Tag: campus life (Page 1 of 2)

old computer monitor with black background, green text that reads "critical failure detected, do not panic.. do not panic... do not panic..."

UCI Summer Research Symposium 2016

August 11, 2016 / kateringland / 0 Comments

Cover of a booklet for the summer research symposium. Has images of students posing in a group and working together to finish an obstacle course.

Cover to the Summer Research Symposium program.

Today was the end of the summer research programs on the UCI campus. This summer I was a mentor to both an incoming PhD student in the Competitive Edge program and an undergraduate student in the SURF program. The summer ended with a wonderful research symposium where half the students presented their work via oral presentations and the other half presented posters. We then had an awards ceremony lunch where everyone was recognized for the great work they did this summer.

A woman giving a presentation at a podium. To her right is a slide projected with the title "Developing a user friendly system to 3D print minecraft creations for autistic children"

SURF Undergraduate, Aminah Tamimi, giving her presentation on 3d printing from Minecraft.

Woman stands next to a podium and a slide that says "Who watches the overwatchers?"

Competitive Edge PhD Student, Amanda Cullen, giving her presentation on Overwatch.

These programs are a really nice way to help students prepare for graduate school. As someone who participated in a similar program (DREU) as an undergrad and in the Competitive Edge program, I can attest to their usefulness.

As a mentor for students in these programs I am also extremely grateful to the programs for the opportunity to give back and be a mentor. As someone who is passionate about increasing diversity in academia and in STEM programs, I am always excited about chances to “do my bit.” In this instance, working with both Aminah and Amanda was a wonderful experience. Not only are they both hardworking students who are going to go great places, but they are generous with me as I felt my way through my role as a peer mentor. I plan on staying in touch with them (especially Amanda since we sit next to each other in lab) as they progress along their careers and continue to be helpful when I can.

A big thanks to everyone who made this summer fun and full of learning!

Crawling out of the fog

November 28, 2015 / kateringland / 0 Comments

For those that know me personally, you’ll know I recently gave birth to the sweetest little boy. He is known as baby Kai in my HCI circles to identify him from the many Kai, Khai, and CHI’s floating about. He’s 3 months old and, as I have heard from several sources, I am just now starting to come out of the fog. I perhaps likened my experiences as more sort of clawing my way out of a pit, but the end result is the same. I am here, slightly battered and definitely disoriented, but so very much richer than I was before.

I start this blog up again because I feel like it was always an important thing for me to document what has been happening in my life- both for my own amusement and to point to when people ask me how I “do it” (that is, go to grad school, be a mom, and stay a semi-sane human being).

The plan is to produce posts (realistically, semi-sporadically) about my research, writing, things I’m reading, videos as I make them, tales from being a grad school mom, progress on video games I’m making, and gaming in general (I’m going to be honest, you’re going to probably get a lot about Minecraft).

EAPSI Alum Advice for Applicants

October 22, 2014 / kateringland / 0 Comments

I have been getting questions about the EAPSI application process, so I thought I would save everyone some time and write a quick blog post about my experience. I will probably update this as needed (when I think of new things or someone asks me a new question).

Firstly, for those who don’t know what EAPSI is, it is a summer internship opportunity that is funded through the NSF that gives student researchers a chance to conduct research in various Asian/Pacific countries. As an EAPSI 2014 Fellow, I was able to spend 10 weeks in Hiroshima, Japan conducting research at the university there. NSF has a lot of really great information on their website, which I highly encourage you to read through if you are thinking about applying.

As a caveat, my experiences are particular to the Japan EAPSI fellowship. Each country has a different relationship with NSF, differing numbers in terms of applicants they will take, etc. For instance, it is a fact that the countries where the primary language spoken is English have a much lower acceptance rate. The non-English speaking countries, like Japan, have much higher acceptance rate (I heard the number 40% floating around, but can’t verify that).

Now, I’ll present my advice as someone who had their fellowship application accepted.

