Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:12] Speaker B: Hello and welcome to the Forward Together podcast. I'm Rick Muma, president of Wichita State University.
Today we're going to talk about the Shocker Design Experience program at Wichita State. With me are three students who have gone through the program and are now mentors.
James Wright, Alex Kimball and Eurydia Brago. Welcome to the show everyone.
Well, thank you for coming by the podcast today. Actually coming to your place to do the podcast.
So what I'd like for you to do is just introduce yourself and tell me what your major is, what year you are and what you hope to become, maybe when you graduate.
[00:00:49] Speaker C: My name is Eurydia, I'm a second year student. I'm majoring in cybersecurity and I, after I graduate I hope to go back to Kansas City and find a company over there to work for. Relating to Cybersecurity or IT.
[00:01:03] Speaker B: Where you're from? Kansas City.
[00:01:05] Speaker C: Kansas City.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: I'm J.C. it's a pleasure to have you here in the studio.
I am a senior in aerospace engineering. My last day of class is in like 27 days, but who's counting?
Hoping to stick around here in town and get to enjoy some of the area aerospace opportunities that we have.
[00:01:24] Speaker B: Okay, and you work at niar?
[00:01:26] Speaker A: I work at NIAR right now. That's correct, yeah. NIAR Environmental Test Lab. Shout out to the guys over at the works.
[00:01:30] Speaker B: Billy Dorita, where did you do you work right now? Anywhere on campus?
[00:01:34] Speaker C: I'm working as a peer mentor for the first year seminar and then I also give campus tours with the Office of Admissions.
[00:01:40] Speaker B: Okay. Okay.
[00:01:42] Speaker D: I'm Alex. I'm a second year in an education major.
Hopefully I want to either work in like the 259 system as a biology teacher or maybe go to like more of the rural areas of Kansas and work over there as well.
[00:01:56] Speaker B: So. Okay, so you just reminded me of something that is kind of unique to these first year seminar courses. So we're in the engineering building, but not everybody's an engineering major. Right. And this first year seminar experience that we're going to talk about, is that correct? So that bringing other disciplines, which is a cool thing about it.
[00:02:17] Speaker A: Yeah, that's correct. That's a big thing that we pride ourselves on. A lot of our students are engineers. Of course most of the engineering advisors, the first year advisors just kind of try to stick the engineers in the program because they know that they're going to thank them later for it. That's actually what happened to me. I think I was registered for a different first Year seminar course. But Monica was like, you're going to want this one, just trust me. And she was right.
We get kind of couple business students here and there. We're trying to get some more business students through the program and then we get a lot of graphic design actually through the program. But we like, we like to have all of our multidisciplinary teams here.
[00:02:48] Speaker B: Yeah, that's cool. Since you're talking about this a little bit, why not? What would you say to a new student or a parent about what the Shocker Design Experience course is all about? What's it meant to do?
[00:03:00] Speaker A: Yeah, it's a great question. I think that a big thing that our program does is a great introduction to the university and the university experience. All first year seminar programs are supposed to be that. But I think that this program in particular is very good at that job because we build a really strong sense of community early on.
I know that in my experience, my team was essentially the first group of friends that I found on campus. I'm still really good friends with people that I met on my teams. I'm sure that these guys probably have similar experiences.
[00:03:28] Speaker D: Yeah, my team, we did a couple of our meetings online from 9am or 9pm to 1am in the morning. And a lot of the times you're honestly just messing around, just having fun, playing games and watching each other play games, that sort of stuff.
But yeah, they're like one of my first group of friends and like how I kind of got introduced to campus life and making friends on campus as well. So yeah, I still keep in contact with some of them through Instagram and everything. But yeah, I mean they were my first kind of like group of people, I guess.
[00:03:58] Speaker B: Are you studying at 1am in the morning or just kind of doing video games?
[00:04:04] Speaker D: First three hours are probably video games and the last hour we kind of just locked in and did our stuff.
