October 22, 2025 • 54 mins
Summary
In this episode, Nicholas Karamanian interviews Emily Lawson-Bulten, a doctoral candidate at the University of Illinois, who shares her unique journey from civil engineering to pursuing a PhD. Emily discusses her early career, impactful travel experiences, and the lessons learned about water scarcity and engineering. She emphasizes the importance of community engagement, the value of mentorship, and the need for engineers to understand the social dynamics of their work. Emily also reflects on her aspirations for the future and the evolving definition of what it means to be an engineer.
Takeaways
- Emily's journey highlights the importance of mentorship in shaping career paths.
- Travel experiences can significantly influence one's professional focus and values.
- Understanding community needs is crucial for effective engineering solutions.
- Engineers should consider the long-term maintenance of their designs.
- Personal connections in the workplace enhance job satisfaction and performance.
- Career paths are often non-linear and filled with unexpected opportunities.
- Being open to new experiences can lead to personal and professional growth.
- The definition of engineering is evolving to include diverse perspectives and approaches.
- Collaboration with communities can lead to more effective and sustainable engineering solutions.
- Self-awareness and understanding one's biases are essential for engineers.
Emily's Email: emilyjl3@illinois.edu
Website: https://www.reroutedpod.comEmail: nick@reroutedpod.comInstagram: @rerouted_podLinkedIn: Rerouted
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Emily's Journey
02:56 Undergraduate Experience and Early Influences
05:39 Impactful Travel Experiences and Water Equity
08:14 Lessons from Kenya: Water Scarcity and Engineering
10:42 Advice for Students: Embracing Opportunities
13:31 First Job Experience: Learning and Growth
16:06 Transitioning to a New Role: Finding Passion
18:49 Optimizing Job Preferences and Experiences
21:01 The Value of Comprehensive Project Involvement
23:48 Final Thoughts on Engineering and Personal Growth
29:20 Passion and Career Reflection
32:04 The Decision to Pursue a PhD
37:47 Expanding the Definition of Engineering
44:08 Personal Growth and Engineering Identity
46:37 Future Aspirations and Open Possibilities
54:13 From Civil Engineering to Academia
54:13 Looking Ahead: The Future of Engineering
Keywords
engineering, career paths, PhD, water equity, community development, travel experiences, civil engineering, mentorship, professional growth, teaching
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome back to Rerouted where we explore unique career paths
to give you the tools you need to create the life you want.
On today's episode, I talked with Emily Lawson Bolton, who
was about to finish her PhD under former guest Doctor and
Perry Whitmer. We talked about Emily's early
career as a civil engineer to how she got to starting her PhD,
becoming a well-rounded professional in her field, and
dealing with what it means to bethe right kind of engineer.
(00:20):
Later in the episode, Emily looks forward to what is next as
she looks to graduate from her PhD program in May.
Let's hop into the episode. Emily, thank you so much for
joining me today. It's great to have you.
Great to be here. Happy to be here.
I want to get started. I just want to ask you on the
surface level, what do you do right now?
Yeah, so currently I'm a doctoral candidate at the
(00:41):
University of Illinois Urbana Champaign.
So how I explained to my 7 year old niece when she asks why I am
still in school is because my job is currently school.
So I'm completing up my researchhopefully this year.
And so that's the majority of what I do is around my research.
(01:02):
I as well TA and then MAA teaching assistant.
So yeah. All right, and we're gonna talk
a little bit more about your research later, cuz I personally
think it's very interesting and I think other people will as
well. So can we start off?
Can you tell me a little bit about your undergrad experience?
Yeah. So for undergrad, I went to a
smaller private or a small private university in Michigan
(01:26):
called Calvin University. And there I got my BSE in civil
environmental engineering as well as International
Development studies. And compared to a place like
Illinois, it was quite a different experience because we
had 4000 students total about just over 100 engineers, I think
(01:47):
120. And in the civil area, there
were fourteen of us that come junior and senior year took most
of our classes together. So quite different.
I personally really loved it. I got quite close with my
professors there and, you know, could still name the 14 people I
(02:11):
went to college with. So as well as I got this really
great experience to be a part ofthe start of the Clean Water
Institute there at Calvin University.
So I was able to do research through that and travel a decent
amount, working on different water systems internationally,
(02:32):
partially because it was such a small university and I was able
to be a part of so many things, right?
