Say What You Mean & Mean What You Say

Greetings, Olin community & friends!

I write to you from the trenches of finals week, with papers, posters, and presentations coming down at me on all sides. (Actually though: two papers, two posters, and three presentations, but not a single exam. And all for projects I'm really excited about, I might add.)

And what else would be more appropriate to do during all of this than reflect a bit on what they all have in common: a Tissue Engineering project where we created "skin" from (bovine) bone marrow, a Materials Science project analyzing bone strength, a User-Oriented Collaborative Design Project prototyping a private "pop-up" space, and a Foundations of Psychology project researching how we perceive our own health? Besides giving away that I'm a Bio:E?


As much as I wish we were making a TARDIS...

Honestly, I've seen lots of connections throughout the semester, however, one of the biggest skills these have all helped me develop (sometimes without even realizing it) has been being able to clearly convey ideas, designs, and findings to others. Project-based learning, and especially this project heavy semester for me, has really driven home the idea that no matter how great your idea is, how perfectly-tailored your design, or how jaw-dropping the results of your research are, if you can't let other people know that in a way that is convincing and compelling, it's not likely you'll make it very far with it. Which is likely something anyone who's been in the field for a while could tell you, but I know isn't something I would have really understood from just cramming for exams.

So basically, half plug for project-based learning in general, and half plug for how cool the projects we get to do here at Olin are. :) I hope you've enjoyed hearing about a sliver of the amazing things that are happening here!

And finally, a huge congratulations to Olin's Class of 2019! I might be a liiiitle biased, but I have a feeling you made the right choice. Looking forward to meeting you all this fall!


Michael c/o '17

Posted in: Michael '17