You have to have a good idea of who you will be working with in the country of your choice. In face, you will not get accepted as a fellow without a letter of support from that person. What I did for Japan is searches on the web for anyone who might be related to my area. When I didn’t hear back from anyone, I had my advisor send some emails. In the end, I found someone who was not directly in my field, but he was someone who could use my expertise (as someone who can built and evaluate tech). We emailed back and forth several times, while I worked out a potential summer study plan*. SAVE all these emails and attach them to your application. NSF wants proof that you have a working relationship of some kind with your potential host.
You don’t need international experience, so don’t stress it. It’s more important that for your application that you have a relationship with your potential host researcher (see #1). You also don’t need to be able to speak the language of your country of interest. NSF is more interested in sparking collaboration and giving students a new opportunity.
Have very clear Intellectual Merit and Broader Impacts categories in your application. If you have applied for the GRFP, then you know how important these categories are. Make sure you have lots of both.
It needs to be clear that you know how to plan a research project that will take place in the allotted time. You only have 8 or 10 weeks, depending on which country you go to. That’s not very much time at all. Be able to articulate the work you will do leading up to the summer and how you will possibly extend your work (and your new international collaboration) into the future after the summer has finished.
Look through the slides and handbooks from the NSF EAPSI website. These were super informative for me when I was writing my proposal and application.

Here are the quotes from my IM and BI categories of my proposal:

“Intellectual Merit. The intellectual merit of this project includes an examination of how designing assistive technology can occur in a cross-cultural practice, particularly between Japanese and American researchers. This project will also result in a prototype of an Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) device for Japanese speaking users. In addition, the work from this project will contribute to the development of a framework to facilitate cross-cultural design of assistive technology. I plan on disseminating the results of my proposed work through academic publication at conferences, such as CHI and UBICOMP, and relevant academic journals.

Broader Impacts. This project will ultimately benefit children with ASD, their caregivers, and with which peers they interact. The project will strengthen international ties between USA and Japan as I collaborate with researchers from Hiroshima University. This project will allow me, as an underrepresented student, to gain experience researching internationally. I intend to share this work and experience at conferences, such as the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing and the Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing, aimed at underrepresented students in both graduate and undergraduate school. This will bring awareness of my work to underrepresented groups in computing fields and help draw more women, minority, and students with disabilities to graduate school. I will also keep a blog during my experience in Japan on my personal website. As part of my studies at UCI, I plan to continue to mentor undergraduate students and to continue to develop technologies that can be used to assist children with disabilities.”

*In truth, this plan did not really end up happening due to a lot of different things, which is totally okay and normal. We still did some amazing research.

Additional questions can be left as comments here or emailed to me at kringlan [at] uci [dot] edu.

Hope this was helpful!

Competitive Edge 2013, Week 4 & 5- New XP

July 27, 2013 / kateringland / 0 Comments

It has been five weeks since I started this Competitive Edge program and got a jump start on graduate school life. I will admit that it has had its ups and downs. However, I can safely say that I am doing something that actually inspires me to wake up in the morning and go into work every day. The only other time I felt this way was when I was doing my DREU project last summer at UMBC- my first taste of life as a researcher. I have definitely found something to be passionate about and if there are bumps along the way, they are well worth the effort to overcome them.

In the last two weeks, I have accomplished a lot and gained a lot of new experience points. I’ll just talk about some of my experiences so that you can get an idea of all the different things going on in my life at the moment.

Presentations. It’s the dreaded event that anyone doing research has to deal with. Being able to present effectively is important for disseminating findings from your work. During Week 4, I was asked to give a short presentation of my planned research project to the STAR Group. We have weekly meetings where people have a chance to get the group’s opinion on research ideas or project planning. I gave a short talk on my project that I had just started planning. I will be honest that my presentation style still needs work, but that’s why we practice. I was also very nervous because this was the first presentation I was giving as a graduate student to my peers (and advisor). I had extreme anxiety over being judge “not good enough”. Anytime I have tried something new this summer, I will admit that I have fears that people will realize that I got into grad school as a fluke and they’ll realize I really don’t belong here. I am told by many more senior grad students that this is a perfectly normal feeling and that it does not really ever go away. Awesome.

