As a transfer student, it is hard to find useful sources of information, which can lead to a lot of missed opportunities. To help incoming transfers, I became a mentor for MentorSEAS and the Transfer Representative for the Society Of Latino Engineers (SOLES). Through these roles I was able to bring awareness to what it is that transfers want and need when they are new to the school, as well as give transfers information I wish I would have had when I transferred. I hope I was able to help make people’s transition easier and to inspire them to help others in the same situation.

MATLAB was the worst class I took in community college.  It was the only class in my life that I felt I could never get at all. I even cried during the final. I didn’t use MATLAB again for over a year until the Transfer Bridge to UCLA Samueli program last summer. Since we weren’t getting graded, I was able to re-learn MATLAB without any anxiety. I spent hours by myself at night coding to finish the assignments and got a lot of help from my summer bridge peers and mentors. I was able to get over my fear of MATLAB thanks to the Summer Bridge program. When I took M20 last winter here at UCLA, it was an easy A for me. Now, I use MATLAB all the time in all of my classes and I think of MATLAB as my best friend! I have come a long way since transferring to UCLA, I would have never envisioned myself saying any of this a year ago!

There are many doors around UCLA waiting to be opened.  One I recommend everyone try is opening the door to research. I got the amazing opportunity through the Air Force Research Lab to work in the Energy and Propulsion Lab headed by Professor Karagozian. She is an extremely smart professor that was very helpful in getting me situated in the lab. Within a week I got a key to the lab, met some of the graduate students I would be working with, background information on all their experiments, and an offer to work as much as I wanted; even through the summer. The research projects they are running are very interesting to me and I enjoyed every day I went into the lab. In addition, I was learning a lot along the way about topics in upper-level classes I have yet to take. My favorite experiment was about how sound affects combustion. Did you know you can use speakers to put out a flame? We were experimenting on how raising input voltage, thus increasing amplitude could extinct a flame or cause other interactions between the flame and sound waves. This data was recorded at high speed and inputted into MatLab to then break down the images and normalize the data to analyze. The application of this research is in jet propulsion where the acoustics from propulsion can cause extinction within the combustion chamber and cause loss of power. Through a better understanding of acoustics on combustion, fuel-efficiency along with power can be increased. My time in the research lab has been an amazing experience and I recommend everyone to try it even if graduate school isn’t your goal because you’ll be surprised how much you can learn.

Research is a great way to figure out what you’ll be comfortable doing. I am currently a part of the UCLA Health MRRL (Magnetic Resonance Research Lab) implementing deep neural network for spectra reconstruction. Previously, I was involved in Dr. Meyer lab and realized that his work might not align with my field of interest. Even so, it was such a great learning experience for me! In both labs, I’m a part of what they call a “dry-lab,” which essentially is the coding side of research. Being involved with research labs also helped me make connection with students who’s been admitted to UCLA since their freshmen year, allowing me to get connected to resources that I was not aware of in my first quarter here as a Junior! If you’re lucky like myself, research positions might also pay you 🙂

I got a job offer from FM global at the end of winter quarter after months of applying and getting nowhere! The entire process took about 4-5 days, while for other candidates the entire interview process happened over a 3 month period.  I was fortunate to meet the recruiter a week before the final interviews were happening. She loved my resume and asked me to do a phone interview the next day! After the phone interview, I conducted an in-person interview, wrote an essay, a cover letter, and had to send in a recommendation letter all in the span of a weekend! The final interview took about 6-7 hours, but at the end I had a very good feeling about the position and the company! I found out I got the position later that week and I could not be more grateful! This was the opportunity I was waiting for my entire college career, and it finally happened! 

I was in a workshop for improving my resume when an opportunity was presented to me. If I submitted my resume that night I’d get the chance to earn an Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) Scholarship, work with a research lab on campus, and be considered for an internship over the summer with AFRL. I immediately started working on my resume, not even waiting to get back to my house before I finished editing and submitting it to the Engineering Transfer Center Director. In the days following, I felt uncertain if I was ready for this jump in responsibility. I realized that this was a real opportunity, I wouldn’t just be another face in the classroom, rather it would be me and a supervisor handling tasks. However, in the time it took to get accepted, I decided to try. Even if I don’t want to, even if I am uncertain in my abilities, I owe it to myself and the work that I’ve done, to take that first step into the workforce. I have not regretted that decision. After going through two quarters of working in the UCLA Plasma and Space Propulsion lab, learning many new skills and accepting a summer internship through AFRL, I am happy that I took that first step.