Can you tell me a little bit more about that, those travel
opportunities that you got? Yeah.
So my first one was when I was afreshman to Kenya.
So I was a part of this thing called the John Perkins
Leadership Institute, Servant Leadership Institute, which was
(02:54):
for first generation college students, but focused around the
life of John M Perkins, who was a civil rights activist and one
of the founding members of the Christian Community Development
Association. So it was really focused on
community development with a Christian kind of theology put
into that. And so because I was a part of
(03:17):
that, I took what my school had this thing called interim.
So in between the fall and spring semester, the month of
January, you could take just oneclass for interim.
And I took the freshman class during the fall semester as a
part of the Perkins program, which meant that I didn't have a
class to take in my freshman year.
(03:39):
And so there was a group of halfengineer, half going under
engineering professor, half going under a geography
professor headed to Kenya. I grew up in an Ethiopian
immigrant church, so I was rearing to go.
And the geography professor, hisname was Jonathan Bascombe.
(04:02):
He saw my energy and was like, Iguess she will not be denied.
And I was really privileged to be able to go on that, that
first trip to Kenya. And that one was really
interesting as well because eventhough I was an engineer and
there was so much engineering onit, I actually went as a part of
(04:25):
the social sciences geography group under Doctor Bascombe.
And so I was exposed to all the engineering items, but was
focused on the social sciences items while we were there.
What were some of like the takeaways for you through that
trip? What were some things?
(04:45):
Were there any moments on that trip that were like aha moments?
Was there anything that kind of really inspired what you want to
do in the future? Because now a lot of what you do
is about clean water and water equity.
So was there any parts of that trip that kind of inspired you
to do what you're doing now? Yeah, I mean, I definitely cared
about water before that. I grew up in Colorado where it's
a really water scarce, scarce area.
(05:08):
People are kind of flabbergastedwhen I make the comment that
growing up we weren't allowed legally a rain barrel because
the water that fell on our ground wasn't ours, right.
So I already cared about water. But that situation really, it
really helped me kind of call into question at first
(05:28):
engineering and then really cement a lot of the things I
cared about. South, significant amount of the
trip we spent with the Samburu tribe in the northern part of
Kenya and we were in a really remote area.
I mean, the car we took spent multiple hours not on roads,
just on dirt land or maybe they were dirt roads and I just
(05:51):
couldn't tell at that point. It spent a significant amount of
time on this. So we were we were quite remote
and the Samburu tribe is a semi nomadic tribe.
And so one of the first things that kind of struck me was they
were actually only in this situation of water scarcity
(06:12):
because they were forced to be less semi nomadic.
Traditionally, they would have grazed their livestock and
traveled them around towards water sources.
And you know, we can go into thehistory of conversation, right?
But a part of that included kindof having tribes be more
(06:36):
cemented in a place. And so we were at a small tribe
that actually had a borehole, but it wasn't working and it
hadn't been working for for two years.
And what struck me about that was, again, as an engineer, I
would have seen this village as taken care of, right?
They have a borehole, they're good, they're connected to
(06:59):
water. But for two years it hadn't
worked because there was a screwloose.
And so I first started thinking about like, I think that's when
as an engineer, I started thinking about maintenance and
like long term, I think that's something that as engineers,
when we're being trained, we actually don't often think
about. We think so much about the
(07:20):
design that we don't consider what maintenance looks like.
And then because I was with the social sciences group, I was
privileged enough to go on a water walk with a, with a
community member. I mean, we, we only went to a, a
shorter, a shorter water source that was about two kilometers
(07:44):
where in the really dry seasons they would be walking three to
five kilometers one way to get to their water source.
You know, they talked about how they would save their donkeys
for the really dry seasons to goget water.
But, you know, we would joke about how I was ready to get
married because I could carry 10gallons on my back and 5 gallons
(08:06):
in each hand. So because I made the, you know,
the minimum 15 gallon mark, I I could be married.
And I mean, it was so much work and it took the entire morning.
Yeah. And I think that that was kind
of the other reason that I was more cemented into the caring
(08:27):
about water and water work and water equity because of
experiencing that water walk with her and being in this
village that, you know, they were so welcoming, they were so
loving. And we were able to fix the
borehole. But The thing is like, it's
going to break again, right? And we left and there was no
long term solution put in place.And so it's kind of this like
(08:50):
acknowledgement now that I don'tknow what's happening there and
I don't know if they have water there or not.