After the STAR Group presentation (where I did learn a little bit about how to deliver a more effective presentation and no one told me I shouldn’t be in grad school), I gave another presentation, this time to my fellow Competitive Edge students and mentors. I will be honest, I was not nearly as nervous about this presentation. Partly, I knew that this group wouldn’t be judging me as harshly (not that my STAR Group was judging me harshly, but it’s all perception…). And, partly, I had a little more experience to go off of.

I have at least one more presentation practice with Competitive Edge this summer and then I have to give my presentation at the Summer Research Symposium on August 15^th. People ask me if I am nervous about it, but I have to honestly say “not really”. I know by the time I reach the 15^th, I’ll be adequately prepared and there’s no use wasting energy being nervous now. Talk to me 20 minutes before I go on stage and you’ll get a much different answer.

IRB. The Institutional Review Board (IRB) is put in place to protect those that are participating in human subjects research. I whole-heartedly believe it is a very important process to have in place for a number of reasons. However, when one is the researcher that has to get their project approved by IRB, it can be a fairly intensive process- especially for newbies like myself.

The perks of the process were that I got to put myself down as Lead Researcher (and consequently take all the responsibility for the paperwork that that title implies). Nothing boosts the self-confidence like seeing your name next to the title “Lead Researcher”. The process also helped me clarify exactly what I wanted to do step-by-step for the study. It was like writing out a detailed research plan, which I think would be really helpful for any project. It forced me to work with my advisor to clarify details I was unsure of and helped me focus my research questions.

The downside, of course, is that I spent five days filling in paperwork and creating all the required documents. It was extremely time consuming and exhausting. When it was finished, I felt like I should have been relieved to turn it in, but instead I just felt anxious about whether or not I did everything correctly. The other downside to the process, is that now I have to wait. I cannot recruit subjects or start my study until I receive approval, which could take several weeks. Luckily, I have plenty to do in the meantime!

Spending Other People’s Money. This probably sounds weird, but I am finding spending money that is not mine extremely unnerving. As part of the preparation process for my project, this last week I have had to start procuring all the equipment needed. I was fine with the idea of doing this, but when it came to that actual deed, I had a minor panic attack. I realize, I’m not your average bear and do have a tendency to react with stronger emotions than most. But it was something that happened, so I will still write about it. I had all sorts of guilt and questioned everything I bought. “Is this the right thing? Am I going to get in trouble?” Completely irrational. My solution is to either never require equipment again (unlikely, unfortunately) or to somehow deal with these irrational fears. Hopefully, with experience, it will get better. I guess I didn’t expect to be the one to actually do the buying. We needed a computer for the study, so I give my advisor the specs. She says “Ok, go down to the bookstore and get whatever you need…” It’s very intimidating when all the responsibility falls on your shoulders, I guess. I’ll be honest, I haven’t even opened the box for the computer yet because I am so scared I bought the wrong thing or did something wrong. Pretty crazy, I guess.

Allowing Myself Downtime. This is a super important point that I keep forgetting. It’s okay to work hard and push until something gets done (especially with deadlines involved), but I have to remember that it is equally okay to take time off. This weekend, for instance, with the exception of wanting to write this blog, I am not even thinking about work. And this blog is more therapeutic anyway.

Learning To Be Myself, Whoever That Is. I am finding that I am not like a lot of the other students in my cohort. And that’s perfect alright. We get along during workshops and are quite friendly. But I am not the sort of person that goes to bars or clubs. I don’t feel a burning need to do things on the weekends. I am actually perfectly happy curling up at home with a good book or video game. And that’s okay. I am just in a different space than many of the other people I’ve come across. I guess I could categorize myself as “settling down” or more sort of family oriented. It was different at WSUV because a lot of people had families and lives outside of school. There wasn’t a lot of pressure to drink, party, or stay up late. I’m happy for people who want to do those things, I just don’t want to do them myself.