[00:04:08] Speaker B: So midnight, one o', clock, you know,
[00:04:12] Speaker A: after you're clocked out for the day. But I think that to a parent that's worried about their kid finding sense of community or feeling lost at sea when they get to college, I think that this is a really good first year program to make sure that they feel at home and make sure that they have a sense of community when they get here.
[00:04:26] Speaker B: And for our listeners and viewers, the first year seminar is meant to make sure that students get fully connected and a similar group of lessons that everybody has across campus as incoming freshmen. And we know that that's important to get people off on the right track so they stay in school, don't drop out. So really, what about your experience? And what would you say?
And you give tours so you might talk about this, right?
[00:04:54] Speaker C: Yeah. So my experience when I was in the classroom, I mean, I'm from out of state, so it was very different for me coming to Wichita. I didn't know anyone, have no family members.
And like they said, I still have contact with some of the people that were in my team.
Sometimes we hang out. After our competition, we actually went and got a seafood boil to kind of like celebrate. So it does bring that sense of community. And then also I do like to talk to. I always, whenever I give tours, I always tell parents about it. I'm like, it's a great experience. You get to talk to people who are experts in the fields.
My product was, it was called NextStep. It was the crutch alternative for people who had any sort of like ankle injuries. And so I was able to connect with an actual physical therapist.
And it was really great because we were about to be done with our prototype and found out that originally it was going to be for knees, but our support was in the knee. So we found out through that expert knowledge that it wasn't going to work out. And so we were able to shift it before our primal prototype. So it does give you that experience. We did workshops.
Never once learned Touch3D modeling of that in here.
And. Yeah, and then Sam and Janelle, the professors, really helpful. They always want to be involved with the students and kind of, they want. They have faculty meetings, so they always meet to make sure that we're always on track.
[00:06:29] Speaker B: So I mean, that's high level stuff that you're. You're working as a freshman incoming friend, which is so cool. So you all participated as freshmen when you came here and now you're mentors. So tell us a little bit about that. What do you think about that? I mean, because you know that you're like teachers, right? So why don't you start?
[00:06:50] Speaker A: Sure. So after three years, it all kind of starts to run together. All of the different experiences I've had with the teams. But from what I remember of being a freshman, I remember like we talked about really enjoying this course and thinking that the peer mentors were so cool. I mean, it was kind of like when you're in high school and you're a freshman, you look at the seniors and they're like these huge adult people that seem so responsible. And then when you get to be a senior in high school, you're like, oh, there's really nothing special about this.
Sort of a similar thing here. We're just kind of overgrown freshmen, just a little bit closer to graduating, maybe a little bit closer to having some of our lives kind of figured out. But I think that the transition from freshman being in the program to being a peer mentor, we're still in the program. I think that we're learning a lot of lessons from the program as we mentor in it that are perhaps some of them more useful than some of the things that we learned in the program as freshmen. A lot of facilitation skills, a lot of leadership skills, networking skills, these sorts of communication skills, how to communicate with the team, not just as someone on the team, but as someone who's trying to be a resource for the team leader for the team.
So I think that it was a really beneficial experience for me, and I'm sure that was for these guys as well.
[00:08:04] Speaker B: Alex, you may already kind of answer this, but did you ever, in your experience as a mentor, have a student that just all of a sudden had an aha boomer and the light bulb went off and they were really inspired by what you helped them do or what other classmates? Any examples?
[00:08:27] Speaker D: Yeah, I think I have one team that I can recall to mine. They're working on a kind of more.
How do I explain this kind of a. Like a wheelchair for dogs, but something that's a bit more adaptable rather than what's on the market right now. So they had asked me, like, what are some very good ways to, like, connect to, like, metal piping? And I had given an example of, like, you know, how crutches have a little push pin in the middle, and you can push it and adjust the height for whatever you want? I give him that idea. And then one of the team members he had thought about, because he was.
He really likes working with guns, and he had thought about a gun mechanism that you could basically twist and push, and it would help adjust different lengths for the wheelchair. So you could go, like, different amounts in different sizes for different dogs as well.
[00:09:16] Speaker B: So these are wheelchairs for pet?
[00:09:18] Speaker D: Yeah, so. So, like, dogs that are, like, don't have any movement in their legs.