At Transfer Bruin Day in 2018, I heard a lot about how student design organizations can be helpful in giving you practical skills and experiences that help you secure internships and jobs after graduation. Through my time with Bruin Racing, I learned how a prototype race car is designed and built. As part of the Composites sub-team, I also learned various lay-up and molding techniques and used them to help manufacture the nose cone, undertray, and other carbon-fiber components. I gained insight into the field of Composites Manufacturing and solidified my understanding of Strength of Materials and Manufacturing theory with some practical experience.

I am finally at the milestone of graduating from UCLA. It’s not quite how I imagined it to be graduating into a global pandemic; but things are never quite how we imagine it to be. Overall I am just so grateful for my journey that has led me here. When I finished high school I remember feeling so lost about what I wanted to study. I attended my local community college, City College of San Francisco for 5 years before transferring to UCLA. During my first two years I took classes from multiple subjects to figure out what I wanted to major in. The only thing consistent in my schedule was math; specifically the calculus series. I knew I liked learning math and I knew no matter what I decided to major in; math would never hurt for me to learn. The first time I was introduced to engineering as a field of study was when my calculus professor, Jamey Bass, asked me if I had considered engineering as major. From there I began to learn more about engineering and the different disciplines to specialize in. I remember feeling “safe” inside my community college bubble because everyone that was majoring in STEM took all the same core classes. It wasn’t until I got accepted into UCLA and walked through the halls of Boelter did I truly feel that I was an engineering student. That was also the first time I experienced imposter syndrome. I had some serious doubts on whether I could be successful in engineering as I received my first F on my midterm exam during my first quarter. I was also met with doubt by family members as I was being asked, “Are you sure you want to do engineering, it requires a lot of math”. After a rough first quarter, I had some thoughts about leaving UCLA. However, I took some time to reflect and realized that at its core I just felt afraid. I was afraid I was not “smart” enough to be an engineer; I was afraid to fail. From there I made the active decision that I rather try again and fail than to runaway in fear. I am grateful for my support network that has encouraged me throughout my UCLA career.

One of the most important lessons I take away from UCLA was learning how to get back up in face of adversity. UCLA has prepared us to be resilient mermaids to swim in the sea of life.

Thank you to my friends and professor for supporting me through this journey, special shout out to my mom that has supported me since before birth.

WE HAVE OFFICIALLY GRADUATED FROM UCLA!

Hi, Im Sam Newcomer! I transferred from Shasta Community College which is located in Redding California. I decided to commit to UCLA after attending Bruin Day and seeing how supportive UCLA is to transfer students. Before the year even started I was able to make a ton of amazing and supportive friends, such as Tara, Chris, Andrew and David, while participating in the Transfer Bridge Program. While at UCLA, I received a scholarship to conduct research from the Air Force Research Laboratory. I decided to join the Zhong Hypersonics and Computational Aerodynamics group where I am conducting research on Linear Stability Theory.

Going into my first lab meeting, I was terrified. I was asked to compose a presentation on the Boundary-Layer Linear Stability paper by Mack. This paper was so dense it took me roughly 8 hours to read the first 3 pages. I went into the presentation expecting Professor Zhong and his 4 Ph.D students to ask tons of questions I didn’t know how to answer. Since it was my first presentation, my second slide had an about me section talking about where I grew up. My professor started asking questions about hiking trails near where I lived that I didn’t know about. I thought to myself, well we are off to a good start. I managed to survive my first presentation and got complements from my lab-mates on my delivery. 

El Camino College recently welcomed a group of UCLA students who ran an Arduino-based workshop for 17 ECC engineering students who have backgrounds in calculus, physics and computer science. Linked to an existing ECC-UCLA partnership, the activity was designed to support the development of our engineering program. ECC students learned applications of Arduino software, and the importance of collaboration with hands-on projects, which provides a foundation for our future circuits course. We look forward to more interaction and activities with UCLA on behalf of engineering faculty and students.

Through another component of our UCLA partnership, three ECC students who completed research at UCLA over the summer will travel to Washington, D.C. in February 2020 to participate in the annual Emerging Researchers National Conference in STEM. Hosted by the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion program and the National Science Foundation, the conference is aimed at college and university undergraduate and graduate students who participate in programs funded by the NSF HRD Unit, including underrepresented minorities and persons with disabilities. Each of the El Camino College students – Bryant Espino, Daniele Carmelo, and Brandon Illescas – was mentored by a UCLA grad student; in turn, each of our students mentored two high school students.

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