And I feel like as an engineer, these are things that we should
know, like the lifespan, right, of our technologies that we're
designing. What would be your advice for
somebody, whether they're an engineer or not?
If they're a college student, they have an opportunity or they
(09:13):
can get an opportunity to do a trip like this.
What would be your advice to them?
I mean, I love it. You know, some people say that
I, I do too many trips. And actually my, my sophomore
year, in between my sophomore and junior year, I was looking
at I, I traveled to Peru with our, our version of Engineers
(09:34):
Without Borders. We called it Engine Engineering
Unlimited because we were such asmall school.
So we were working on a a project in Peru and I was trying
to decide should I get an internship in Michigan or should
I go and play soccer? Because I was a college soccer
player at that time. And there was this opportunity
(09:55):
to be a part of a summer Soccer League that also did soccer or
soccer camps for kids that we played in Brazil.
And then we also came back and played around Chicago and, and
did camps around there. And I remember talking to the
professor that I was going to Peru with, trying to decide what
(10:16):
to do and, and kind of get his advice.
And he was like, you know, for the rest of your life, you'll
have this opportunity to be an engineer.
And, like, it'll probably be an opportunity to be an engineer in
Michigan, but when, again, will you have the opportunity to go
play soccer in Brazil? And I was like, say less, right,
(10:39):
Like, and I think, you know, when I look at traveling, for
me, I've really been blessed by the opportunity to be a part of
so many people's stories and hear from so many different
voices. And I think that that's, you
know, even if you're traveling as an engineer, right, during a
semester abroad as, as some of those are doing, you know, it to
(11:02):
me, it's it's an opportunity to start hearing different voices,
to hear different perspectives. And it it's just so valuable.
Yeah, in our society today. And yeah, definitely changed me
the the travels that I completedwell in college.
OK, even if you're not an engineer, it's still not just
(11:22):
for your engineering knowledge but for the for perspective in
general. Doesn't just help as an
engineer. Well, yeah, that's fair enough.
Although I will say there's something weird about engineers
where like from so early. I feel like everyone's so
serious. Yeah.
It's really not that serious. And honestly, I love what you
mentioned as well about the you have the opportunity to be an
(11:44):
engineer for the rest of your life for that internship between
sophomore and junior year. I feel like, you know, I talked
to, I mean, I was in this position because I'm a junior
now. So now I'm looking at the summer
between junior and senior year for internships.
But I mean, talking to people who are in their sophomore year,
they really feel that pressure. And I mean, I was there last
(12:05):
year. There's we definitely can get
quite serious. And I don't know if that's just
the Illinois culture, but it is.I mean, yeah, that makes a lot
of sense. Yeah, that's.
So I do not appreciate a single industry internship in
undergrad. Really.
Yeah. OK, So what did I even do
(12:25):
between my junior and senior year?
I did something. Mm.
Hmm. But then I, I, then I went and I
worked as a research fellow. I, I actually did research on
water policy between my junior and senior year in the political
sciences department. Very interesting.
So I did that between my junior and senior year and then during
(12:50):
my senior year, and actually thesummer passed my senior year, I
worked as a a research intern, research fellow at the Clean
Water Institute. But that meant I got to go to
Jordan. So I mean, for me, again, no
brainer. And yeah, I graduated without a
job, but I found one in less than a month and it was fine.
(13:14):
Yeah. So there you.
Go. I am curious also as well,
internship or not the not the research that you did with part
of the political science department with clean water.
Do you feel like that research experience that wasn't
necessarily engineer made you a better water engineer in any
way? Oh, I definitely think that
understanding policy makes you abetter engineer, To put a poor
(13:40):
metaphor on it. Again, as a soccer player, when
I, one of my first jobs was as areferee and a big part of it, my
father was like, yeah, you know,you're going to make at that
point I was like 13. So like it was decent money for
a 13 year old. Oh.
For sure. But the other thing that my
(14:01):
father was like, you're going tounderstand the game in a
different way because you're looking at it from a different
perspective. I really got that while working
on the policy. The first part of it was
actually focused on Christian perspectives towards water.
