Northwestern’s annual Engineering Week concluded six days of celebrating NU engineers Saturday.
Every Spring Quarter, the McCormick Student Advisory Board organizes E-week, a series of events promoting innovative technology. Many events also highlighted the creative design work of McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science students.
McCormick senior Francesca Ferrero, who coordinated E-week, said the goal of MSAB is to spread awareness about McCormick disciplines and student organizations.
“These events are a commitment to improving the McCormick experience,” said Ferrero, vice-chairman of MSAB. “By giving out helium balloons to attendees at the events, MSAB hopes to demonstrate McCormick’s presence on the NU campus and commemorate the efforts of fellow McCormick students as they engineer a better world.”
This year’s E-week hosted 10 on-campus events, including Dean’s Scholars Survivor, a debate between eight faculty members, a solar panel exposition sponsored by Engineers for a Sustainable World and Battle of the Sexes, a series of games sponsored by the Society of Women Engineers to determine who is best at engineering.
Weinberg freshman Shreya Agarwal said free food and accessories were many students’ favorite parts.
“The most popular parts of the E-week were the free bagels in the morning, the rulers titled ‘Engineers Rule’ and buttons with ‘I love Tech’ (written on them), which MSAB distributed in the Tech lobby throughout the week,” she said.
Ferrero agreed the free food drew lots of attention.
“More than 500 rulers, 500 bagels, 10 pounds of cream cheese were given during the week,” she said.
Dean’s Scholars Survivor, the week’s most popular event, had more than 50 students and eight faculty members in attendance, each professor from a different engineering department. The faculty members were given five minutes each to defend their respective majors and convince the audience that their field of study was best equipped for surviving an apocalyptic event. The civil and mechanical engineering departments tied for first place.
McCormick sophomore David Libbe said the event showed that each engineering discipline has something unique to offer.
“The event was a very entertaining display of wit and reason in which the professors drew on disciplinary knowledge and practical experience,” he said. “It gave some interesting insight into the unexpected benefits of several majors.”
