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2006 UCF-CECS

Engineering Futures Forum 

In celebration of National Engineer's Week (February 19-25, 2006), the University of Central Florida's College of Engineering and Computer Science will be hosting their second annual Engineering Futures Forum for high school students in Central Florida. The purpose of the forum is to acquaint students with information about engineering futures (from professional engineers) and engineering degree programs available at UCF.

The Forum will again be held at Lyman High School's Performing Arts Auditorium on Tuesday, February 7, 2006, from 12:00 p.m. until 2:00 p.m.  A panel of practicing engineers will be contacted to participate from the Central Florida Region.  Last year's panel included  representatives from:

  • UCF-CECS
  • Boyle Engineering
  • Lockheed Martin
  • CDM and PBS&J (representing the East Central Florida Chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers). and 
  • NASA-KSC

The Forum will open with an an introduction of the speakers and a brief presentation regarding the Why Engineering Survey and what practicing engineers are telling students about their early experience and current day realities regarding the engineering profession.  We will then break out into smaller sessions where the engineers will be able to meet with students and informally discuss such issues as: 

  • details of their educational and professional background to include where they work and what they do,
  • why each individual entered the field of engineering and why they pursued a specific engineering degree,
  • what impact working as an engineer has had on their lives, and 
  • what is the outlook for job opportunities (in their field) for the future. 

High school students (grades 9-12) are invited to participate.  Each student will receive a package of information about the forum, e-mail addresses of the participating engineers regarding any questions they might have and information about degree programs available at UCF's College of Engineering and Computer Science.  Click on our Stay Informed link and provide some contact details so you can be kept informed of developments leading up to the day of the event.

What Was Learned from our first year event:

The participating engineer panelists and students were asked to complete an evaluation of the event.  Some of the engineers' comments included:

I think the introduction worked well, a panel of about 4 for a large group might work, but I think a breakout session would be better.  I think in breakout sessions it would help not to isolate the panelist from the students (up on a stage).  After the presentation we actually got a better exchange with the students.  I thought this was very good.   

The panel concept is sound.  The variety of backgrounds in engineering made it especially worthwhile.  The panelists used more time for many of their answers than may have been desired.  For this reason, perhaps using only a couple of “broad” questions at the beginning for each, followed by a series of specific short-answer questions from the panelists, may have prevented the rushed atmosphere at the end.

I would shorten the panel to 4 to 6 members. Ask more questions - not the same question to each panel member. Since you know the panel members, you could ask them a question that would bring out their experiences (which are different from other panel members). With a smaller panel, there should be some time for them to comment on what others are saying. Also - you might consider having questions from the audience spread out into the panel time. It might help the students become more involved in the process, rather than just wait till the end of the time period.

Some students commented:

The forum provided us, the students, with many different examples of engineers today. 

Forum was quite informative regarding engineering jobs nationally.

It was very informative about engineering careers, college and jobs that may open soon.

Speakers were very informative and easy to listen to.