So we did an entire biblical inventory of every time water
(14:21):
was referenced in the Bible. And then we started looking at
policy because the work was focused around water rights in
the western United States. And so moving, you know, again,
I got got a theological perspective of water, then I
started getting this policy perspective of water.
I started understanding international policies and
(14:44):
politics around water as a humanright and what that means.
And I think it does make you a better engineer because you
understand the context or the background of what you are
designing in. OK.
I want to extrapolate that out alittle bit and say it seems like
that would make that fair to say, even if you're not a water
resources engineer, being able to understand your subject but
(15:08):
from a different angle seems like generally that would be
useful. OK.
Yeah, right. And then you also know how to
interact with people from different perspectives that
aren't just on the technical side.
You understand the lingo of policy makers, and you might
even understand a bit more why things happen the way that they
(15:28):
do. Then when I'm an engineer and I
have to get approval for something, I understand kind of
the process of why the approval system is this way, which also
means that I understand when I can challenge that process.
Yeah, Yeah, that seems like a bit of a superpower honestly to
have on an engineering team or any team.
(15:50):
And I not even. Just we wouldn't go that far.
Well, honestly, you know, you were saying that engineers are
very, very serious. So quite honestly, even just
being able to talk with other people might be a superpower for
an engineer. So you know this.
Is true, Yeah. We don't give ourselves enough
credit. We really don't.
I completely agree with you. I think that we can be a lot
more social than we than we giveourselves credit for 100%.
(16:14):
But OK, I feel like we got a well, engineering talks not
going to stop, but this engineering talk will, I fear.
OK, so you mentioned you graduated, you didn't have a
job, but you got one like a month later.
Can you tell me a little bit about that first job out of
college? Yeah, for sure.
So my first job out of college was in industry.
(16:34):
I was a staff engineer for a small private development firm.
I worked on natural gas distribution, environmental
inspection. I got to design these fancy
things called like horizontal directional drilling when they
need to take a pipe like across a big area and they don't want
(16:55):
to dig through it. So they essentially make like a
giant U giant loop. It was a good job.
I definitely learned a lot. It was not the job for me.
I was there, I don't know, a year and a half, just under 2
years. And I learned a lot in that job
of what I cared about in a job. And that included, you know, we
(17:19):
had short cubicle walls and kindof a more open space.
And I loved that. I learned that I care a lot
about who I work with. I am a pretty social person and
so I loved talking with my Co workers.
You know, sometimes a Co worker and I would have to go to Ohio
to go check out some natural gasdistribution there and we'd both
(17:43):
get in the truck and drive for hours upon hours of time.
And I actually loved it. I loved being able to talk with
my Co workers and hear more about their lives.
And I didn't realize that that was something that you might
look for in a job until that point.
I really loved my boss. He was a great manager.
(18:05):
He managed really well for me where he gave me space to try
and fail and also was like supportive of me even when I was
failing, to then kind of pick myself back up and try again.
And I think that was so important at my first
engineering job to be able to get that kind of experience and
(18:29):
have a boss like that. I think I wouldn't have done
well with a job that was really with a boss that was very
micromanaging. It just wouldn't have worked out
well because I can be kind of anindependent person.
So yeah, I'm, I'm grateful for that job and also understand
(18:49):
that it wasn't me. I learned that I care a lot
about what the job is doing, notjust my work in it, because I
did enjoy my work. I like design.
I liked environmental inspectioneven.
But I cared who my clients were and I cared what the larger
picture of things that we were doing.
(19:11):
And so for me, working in that setting didn't work as well
because I often wasn't interacting with the clients.
I even if I knew who the client was, the client would be a large
organization like DTE. And so it was harder for me to
get behind the designs and really care deeply because of
(19:33):
that. Got it.
I can understand that. So then you've gotten this first
job. You've kind of figured out some
of your likes and your dislikes,what you do and you don't want.
How did you go about optimizing the things that you did like and
the things that you didn't like for your next role?
Yeah, great question. I don't know how, but I just
definitely did optimize those things.
(19:55):
I started looking at other jobs and at first I was like, I don't
even need to be an engineer anymore.
I was like, I'm I'm done with this.
I'm done with being an engineer.I applied to be a youth pastor,
which I mean, it would have beengreat, just wasn't my path.
