biggest accomplishment this weekend was launching a canoe and bringing it home in one piece. This is the fourth consecutive year our organization has built a concrete canoe, and this is the first time the canoe didn’t fail structurally in the water or during transport. I was personally captain of the environmental engineering team, we developed a bench scale column filter to remove phosphorous, the major component in fertilizer and a major contributor to toxic algal blooms, from simulated storm water. Although the results aren’t currently available, our independent tests yielded promising results.

The coolest thing about my team’s design was the implementation of iron pigment we derived from acid mine drainage near campus. Using this source of iron we are effectively treating two water quality issues with one product. The following link is to a story about our concrete canoe team; note that our canoe was affectionately dubbed the Yellow Submarine. If you take a look at the pictures it becomes apparent why.

Read the Russ College news release for more details on the competition.