Nathan Tadhg Patrick

Reflection

ABET Outcome Survey

My scores for the ABET Outcome Survey evaluate the courses AE 481W and AE 482.

Please click here to view the pdf file.

AE 481W/482 Course Survey

Senior Thesis has definitely been a learning experience for me. There were many mixed emotions throughout the entire process. I also have some suggestions on how to avoid many of the headaches that I encountered.

Starting last summer with selecting a building, I really did not have a choice of what building to use. I was basically given the only option of using the Hilton Hotel at BWI Airport. It would have been nice to have several different options, but it really depends on the company that you intern with for the summer. Some companies have a wider variety of projects to choose from, and others have many governmental projects that may not be usable for Senior Thesis. In any case, Southland Industries, my Senior Thesis sponsor, was generous enough to provide me with all the drawings and specs that I needed.

The next issue came early in the fall semester in AE 481W when I was attempting to gather information to use for my Building Statistics. I attempted to contact some of the professionals involved in the design and construction process, but not everyone responded to me. Some said they did not have time to help answer my simple questions, and others said that they could not help me without getting paid by the owner for their time. However, everyone I contacted at Southland Industries was more than happy to help me out. All this assistance was greatly appreciated and made my report more accurate.

Throughout the fall semester, three Technical Reports and a Proposal had to be written for AE 481W. These all were very time consuming, but much was learned about the Hilton Hotel at BWI Airport during the process. I definitely learned a lot just by reading the plans and becoming familiar with the specs. It was also good because I had to use all the different sections of the plans, and I really learned about many of the different systems in the BWI Hilton. Often waiting until the last minute to get everything finished was not the best idea, and many late nights were needed to get all the reports done.

Writing the Proposal was somewhat ambiguous, since I still really was not sure what I wanted to study for my Senior Thesis in AE 482 for the spring semester. After writing the initial Proposal, I came back in the spring and attempted to rewrite my Proposal with some alternative ideas for my main mechanical depth redesign. This turned out to be a bad idea for several reasons. I ended up debating with myself for a long time about what systems I wanted to change, how to change them, and what new ones to use. This also put me far behind my original schedule and calendar of when I wanted to be done with certain portions of my calculations and design. So for the entire spring semester, I felt like I was behind and just trying to play catch-up.

Writing the Final Report definitely took much longer than I first anticipated. This should not be a surprise, because almost anything I did throughout Senior Thesis took much longer than I expected. I waited until I was done with all my research and calculations to actually write the Final Report, but this may not have been the best approach. Countless late nights were required to complete everything over the last couple weeks before the report was due. The actual compilation and organization of the Final Report took an extremely long amount of time. Even just determining the page numbers for the Table of Contents and organizing all the resources used for all the Appendices took several hours.

After completing all the work for AE 481W and AE 482, I have learned many things, and here are my suggestions. First of all, and most importantly, get started working on all the assignments as soon as possible. Do not wait until the last minute, or even the last couple days before a report is due. Procrastination is a horrible thing, and many headaches and a lack of sleep can be prohibited by avoiding it. The second most important thing I learned is to not stress out so much over Senior Thesis. It is not such a big deal that you should feel miserable and stressed for the entire year. Thesis is really just a big project with several smaller pieces. Treat it like that and give yourself smaller deadlines that are easier to complete to break things up. This way, you will actually get things accomplished and you will not feel too overwhelmed by it all. Next, find a friend to work with throughout the entire process. It was a great help to me to have someone to bounce ideas off and keep me sane. Sometimes I would get stuck on some detail or forget how to do something simple, and having someone else to help you clear your thoughts or give you little tips really makes a big difference. Finally, be sure that you still make time for all your friends. Thesis is only a project and a grade, but your friends are what really matter. Try to make time to hang out and really enjoy being a 5th year senior at Penn State.

CPEP and Discussion Board Reflection

The process of creating a website to be used for Senior Thesis was really not too difficult, especially since templates were already created for our use. This really saved me a lot of time because I only had to make slight modifications that were needed to personalize my CPEP site. It was also possible to completely overhaul your website, and this could be done by revamping the templates provided. The CPEPs were definitely beneficial and practical. It was much simpler to just post the reports instead of having to print them out and getting them bound to turn in to the professors. With the CPEPs, any of the professors could read the reports whenever they wanted to. It is also good because the information is posted for future students to reference. You can also access the reports from anywhere without carrying around a large stack of papers.

The Discussion Board was a good item to have for use during Senior Thesis. It made it easy for Professor Parfitt to contact everyone with announcements. The concept of having design professionals willing to help you out and answer all your questions in a matter of hours was also helpful. Despite having this tool at my fingertips, I chose not to use the Discussion Board to ask any mechanical-related questions. I had several contacts at Southland Industries that were more than willing to answer all my questions within a day or two. But simply having the Discussion Board available for use was a good idea.