Traveling to China

Jessica Borer,
Senior, Electrical Engineering

Athens, OH 27 January 2013 – One thing every student loves about Ohio University is its unusually long winter break. On semesters, we have a month off for winter break, these four weeks gave me the opportunity to visit my dad. For the past seven years or so my dad has been working in China and living there for the past year and a half. We’ve always been a close family so it can be difficult to not be able to call him up whenever I want to. After Christmas this year my mom, sister, and I went to visit him in Shanghai.

Shanghai is pretty different than the US, especially compared to Athens. For starters, there is a 13 hour time difference which takes a couple days to adjust to. The trip was a ton of fun though; we went to the top of the third tallest building in the world and visited an aquarium with the longest underwater tunnel in the world.

It was also just great to spend time as a family for more than a couple days at a time. I was never able to visit my dad during the summer because I always worked so this four week break was the only time I was be able to see how my dad lives half way around the world.

EE Senior Design: Robotic Bobcat

Jessica Borer,
Senior, Electrical Engineering

Athens, OH 31 October 2012 – Every senior engineering student must complete a capstone project and for electrical engineering we get to choose which project we want to work on. I chose the Robotic Bobcat and am working on a team of four undergrad students and two graduate students. One of the interesting things about my project is that it is a continuing project, so this is the third or fourth year for this specific project.

Robots are being greatly researched by the military so they can be sent into dangerous areas and spare human lives. The end goal for the robotic bobcat is to create an autonomous quadruped robot with ‘intelligence’. This ‘intelligence’ would come from integrated external sensors. For example, one of the graduate students’ assignments is to integrate video processing so the bobcat will be able to avoid upcoming obstacles when walking. This way it would not need to be controlled but would be completely autonomous.

Senior design is a great way to get engineering students to start thinking about planning a project from start to finish. It is also a way to get students used to planning software that they will surely use in jobs after college. We also have to research possible products we will need for project. I look forward to seeing how much we can accomplish by the end of the year!

Wednesday Nights at Grinders

David Parisi,
Senior, Computer Engineering

Athens, OH 22 October 2012 – My new favorite place to eat near campus is called Grinders. I’ve been at Ohio University for four years, yet my first time eating there was only a few weeks ago. It is just a small restaurant/bar that is right across the street from my apartment (extremely convenient).

The first time my friends and I went to free wing night (Wednesdays) we tried to eat as many wings as possible. We ended up getting 12 wings apiece and all we had to pay for were drinks. After that we made Grinders wing night a tradition. We love the free food as well as the pool table that’s available for us to play on. It’s going to be a great place to unwind midweek during the school year.

Last week we went to wing night–as usual now–and sat down getting ready for our wings. Only this time we noticed that as they were being handed to us something was written on the bottom of one of our paper plates. We had won a free pizza! So not only did we fill up on wings that night, but we got a free large pepperoni pizza. Needless to say it was a good day. I can’t wait to go again this Wednesday and check under all of my plates for that free pizza. If I win there’s an eighty percent chance that I’ll share the pizza with my friends.

Missing Athens

David Parisi,
Senior, Computer Engineering

Athens, OH 15 September 2012 – This summer I did some vacationing in Europe and took online classes back home in Cleveland. I was only able to visit our Athens (not the Greek one) a few times this summer, and during those times I had to take proctored exams for my online classes. I did not have much time to really enjoy Ohio University culture and boy have I missed it. Being back at school feels great. Yes, I always miss my family and friends back home, but there is just something about being back at OU. I don’t know exactly what it is, but it has to be some sort of combination of the students, friends, professors, layout of the college, and the Ohio University atmosphere. It just feels like I belong here.

I moved into my new apartment a week before school started, and it is now very convenient to go to classes since I live right next to the engineering buildings. While I’ve been back I’ve been busy with schoolwork but have been able to make some free time to see my friends. It is always a blast to go uptown with them. A few nights ago one of professors was playing in a band up on stage at a local brewery. He played an amazing saxophone and we were all surprised and very excited to see him. It is always a good time in Athens whenever we go out.

Group Projects

Jessica Borer,
Senior, Electrical Engineering

Athens, OH 16 May 2012 – I am currently taking a computer science class and we were recently assigned a group project. A lot of teachers are starting to do this in a lot of classes because after college, you know in the ‘real world’ most projects are completed by teams. We didn’t get to pick our teams so I worked with three people I had never met before and it was quite an interesting experience.

The first time we met (at one of the awesome group project rooms in the new engineering building) one guy had already started the project and had quite a bit done without consulting the rest of us. I thought this was cool, less work for the rest of us. Then as the week progressed the same guy would work with us less and less and eventually tried to delete our files of the project so he could complete it all by himself. The sad truth is that you’ll encounter someone like this out of school as well. He wasn’t trying to be a jerk but just wanted to finish the project so bad he forgot it was a team project.

This is exactly why teachers are assigning more team projects now, so we can become familiar with how a team works. Also, so we can see how we work in a team and see if we need to change a few things before we show up to a job and get thrown into a team project.