[00:09:22] Speaker B: I got paralyzed or maybe got hit by a car, and I got paralyzed that way. I mean, I've seen that on.
I don't have a news. I don't know where I've seen that exactly, but I have seen that sort of thing. Any other kind of examples that you guys can think of that really have your work as a mentor had Helped really move something forward for a student or a group.
[00:09:44] Speaker A: Yeah, I had a team, I think this was two years ago, they were working on a smart tracker to go in bibs that they would hand out at the Prairie Fire Marathon to make tracking of the racers a lot easier and a lot easier for the race staff to handle.
So they were really working hard trying to figure out a GPS system and they were kind of up a creek without a paddle. They didn't really know how to do the electronics for it or even kind of what systems to look at or what where you even start coding to actually put code into the microcontroller to run it. And thankfully by this point in time, these were all things that I had experience with.
So I was able to kind of lead them in the right direction and kind of show them, here's a software that you can use. I'll show you a few things, kind of get you started and let you guys run from there. And then a few meetings later, they were showing me on their computer screen how they like walked around in the parking lot and spelled out WSU with their little gps.
So it was really cool to give that team a few ideas and see them run with it.
[00:10:40] Speaker B: Yeah. And the application of these things is really cool. What about you?
[00:10:45] Speaker C: Yeah. So right now the students are working on a video script that's going to go along with their prototype. And I just went with one my teams yesterday.
And in part of one of the requirements for the video, they have to explain why they're team is the best for the prototype. So they kind of have to talk about their skills. And so my team was like, we don't have any skills, we're just working on it. And I was like, that's not true. You're a computer science major, so you're going to use your programming skills for your project, which they are because they're making glasses that will transcript live dialogue. So you're going to have to use that. You're going to learn, and you're also learning how to 3D model. So you just have to think about your skills. They might not seem as technical, but they're definitely helpful for your prototype. And after I explained that to them, they seem a little bit more confident themselves, kind of have to think a little bit deeper.
They were definitely undermining their own skills. But after the conversation, I mean, I hope they're a little bit more confident in themselves and are able to figure out those skills that they have.
[00:11:57] Speaker B: That's great.
So we know that.
Well, let me Back up a little bit. The reason why this course was developed is because, particularly in engineering, but other majors that have heavy math kinds of requirements, that those students were having difficulties staying on track and dropping out. And we're really having some pretty serious retention issues.
And we know that now that we have a couple of years. Actually, I don't know exactly how many years, maybe even more than that, but a couple of years of really good data on this, that, that. That students are persisting at a. At a higher rate because of this course. Now, it's kind of hard to actually say it's a cause and effect, but every. If you. If you look at the correlations, it does look like this is affecting them.
What is it that. And I'll start with you.
What is it that for you that really made a difference in your success going forward?
[00:13:00] Speaker C: Yeah. So with the course specifically, I feel like actually having that peer mentor we met every week. So they gave us advice not just for the class, but for college, the college experience in general.
Sometimes you can't talk with your professor about that. You can't ask your professor what class is best or what time, what professor should I take my class with? But that's something I was able to ask my peer mentor. We were able to kind of talk about that college experience, those struggles and where to find resources for those struggles. And now as a peer mentor, I see that it really does make a difference.
I have team members that text me at 12am asking me what classes am I taking and are they hard or not? So it definitely helps a lot. Are you awake at 12am Yes. I always tell my.
I'm usually up pretty late, so I'm like, you can text me on teams whenever you want. I'll. I'll try to respond as soon as I can because I want to be that help, that assistance that I had when I was a freshman.
[00:14:04] Speaker B: That's great.
[00:14:05] Speaker A: Yeah, I agree. I think that the peer mentors are a big part of it, but I think it really, at least for me, and from what I see in my teams, it comes back to what I said earlier, which is the sense of community that we build. So the peer mentors, they help a lot. They're a resource that's higher up. But even just the team that you build and the experiences that you go through, kind of the fires that you have to put out, the shared bonding experiences that you all have when classes start to get more difficult or the semester starts to pick up, especially in second half of freshman year when you're kind of trying to figure out your sophomore year. You have a built in group of people that you can kind of plan your life with. And the fact that it's not just all people from engineering, that it's people from other majors typically tends to help out a lot because you can get some other perspectives on how people are handling things.
