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Orginially from Ohio, I went to the big city of New York for about 5 years (mainly for school), and now I am working towards my masters at Cambridge in England. I hope this website gives everyone a taste of what my life is like here... and if nothing else I think you will find it fun and entertaining!!
Saturday, October 23, 2004
Career??
Ok so all of you have been getting on my case about education and real life... so yeah here is a boring update with no pictures about the educational status of my life at Cambridge. I am completely loving all of the business courses... although it is quite a different format than we do in the states. There is no homework, but I am starting to learn that you are still supposed to review what you did in the previous class before the next class. In fact, one of my professors actually asks people complex questions about the previous class and does not let you refer back to your notes!! And we are talking about being able to spew back equations here, not just concepts!! Also, they often have these silly in class exercises (well the business classes do)... where they teach you a concept and then give you 5 minutes to work with a partner to come up with examples of whatever the concept was. hehe for some reason that feels totally like elementary school over again. All in all though, you do end up learning a lot from the classes.
On another note, I did finally come up with a concrete research topic for the year that my advisor has approved!! It is really funny, because I wrote him an e-mail explaining what I was thinking about and my rationale behind it (because it seemed really hard to find him when I was free)... so luckily I made it to his friday NINE AM class and he told me to hold on after class. So for 5 minutes after class he said he received my e-mail and was thrilled with what I selected as a project... and he tried to make the specifications of the project more specific. It is going to be really fun!! I cannot wait!! So what is it I am going to be working on you ask? Clarification of the inclusiveness of various product groups. In the past my group has looked a very specific products, for example the latest digital tv cable box, and has done case studies to determine who is excluded from using this new technology and why they are being excluded (is it something physical, mental, etc?). However, what if we look at the entire class of cable boxes or the entire class of televisions, or teapots, and the list just goes on and on. Before we can figure out which products are excluding the most people, we have to determine which classes are most exclusive. For example, are teapots more exclusive than televisions? Or perhaps televisions have a wide range and thus some are more exclusive than the most exclusive teapot, and some are more inclusive than the most inclusive teapot. So I am going to do looooots of case studies, and draw on various case studies that my lab has already performed. Right now my assignment is to read this really long 100 page paper released by the Department of Trade and Industry called "A study of the difficulties disabled people have when using everyday consumer products". The main output of my master's research will hopefully be a database with an interface such that you can take any disabled individual or eldery person and answer various questions about both their physical and mental capabilities, and then a chart will be produced showing which products groups they are likely to be able to use... and if they are able to use any product from the group or if it can only be from a smaller group of products that are designed a bit more inclusively. hehe ok I hope all of that made sense... if not, maybe I will clarify or go into more depth at some later point hehe.
Now all I have to figure out is what do I want to do with my life??? Now I do realize that I kind of have to figure this out on my own... but I could use some help!! ok so I figure I should start with the knowns and then try to fill in the unknowns... so here is what I know. I know I want to get married and have kids (a minimum of 3... because I have a brother and sister, and let me tell you that my sister was the best idea my parents ever had!!.... hehe well besides for me and my brother ;) ) I also know that I want to raise my kids... meaning I don't want a nanny raising my kids. I also know that I want to do something in addition to raising my own kids. Furthermore, I know I want that something to make a difference in the world. I don't want some generic job like being a waitress or a house cleaner (hahahaha can you imagine ME being a house cleaner??). It has crossed my mind that perhaps the thing I should do should be profitable first and foremost, and then I could also be active in some kind of charity type activity to aid in making a difference in the world. But you see I have these two big gaps. What can I do that is profitable, I would enjoy, and can be done while raising kids (and preferably might make a difference in the world!!)? I do have an entrepreneurial spirit... so starting my own company seems like a fun option. But I also am becoming quite fond of the idea of a marketing oriented job. I met a lady who graduated a few years back from my department at cambridge (EDC -- engineering design centre). And she is now working in cincinnati at P&G (how ironic is that??) and she is working on the design of product packaging and labels to be sure that they are not excluding people from using their products based on how they are preseneted to customers. Something along those lines sounds pretty fun to me too... but I am not sure how "part time" oriented that type of job would be. The option of being a professor seems like it is fairly flexible... and depending on the type of research being done, it could make a difference in the world... but then I start thinking about how in order to be a respected professor you have to be publishing A LOT... which takes time and means that ultimately it may not be as flexible and easy to juggle with everything else either. All I know is that I don't want my children to ever feel like they are my second priority. I feel lucky in retrospect that my mom was a stay at home mom... we (meaning my siblings) were always her number one priority... sheeeeesh how am I ever ever going to figure out what I want to do?? Do any of you have any ideas as to what a good plan would be? Any help would be sooooooooo wonderful!!