And then I would just randomly scroll LinkedIn or Indeed like
open jobs. And my next job I ended up
(20:16):
getting a position with the conservation district that then
made me working for the nationalresource.
Conservation Society. And it really did start to, as
you said, optimize those things that I loved about the job.
You know, I remember, like, Calvin didn't have agricultural
engineering, so I didn't even know what NRCS was.
(20:40):
I'd never heard of it, right? And so it was like this new
experience of looking into a jobthat I didn't even know existed.
And then as I started talking tothe individuals, even in the
interview, it was crazy to thinklike that can be a job, Like
that's an engineering job. You know, at, at NRCS, you often
(21:05):
are working with a private landowner because the National
Resource Conservation Service works on private lands.
So you're working with private land owners that want to do
environmental improvements to their land and you work with
them from start to finish. So you're going out to their
land. You're talking with them about
(21:25):
the challenges that they're experiencing.
You have like the district conservationist who's been
working with them. That might suggest a couple of
technical practices to do. You as an individual are going
to go out with your survey rod and survey the space.
And then you're going to take that information and you're
going to take it to your office and you're going to upload it
(21:47):
and you're going to, you know, look through CAD.
You might have to do a watershedmap in which you pop over to the
USGS office and see if you can find their topographic maps of
the area you're in. You're going to design it and
then send it out to bid. And then if it gets, if it gets
(22:07):
approved, you're going to prepare the construction
documents and then you're going to meet with the contractors
that the landowner hires and you're going to talk them
through what's expected. And then you're going to be
there for inspection as well of construction inspection.
And so it was so cool because again, as an engineer, to see
(22:28):
something that I got to be a part of the entire process from
start to finish, right? Yeah.
And see the impact of it and know what the impact's going to
be in that land owners life was just, yeah, I mean, it was
invigorating, right? I didn't even realize how much I
didn't enjoy my previous work until I was doing that work.
(22:50):
And I was like, this is awesome.I get to, you know, talk with
land owners as a part of my job.Like, that's crazy.
Sometimes they bring you cookies.
I don't know. It was great.
That's nice. And then my Co workers, we were
really small group and it did expand a little bit more through
(23:13):
my time there. But my Co workers, there's four
of them that to this day are some of my best friends and I
still like will go up to Grand Rapids and hang out with them.
I went to one's lake house the other day a couple months back.
And so for me, that is again, really important that I'm
(23:35):
connected to the people that I'mworking with.
And I don't think this is a thing for everyone.
My spouse works remotely and he loves being by himself and
working remotely. He's also an engineer, right?
But as they say, different strokes for different folks.
For me, I'm the type of engineerthat wants to be with people,
(23:56):
wants to see the impact of that.And so upon that I started
learning like again, what thingsI loved about a job.
And so I learned that I loved being able to be a part of the
whole of a job that I loved a bit more of the designing and
and problem solving because thatexisted much more when working
(24:19):
for the conservation district than working in industry.
Because often times in industry,people kind of already know what
they want, especially in naturalgas distribution, there's not a
lot of room to play. I would say sure.
Yeah. And then NRCS, I got to do that
(24:41):
more. I got to problem solve more and
I think that that's something that I learned that I really
love. I love the problem solving the
challenge of it of like. Not sure what exactly works.
It seems like in this role, you really, you really did it all
right. You were saying you did it from
start to finish all the way through.
(25:04):
You obviously at some point you learned how to do all those
steps, but what were some thingsthat you learned generally from
having ownership of that whole process?
What were some what was some value that you got from having
to learn how to do all these things and really taking control
of the whole thing? Yeah, I think one of the keys is
like, again, what often makes a good engineer and a good
(25:25):
designer is how much you can seeand understand the context, the
larger aspects of what's happening.
And I think right now with the way that we often use standards
in the US engineers so quickly as they're starting a project or
ready have the standard outcome like prescribed, right.
(25:50):
And so I think like that was really powerful that, you know,
even if I didn't get to see it being able to work and shadowed
those that had been working in it a lot longer than I, my boss
Chris, or there were two other engineers, Aaron and Juanita
that had been there a lot longerand then one other engineer,
(26:12):
Lexi, who had been there a shorter time.