So yeah, I think just to kind of call out some of those stats you were talking about, we've got 80% persistence rate across the freshman and sophomore year for over, I think around 450 students. So we're really impressed with those numbers and I think that the community and the sense of purpose and support that we build in this program is a really big contributor to that.
[00:15:15] Speaker B: It's phenomenal. It's a big, as you're saying, a big shift from what was happening before.
And you know, I'm interested in the persistence for a couple of reasons. One, I want everybody graduate on time or you know, as close to four years as possible.
But also for the institution, as if we lose students along the way, it's a real loss for the institution and you know, takes a lot of money to recruit students.
So we need to do everything we can to keep them through and that helps the university on the revenue side of things as well. So good to hear that data.
What about you, Ox?
[00:15:52] Speaker D: I do agree with them that the community is a really big part of it. But what really kind of. Because my freshman year I was a biomedical engineer and then just last semester I switched over to education.
But what I think if I did stick with engineering, I think seeing all the hands on and group activities with my team would have really led me to be more of an engineer. Because like you said, you have a lot of your hard math classes, like you have calc 2, diffieq and then you have physics. Physics 2, all these really difficult math courses where you're just doing math and math and math and science and science and science over and over again for your first two, maybe three years and then you finally get to your engineering courses. I think like people get really burnt out with that and then they just kind of switch over, feel like they aren't good enough for it anymore. So like having this my very first year and seeing I can work with different people, I could be very hands on with everything.
I think it's really helpful for students to see this is what you're going to be doing. It give them a little bit more push or drive towards the end goal.
[00:16:54] Speaker A: Yeah. A glimpse of the future, so to speak. Yeah, I Think piggyback off of that. These really math heavy courses, engineering.
It just helps to know that some people care about you and also to know, like you were talking about, that it's okay if you don't want to be an engineer, it's okay if you change your mind, it's okay to fail. We try to show them early on that it's okay to change your mind if things don't go the way that you expect, that your team will be there to support you, your mentors will be there to support you, that we've got a really good campus full of people that are there to support you. So even if things don't go the way that you planned, if, if you want to change your mind, but stay in the university ecosystem, we're here to help.
[00:17:34] Speaker B: One of the common things that you all mentioned. So just this morning I came from what's called the National Advisory Council. It's a group of 100 people that, from across the country, many of them are alums, but definitely supporters of the university. And they're, you know, they're out there professionals and they come to the university twice a year to hear about what we're doing and provide advice about, you know, what they're seeing in the workforce. And what we had this morning was a long conversation about these durable skills, teamwork and problem solving, critical thinking. And it's really nice. I wish you guys were there because you could have been able to demonstrate that, you know, a lot of, a lot of folks out in the workforce, one of their biggest complaints of students coming out of school is they don't have those kind of skills, they don't know how to work with a team. And it sounds like this is really something that has been very helpful to you. Do you have anything you want to add about that?
You ready?
[00:18:36] Speaker C: Yeah, definitely. This class helps with all those skills. And one thing that we learned early on, especially in the fall semester, is that it's okay to have weaknesses in some fields and also have strengths. So while someone might be good in survey, doing surveys and doing interviews, someone might be better off doing our proof of concept before the prototype.
So it's called widget, I believe.
Yeah. So they kind of do a survey based on what their interests, their strengths, and based on the widget, someone might have like discernment or invention, they kind of assign themselves their tasks because that's another thing. We let them figure out who's doing what, assign roles. So when I was doing this, I had a journalism member in one of my team so he was amazing at being able to do the interviews and the surveys. And then one of my other teammates who was in engineering, they were mainly the ones doing, like, those designs for our prototype.
[00:19:43] Speaker B: That's great.
So to kind of wrap it up, what piece of advice would you give to an incoming student about this or anything else based on your experience and how they might want to approach a student? Being a student here at Wichita State, you want to start?