Large-Scale Multitasking. I have to juggle a lot of different tasks at once. I have my project (which has several balls in the air right now), Competitive Edge requirements (which don’t especially overlap with my project), networking inside my lab and outside, maintaining my household, and making sure Kyle remembers who I am. I am working on my research project which I am hoping will turn into a submission to a conference while simultaneously working on my NSF GRFP proposal (will give all the dirt on this in a separate blog post) and working on past research (my ASSETS poster was accepted, YAY!). I feel like there is a lot in the air and I’d better not let anything drop!

Stay Tuned! I’ll be keeping you posted on my research project progress and I am planning a blog entry dedicated to NSF GRFP. Until then, DON’T PANIC!

Getting Started, Competitive Edge 2013

July 6, 2013 / kateringland / 0 Comments

This summer I am participating in a program at the University of California, Irvine called Competitive Edge. The aims of the program are to give minority (and women) incoming graduate students a “competitive edge” on their Ph.D. programs.

After a successful drive from Washington down to southern California, we settled into our new home in campus housing adjacent to the UCI campus. One benefit of the Competitive Edge program is the early move in for the student housing. We had a couple days to acclimate before I started my program. This was spent mostly setting up house and trying to get used (mostly unsuccessfully thus far) to the heat.

Road to Irvine, CA.

The first day of the program was orientation, including a campus tour, luncheon, and a ropes course. Yes, a ropes course. Most of the folks back home would probably have a hard time imagining me up on a ropes course because, honestly, heights really aren’t my thing. But it happened. And I even did the zipline at the end.

Competitive Edge Students gathered near the ropes course.

Competitive Edge Students after the ropes course.

Each week, the Competitive Edge will be holding workshops to help us make the most of our grad school experience. So far, I have attended workshops on Research Resources, various informational sessions on the types of fellowships available, a workshop on the Ford Foundation fellowship, and a session outlining the NSF GRFP. From here on out, the workshops get more specific into the application process. We will be getting feedback on our essays, proposals, CVs, and even on how we give presentations. At the end of the program, on August 15, we will each be giving a 10 minute presentation on our research at the Research Symposium. All in all, this program is definitely designed to make us much stronger graduate students.

The rest of the week I get time to do research in my own lab. I am a member of the Star Group in LUCI. I will be working on researching assistive technology for those with Autism. This past couple weeks, I have been doing background reading and getting settled in the lab. I will be working with a great group of people in my lab (everyone is really friendly and more than willing to collaborate) and I’m excited to really start working.

On Getting Into Grad School, Part 4

April 20, 2013 / kateringland / 0 Comments

Did you miss Part 3?

March 2013: UC Irvine Visit and THE Decision

After leaving Boulder and hearing what students there had to say about their school, I was more inclined to accept Irvine’s offer. I wasn’t going to say with 100% certainty until I had visited the school and made sure I clicked with the people there, but based on the research that was happening and what I heard from others, Irvine was the way to go.

It did not take me long to feel like my initial instincts were correct. I got off the plane and already felt like I had come home. Now, I had to be cautious, because in a lot of respects, I had come home. I spent the first 12 years of my life in Southern California. I had decided that Kyle, my husband, needed to come with me on this visit. If this was going to be our home for the next 5+ years, I wanted to make sure it was going to work for him. He was not as impressed at first as I was. I knew what he meant about it not being “green”. The Pacific Northwest is definitely a lot greener, but I think that’s probably not the best reason to turn down a grad school offer. J I also have to say the women huddled around the hot chicken case at the Whole Foods because it was under 70 degrees outside was extremely humorous.

When I checked us into the hotel, I was given a “goodie” bag with snacks and a folder full of information about the school and department. I think the snacks were a really great touch, even though I couldn’t eat most of them. I did enjoy the pudding cup and the Star Wars gummies. The information packet was definitely overwhelming. It had lots of information on what research was going on and other facts about the school. It also contained a hardcopy of my acceptance and award letter. There was also a schedule for Friday, which included what professors I was going to interview with.

