Louisiana Tech Outstanding Member Spotlight

The Louisiana Tech University Society of Women Engineers is excited to share about one of our outstanding members, Madison Abigail (“Abby”) Walker. Abby is a sophomore Mechanical Engineering student and the Treasurer of our Society

of Women Engineers section. Abby is also involved in our Aerospace Engineering Club on campus, fulfilling a role on the Leadership Team. In the past, Abby has served as a Flight Coordinator for the club’s “Harley IV” – a scientific payload launched on a weather balloon in order to test a duplex communication system.

Abby is an outstanding member of our SWE section because she is a dedicated, hardworking officer, picking up extra duties when it’s needed most. She has pushed and organized for SWE to have over 4 fundraising opportunities before the National Conference in October of 2017. In fact, leading up to the school year, Abby worked over the summer to complete a grant application to ensure we would be able to sponsor our member’s travel accommodations for the Conference. Because of Abby, our section was able to raise enough funds to bring 30 collegiate members to Austin, TX! Abby has been one of the biggest driving forces behind all that our SWE section has to offer at Louisiana Tech, and we are proud to have her apart of our Executive Officers.

When attending Conference, Abby interviewed and accepted an internship position with Northrop Grumman as a Technical Manufacturing Intern for the summer of 2018. In this role, Abby will work for a minimum of 10 weeks in Baltimore, MD, ensuring proper usage and implementation of parts for mission systems. We cannot wait to hear about Abby’s summer when she returns!

Abby joined our Society of Women Engineers section her freshman year because she has a passion for promoting women in STEM, as well as outreaching to the community’s children about concepts of engineering and science. Abby plans to pursue higher education upon the completion of her B.S. in Mechanical Engineering—she hopes to complete a M.S.E in Aerospace Engineering or Engineering Management. Abby’s dream job is to design the exterior of space or air craft, while innovating more efficient ways to implement air and space travel.

A&M Kingsville Outstanding Member Spotlight

 

Brittney Gonzales is a junior Civil Engineering student at Texas A&M University-Kingsville. She has been very active in all SWE events this semester by volunteering at fundraisers, designing this year’s T-shirts and attending this year’s SWE National Conference, where she was offered an internship with the National Security Agency and Bechtel Construction Company. We are very proud of her! There has never been a meeting or volunteering event where Brittney doesn’t have a smile on her face or isn’t eager to help.  Not only has she played a vital role in our local collegiate section, but she has also displayed dedication for the mission of the Society of Women Engineers as a whole. Brittney is a role model that inspires us to strive to reach our fullest potential, not in just our collegiate careers, but in all aspects of our lives. There weren’t any doubts among us when choosing the best member to receive this award.

UNT SWE Events

Here are some pictures from our first general meeting for the spring semester. We started by writing our goals for the new year, which is shown in the first picture. For the activity, we split up into groups to make catapults out of Popsicle sticks, a rubber band, and tape. After all the teams assembled a catapult, we tested wh

ich one was best using marshmallows.

Lamar Outstanding Member Spotlight

Member Name: Estibi Azpilicueta
SWE Post: Secretary 2017-18

Estibi is a Chemical Engineering Junior at Lamar University, and has been an active member of SWE since her freshman year. Currently, she serves as the secretary of SWE and has been very sincere with attending every officer and general meeting and social events, making sure that the meeting minutes are sent out in a timely manner, and helping out the organization whenever need be. Other than SWE, Estibi is actively involved in research. She is an Honors student, a Lamar ambassador, and has an excellent academic record. Lamar SWE is very lucky and proud to have her!

Tulane University Outstanding Member Spotlight

Hi! My name is Hailey Day, and I am currently the secretary of the SWE Tulane chapter. I am a senior studying chemical engineering and German studies, planning to continue my studies post-grad.

This past summer I was given the opportunity to be a Lab Intern at Intana Biosciences. Intana Biosciences is a small biotechnology company located near Munich, Germany. Much of the

work is contracted research for larger biotechnology companies. During my three months working there, I was able to expand my knowledge and techniques gained while working in the Robinson lab at Tulane. A large component of their research focuses around using fluorescence cross-correlation spectroscopy in new ways to characterize and analyze proteins, and I was given the opportunity to use this new technique in protein analysis. Another big aspect of the internship was the ability to get a study abroad feel (which isn’t an option for chemical engineering students at Tulane) during my internship by immersing myself in the language and traveling all over in my few days off.

In my time at Tulane, I have attempted to create a community for engineering students, especially female engineering students. SWE is a great community for the female engineering students at Tulane and has provided me with many outreach opportunities to work with females at the K-12 level in encouraging curiosity and interest in STEM. I have also attempted to make another community aspect at Tulane by founding and colonizing a colony (soon to be chapter) of Theta Tau, allowing a tight community of engineering students, both male and female, who support each other in everything we do.

Texas Tech Outstanding Member Spotlight

Alyssa Acosta is a Junior Environmental Engineering student pursuing a joint 5-year Bachelor’s and Master’s of Science in Environmental Engineering as well as a minor in Wind Energy and Mathematics at Texas Tech University. Alyssa joined the Texas Tech SWE section during her freshman year in Fall 2015. She has been awarded the “Most
Active Member” recognition for two years in a row which has allowed her to become our
SWE Secretary for the 2017-2018 academic year. During her sophomore year, Alyssa
was a co-leader for our annual Mother/Daughter event in Spring 2017, and she will be leading this year’s Mother/Daughter event in Spring 2018.

During her time at Texas Tech University, Alyssa has gained experience as a Research
Assistant with Dr. Kayleigh Millerick and Dr. Weile Yan in the Civil, Environmental, and
Construction Engineering Department. She is part of a group working on remediation of
TCE (trichloroethene). She also works in the Engineering Opportunities Center (EOC) as an Engineering Ambassador where she assists students with resume critiques, gives tours of the engineering facilities, speaks to prospective students, and assists with Job Fairs and any event hosted by the EOC.

During Summer 2017, Alyssa studied abroad in Italy where she got to experience the
culture, explore around the historical attractions of Italy and ate lots of gelato. Summer 2018 will bring her new challenges as she will be interning for Wanzek Construction. Alyssa is a leadership example to other female engineers on campus as part of the Society of Women Engineers, we are proud of Alyssa and will continue to encourage her to develop her skills and grow in her career to the best of her capabilities.

Texas Tech Events

“Catch the Engineering Bug” is an annual outreach event hosted by the

SWE Texas Tech section. Our mission is to inspire middle school girls from all over West Texas to one day pursue a degree in the STEM field.

The girls spend a Saturday at Texas Tech University learning about engineering through lectures, demonstrations, and hands on activities led by SWE members, professors, and students from other engineering organizations.

This year, our event took place on Saturday November 11th, and we had almost 400 girls from all over West Texas come to our biggest event ever!