Hugs :)
On another note, I did finally come up with a concrete research topic for the year that my advisor has approved!! It is really funny, because I wrote him an e-mail explaining what I was thinking about and my rationale behind it (because it seemed really hard to find him when I was free)... so luckily I made it to his friday NINE AM class and he told me to hold on after class. So for 5 minutes after class he said he received my e-mail and was thrilled with what I selected as a project... and he tried to make the specifications of the project more specific. It is going to be really fun!! I cannot wait!! So what is it I am going to be working on you ask? Clarification of the inclusiveness of various product groups. In the past my group has looked a very specific products, for example the latest digital tv cable box, and has done case studies to determine who is excluded from using this new technology and why they are being excluded (is it something physical, mental, etc?). However, what if we look at the entire class of cable boxes or the entire class of televisions, or teapots, and the list just goes on and on. Before we can figure out which products are excluding the most people, we have to determine which classes are most exclusive. For example, are teapots more exclusive than televisions? Or perhaps televisions have a wide range and thus some are more exclusive than the most exclusive teapot, and some are more inclusive than the most inclusive teapot. So I am going to do looooots of case studies, and draw on various case studies that my lab has already performed. Right now my assignment is to read this really long 100 page paper released by the Department of Trade and Industry called "A study of the difficulties disabled people have when using everyday consumer products". The main output of my master's research will hopefully be a database with an interface such that you can take any disabled individual or eldery person and answer various questions about both their physical and mental capabilities, and then a chart will be produced showing which products groups they are likely to be able to use... and if they are able to use any product from the group or if it can only be from a smaller group of products that are designed a bit more inclusively. hehe ok I hope all of that made sense... if not, maybe I will clarify or go into more depth at some later point hehe.
Now all I have to figure out is what do I want to do with my life??? Now I do realize that I kind of have to figure this out on my own... but I could use some help!! ok so I figure I should start with the knowns and then try to fill in the unknowns... so here is what I know. I know I want to get married and have kids (a minimum of 3... because I have a brother and sister, and let me tell you that my sister was the best idea my parents ever had!!.... hehe well besides for me and my brother ;) ) I also know that I want to raise my kids... meaning I don't want a nanny raising my kids. I also know that I want to do something in addition to raising my own kids. Furthermore, I know I want that something to make a difference in the world. I don't want some generic job like being a waitress or a house cleaner (hahahaha can you imagine ME being a house cleaner??). It has crossed my mind that perhaps the thing I should do should be profitable first and foremost, and then I could also be active in some kind of charity type activity to aid in making a difference in the world. But you see I have these two big gaps. What can I do that is profitable, I would enjoy, and can be done while raising kids (and preferably might make a difference in the world!!)? I do have an entrepreneurial spirit... so starting my own company seems like a fun option. But I also am becoming quite fond of the idea of a marketing oriented job. I met a lady who graduated a few years back from my department at cambridge (EDC -- engineering design centre). And she is now working in cincinnati at P&G (how ironic is that??) and she is working on the design of product packaging and labels to be sure that they are not excluding people from using their products based on how they are preseneted to customers. Something along those lines sounds pretty fun to me too... but I am not sure how "part time" oriented that type of job would be. The option of being a professor seems like it is fairly flexible... and depending on the type of research being done, it could make a difference in the world... but then I start thinking about how in order to be a respected professor you have to be publishing A LOT... which takes time and means that ultimately it may not be as flexible and easy to juggle with everything else either. All I know is that I don't want my children to ever feel like they are my second priority. I feel lucky in retrospect that my mom was a stay at home mom... we (meaning my siblings) were always her number one priority... sheeeeesh how am I ever ever going to figure out what I want to do?? Do any of you have any ideas as to what a good plan would be? Any help would be sooooooooo wonderful!!
Hugs :)