Thursday night we had a dinner with the current Informatics grad students. It was great waiting in the hotel lobby and meeting up with some of the people I had met in Boulder. Already knowing a couple people made the whole experience slightly less daunting. The current grad students picked us up and we had a big dinner together. I got to meet my roommate that I will be staying with in Paris for CHI. I also met other students who I would potentially be working with in the future. And apparently my reputation preceded me because at least one of them already knew of me. I am going to admit, it was completely surprising, but also felt pretty good.

I came back to the hotel feeling very excited for the next day. If the grad students were any measure, I was really going to like this place. I’m going to admit, it was hard to share these experiences with Kyle and give him a good sense of how I was feeling. I think my excitement (and exhaustion) was pretty obvious though.

The next day, Friday, I got up early and had breakfast with Kyle. I then waited for the shuttle to take me over to the school. Apparently, there was some confusion and only have of the prospective students had signed up for a ride, so the whole day started a little more slowly than anticipated. We drove straight to the Bren School of Information and Computer Science. I received an additional packet of information that was more general to the entire School. The morning was spent going over all the great things about the school, “the second happiest place on earth” (after Disneyland, of course). Then we broke down into subgroups of Informatics, Computer Science, and Statistics. We spent more time talking about the Informatics department specifically. I learned about the degree, what kinds of courses I would be taking, the research, how the department operates. One of the things that really caught my attention (and this had come up at the grad student dinner as well) was that there seemed to be a lot of collaboration and cooperation. It didn’t feel like there was negative competition, it was more like everyone was trying to help everyone else out. That’s the sort of environment I was looking for.

Then I got to meet with three professors. While they all had really interesting research that I could see myself working on, I knew as soon as Dr. Gillian Hayes told me about the Autism Research Center, I was hooked. This was the sort of assistive tech research that I wanted to be doing. I told her in the interview that I was set to come to Irvine straight away. How soon could I start working?

I feel extremely fortunate that things have worked out this way. I feel lucky that I found a department that feels good and an advisor that I felt an immediate connection to. I know the road ahead will be challenging, but I’m happy that I chose this road or that this road chose me. However that works out.

On Getting Into Grad School, Part 3

April 13, 2013 / kateringland / 0 Comments

Have you read Part 2 yet?

October 2012: More Traveling Fun

Amidst getting through my senior year classes (which were amazingly more difficult than my previous courses), I traveled some more in the fall. At the beginning of October I went to the Grace Hopper 2012 Conference in Baltimore, Maryland. I had been given a scholarship to attend, all expenses paid. It was great because I was traveling with some of my friends from the west coast. We all stayed in the same hotel and I got to show them a little bit of Baltimore (like the train from the airport to downtown).

At Grace Hopper, I was sure to visit the booths of some of the schools I was planning on applying to. It was nice to connect up with people I had made connections with the previous year and with those I had made connections with over the summer.

Later in October, I attended ASSETS 2012 in Boulder, CO. This conference was a lot smaller than anything else I had been to, but it was definitely worth the trip. Here again, I connected up with people from the summer and learned a lot about the assistive tech scene. It was sort of an affirmation that this was the field that I wanted to go into and was proof that it was a viable field to go into. I think one of the best parts was going to dinner with Amy and Michele (that I worked with over the summer) and getting all sorts of advice on how to proceed with my grad school application process. It was a lot more information in one evening than I had ever gotten from anyone at my home institution. I am glad to have made these connections and definitely don’t want to ever turn up the opportunity in the future to make more connections like these.

November 2012: Wrapping Up the Semester and the Applications

By the time I came home from ASSETS I was ready to finish up my applications and get everything done. I had a much stronger idea of what to write for my personal statements and a stronger overall story for the application package. I spent the rest of November writing all the different personal statements and starting to turn in my applications. For the most part, I was able to get all of my applications done by the first of December. This gave me a little breathing room before finals. While the majority of the applications were due December 15^th, I didn’t want to be trying to turn them all in last minute.

It was at the beginning of November that my first paper (I was second author) got presented at a conference. The conference was in Taiwan, so I didn’t have the funds to go, but it was still exciting to have a paper published.

December 2012: This is the End?