[00:20:08] Speaker C: Yeah. So my advice is don't be afraid to make mistakes. You're going to make mistakes, and you learn from those mistakes.
You want to have errors so that you know what you need to fix.
This class, a lot of students are making five, six, maybe even seven prototypes, and they're learning from their past prototypes, those flaws and errors, and they're open to learning so that they can change it and make it better for the user who they have in mind for their prototype.
[00:20:39] Speaker A: Yeah, I think kind of to go along with what you said earlier, where a lot of people in industry feel like what used to be soft skills are now the skills that they're looking for, especially with emerging technologies, it's not as much of a commodity to have all these hard skills anymore to just be able to use the CAD programs or know how to do the math, because, I mean, people don't need to know how to do those things as much anymore. And it's now more so about how can you interact with the team. Do you have good people skills? Are you good at networking? Do you know how to learn?
Do you know how to apply yourself? Do you have initiative? Those are the kinds of things that, at least in my experience, employers seem to be looking for, and that will put you ahead.
So if you use your college experience, of course, to learn about the thing that is in your major, to build those sorts of academic resources, build your academic library, that's going to be good for you. But I think that you should focus more on how you can improve yourself and build those durable skills that employers are looking for. How you can either join a program like this or join as many extracurriculars as you can get in clubs. Just get out there and meet people and practice talking to people and maybe leading a group, just trying to make sure that when you do get out of the workforce, you've got something that separates you from just someone who knows how to use CATIA or knows how to use whatever your industry's school of choice is. If you've got those durable skills, that's going to make you a much more hireable person. It's going to really bend you forward.
[00:22:08] Speaker D: I think my piece of advice is don't be afraid to change and be ready to adapt. Because like I said earlier, I was a biomedical engineer my first semester. So it was a really big ego hit for me to switch out of that because I know my parents really wanted me to be in a high earning career and to switch down to, or not switch down, but like switch over to being a teacher. And it was just kind of like I discovered through this program, I guess that I really enjoy teaching, being a leader, working with people.
So I switched over to education my last semester and that's really been a really big change for me because I always thought I was going to be either engineering or some sort of like medical profession. So, yeah, my advice was just, you gotta learn to adapt. So, yeah.
[00:22:49] Speaker B: Okay, so I have to say something about that. That is another word or skill that these folks brought up this morning is adapt.
And that's the other thing that they believe that there needs to be more from incoming employees because, you know, things change all the time and you, you've got to be able to switch and multiple times it just depends on, you know, what's going on. So I'm glad you brought that up too.
All right, so we are taping this today on April 10th, but we're going to release it right before graduation. And the reason why we're doing that is in your graduating. So this will be extra special for you is to be able to demonstrate to people these kinds of experiences are helping students. And so make sure you push this out to your mentees and to other people so they can see what you're doing and the impact that you're making. And I want to also thank you for participating in the podcast today, but also, you know, stepping up and being a mentor, it takes a lot of courage as a student.
And it sounds like you guys are the perfect professors one day you're really involved in what you're doing and I can see that in your responses. So thank you for stopping by the podcast and we wish you all the best.
[00:24:13] Speaker A: Yeah. Thank you for coming by.
[00:24:14] Speaker D: Thank you.
[00:24:17] Speaker B: Thanks for joining us today. Be sure to follow, rate and share the podcast so others can find it too. And if you're curious to learn more about the mission and vision of Wichita State, check out my book, Student Centered and Innovation, a guide to transforming higher education. It dives deeper into the story of Wichita State's transformation and what it takes to lead meaningful change. Visit Wichita. Edu book for more Information Information and Go Shockers.
[00:24:52] Speaker A: Sponsorship for the forward together podcast is provided by scott rice officeworks and the shocker store.
Additional thanks to nair amp, wsu carpentry shop and go create.
Produced by caleb johnston, dakota miller, katie pham, matt rascoe, curt ryerson with the help of kaelyn bragg, ryan chastain, tim hart, carmen heitsch, sarah tankornellis, tate penner and marcus wright.