I got all my applications done before finals and wrapped up the semester completely exhausted. And broke. Did I mention how much money this whole process ended up costing? I’m a little scared to actually tally up the total, so I won’t. But it was a lot. It was probably in the neighborhood of $1000 after application fees, GRE tests, and transcript requests.

Then the worst part of the entire process began. The waiting.

Knowing that my entire future was in the balance and that the outcome of these applications would determine where I would be living and what I would be doing in less than a year was completely nerve-wracking. And it wasn’t just my life I was messing with- it was also my husband’s.

January 2013: Dealing with Rejection

Luckily, schools were on the ball and started culling their applications by mid-January. I got a couple of rejections right away. While this was a bit discouraging, I had mentally prepared myself for such occurrences. And a rejection was much better than not knowing at all.

But I didn’t have much time to feel sorry for myself or worry too much because I was also keeping myself busy with school and MORE travel! I was prepping at this point to head to the Tapia Conference in Washington, DC. I was to present a poster on work I had done in the fall for my professor.

Right before I left for the conference I found out that I had a phone interview with UC Irvine the Monday after I got back. While I was very nervous about this, I was happy I had made it past the culling phase with at least one school!

I also got invited to interview with Facebook at the Tapia Conference and invited to a Google workshop called Google.GetAJob(). I felt like I would have a lot of hard decisions to make in the next couple of months about our future.

February 2013: It All Starts Coming Together

The first week in February is when I attended the Tapia Conference. While I was there I spent a day visiting my friends at the University of Maryland Baltimore County. I talked to them about my grad school applications and interviews. It was really great to catch up and also know that what I was going through was completely normal. The conference itself was also really great. I got to meet people from all over and network with the research labs. I did a poster presentation, which I had only done once before. I got a lot of really great feedback and most of it was positive, too.

During the conference, immediately after my Facebook interview, I got an email saying that I had been accepted to present my poster at the Student Research Competition at CHI 2013 in Paris. If I had had any thoughts of just skipping graduate school and going to industry, they instantly vanished. I knew I wanted to do well at CHI and continue doing research that I enjoyed so much.

After I came home from the Tapia Conference, I had my interview with UC Irvine. It was very informal and a really positive experience. I was able to tell them I had gotten accepted to CHI, which really helped my own confidence.

I also found out that I was invited to an interview on campus at University of Colorado, Boulder set for the 14^th of February. So, off I went on another trip after having just come back from Washington DC.

The night before I left for Boulder, I found out that I had gotten into UC Irvine. I was over the moon. It also made me feel much more comfortable while traveling to Boulder. There I met with students and faculty on the campus. I really loved the town, at least until I got snowed in and ended up staying an extra day. I’m not sure I could live in a place where there’s that much snow. It was still a great learning experience and I got a good idea of what I wanted to find out about Irvine when I visited them in March.

On Getting Into Grad School, Part 2

April 6, 2013 / kateringland / 0 Comments

Did you miss Part 1?

Summer 2012: DREU Internship, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

I won’t go into all the great details of my life during this summer internship. Most of it can be found other places on this blog already. The highlights I will mention are: after working at UMBC I began to realize that going to grad school could really happen and that I might actually enjoy it, Amy and others at the school really mentored me and helped me get a deeper understanding of the whole process of grad school applications, and I started actually writing my grad school application material.

Having this internship gave me a perspective into what grad school could be like. I can’t imagine applying to grad school without knowing that experience and knowing whether or not it was something I could handle/enjoy. I was also able to talk with Amy about potential schools and make a list of schools I would consider applying to in the fall. It was the mentorship and guidance that I really appreciated. Just being able to talk to someone who knew the field and could give solid feedback about my ideas was great.

I also got to do some really cool research and see other people working on some equally awesome stuff. I got the chance to write a paper (which I later submitted, more on that later) and present a poster at the end of summer festival. I was even selected to present my work to the entire festival, which was a huge learning experience. I had to put the power point together (make a video for it!), write the presentation, and then speak to a room with at least 100 people in it. It felt like every step I had taken that summer was a new one, going deeper into a mysterious cave of wonder or something.

August 2012: Home Again (And Time To Get To It!)

By the time I had come home and started back at school for my senior year, I had already completed my list of schools I was going to apply to, started a rough draft of my statement of purpose, and signed up (and taken the week before classes started) for the GREs.

It was at this point I made one of my bigger mistakes. I really should have asked for more help. It’s hard when you’re at a small university and very few people truly understand why you would even want to apply to a PhD program. As has been a consistent theme for me, I felt isolated and, therefore, isolated myself. I could have reached out to more mentors (at home and at UMBC), but I decided to go it alone. This was especially difficult to write and edit my statement of purpose(s) and the essay for the NSF GRFP.

I sorted out my references as soon as classes began. I committed one of those faux pas where I only had three letter writers. Fortunately, they all pulled through and I didn’t to materialize another letter writer at the last minute. I used two professors from my home institution that I had worked with on research and with my ACM-W Chapter. My third reference was my mentor from UMBC.

September 2012: Keeping it All Straight

I think the hardest thing from September on was keeping everything organized. I had to keep track of all the materials I was submitting to each institution. It felt like every single one had different essay requirements (not to mention all the other requirements!). Some wanted multiple essays, others wanted just one. And the length was different for each as well. Some only wanted 500 words or less, while others were 2000 words. There was no real way to write just one essay and tweak it for each. I had to write fresh essays for almost every university I was applying to.

Next week: lots of traveling and the submissions in Part 3!

Fall Week 5

September 24, 2012 / kateringland / 0 Comments

I have yet to have a blog post this semester get published on time. I am endeavoring to correct this. Perhaps this is the week I get lucky! This week I had to make some tough decisions and figure out what was going to get cut from my schedule because I am just too busy. Between working (research), school work, home life (some of my home life is feeling sorely neglected at the moment), traveling, and getting ready for grad applications I have zero time. It’s getting me sick and I’m super exhausted. So, something has to give.

I decided to drop the Game Design class, even though it is by far my favorite elective. I am still going to attend the lectures, but I simply don’t have time for all the homework. I was spending ten times more of my outside class time working on projects for that class than all my other classes put together. Not a good balance.

This week started off the first round of exams. This coming week I have GREs on Monday, Web Data Management on Tuesday, and Algorithms on Thursday. Luckily, then I’m off to Baltimore for Grace Hopper! I have finished downloading the conference app on both my phone and tablet. I’m starting to figure out exactly what I need to pack. I’m super excited!!

Since dropping the extra class, I’ve actually managed to get some things accomplished. I’ve finished fixing up my DREU section of the website, so that I can get my last paycheck (which I could really use right now). That was a huge weight on me. Now I have to build a new section for my CREU work, which I’ve been putting off. I think I will actually have enough time this weekend to get that done too. I’ve also gotten a nice chunk of research work for CREU done as well. I’ll hopefully get around to updating my website, so I can start sharing snippets of that.

I also attended the club orientation on campus so that our ACM-W Chapter can be official. I got some good ideas for things I would like to do with the group, so I need to start organizing meetings for that. I still have to work on the website, but I think some of this will have to wait until after Grace Hopper, unfortunately. There is just not enough time in the day for everything!

Fall Week 3

September 10, 2012 / kateringland / 0 Comments

This week was short because of the holiday on Monday. Also, on Wednesday it was my husband’s and my second anniversary. I have been pretty much swamped with school work, research, and ACM-W, but we did manage to make it out to dinner at least.

Time is going by way too quickly. Grace Hopper is only a month away. Pretty soon I’m going to be out of time for things like grad school applications! AHH!

I have managed to play a little bit of Guild Wars 2 and can’t wait until December when I’ll have more time to get into it. I’ve made a plant person who casts awesome spells. Pretty fun.

I helped move my brother back up to Seattle (at least for a while) as he’s taking a class up there. It’s weird having the house a little more empty. But it was nice heading north and visiting with my grandmother for a bit. I spent most of the weekend working on my game for game design class. When it is good enough for public consumption I’ll post it in my portfolio. Stay tuned.

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