And it worked out quite well forme in the fact that I could get
kind of the Longview from those that had been there for 20-30
years. And then I could then turn to
Lexi and be like, OK, so now like, what does that look like
(26:34):
today, right? Because those that have been
there for 20-30 years didn't even necessarily want to use
CAD, right? And it's like, OK, I could use
CAD. Like, I know how to use CAD, but
they're going to be able to point things out that I wouldn't
have known, right? I'm working on a composting
facility and my boss might say, did you ask, did you ask the
(26:55):
landowner how big his skid steeris?
Be like, no, what, why would I need to do that?
And he's like, well, because that will determine if he can
stack it to 4 feet or if he can stack it to five feet and which
would be like best for his practice, right?
And so it was this process of learning all of these things to
(27:17):
optimizing the design, fitting the design into how land owners
were already, you know, often farming their land that I'm, I'm
doing a grassed waterway across the land.
Well, Juanita might point out, how can we get this to minimize
the size of the grassed waterwayso that we're still dealing with
(27:39):
the erosion, so we don't have erosion, but also so that we're
not impacting the farmer and taking, you know, every foot
lost of their land is money lost, right?
And so if you have a really large grassed waterway, they're
going to lose a lot of money. And so starting to think about
those other aspects, right? The context of it all, seeing in
(28:03):
person working with contractors is the best and most frustrating
and most humbling and like a combination of best and worst
that exists in my opinion. I mean, contractors are, they're
so knowledgeable and they're also so cocky.
This is obviously an over exaggeration.
(28:24):
Not every contractor is like this.
But to know when to stand up to a contractor, right?
And argue about like a cement ratio versus when to be like,
oh, you know more than me. Like I may be the designer, but
like, you know that this isn't even realistic to build was a
(28:47):
really valuable experience, right?
Seeing how to actually like twist rebar or tie rebar
together and things like that. Then when you're going to
design, you start considering these things.
And so then it changes how your construction documents look.
It changes how you do the designin general.
(29:08):
And so I do think it's a really powerful thing to be able to be
a part of the whole process. Yeah.
You start seeing what matters ina process.
Yeah, I really, I did really love it so.
I can tell by the way you're talking about it almost makes me
wonder to be honest. I'm like man, why are you still
not working not to? Of course I'm not.
Into career. Shaming here, but but it's
(29:29):
still, it does make me wonder because, you know, you're
talking about the so passionately, which is really,
really incredible to hear. Honestly, that's one of my
favorite things about doing thisis that I get to hear things
like this. It's really enjoyable for me
personally. But yeah, it seems I can see how
what you're saying. It's just being able to
understand and empathize a lot more with different stakeholders
really helps you become better at what you're doing.
(29:50):
Whether or not you're an engineer, just being able to
understand the process, understand where that affects
different things leads to you becoming really good at what you
do. Because also as well, I am so
early, it doesn't even feel right to say that I've started
my career as an engineer at thispoint.
But I can tell just from the, you know, the people that I've
spoken to and what I've seen at this point that that is how you
become a good engineer. And I can where I'm talking with
(30:13):
other people know that that's how you can become really good
at really anything as well. Past guests on the show have
also backed this idea. So that's really, really
exciting just for me as well to see this very specific part of
how a really specific example ofexactly what you're doing and
how you become really good at it.
So yeah, that's really and it's.Interesting what you said about.
(30:35):
Yeah, it's kind of crazy how much I love that job and that
I'm not in it because I think that this also to me, when
thinking about career and careertrajectory, like I do think I
could have stayed at that job and been really happy.
And that doesn't mean that what I'm doing now is like a mistake,
right? I think that for some reason, at
(30:56):
least for me growing up in like high school, I would have
thought that there's like a perfect job out there.
There's like my calling. This is what I'm supposed to be
doing. And I just don't think that's
true anymore. I think that there's a lot of
things that I could do that I would enjoy my life during, and
there's not one special thing out there that I could be doing.
(31:18):
But instead it's kind of the decisions along the way of,
yeah, how do I optimize what I want to do?
How am I enjoying the period of time I'm in now?
And knowing that it could change, it could not change, and
either way it'll probably be OK,is really helpful for me to
think about at this current, very unknown stage of my career
(31:43):
trajectory. Yeah, that's really awesome.
Thank you. That also as well, pretty much
like everything you've been saying, that's wisdom that can
be very easily extrapolated to alot of people's lives.
So thank you for sharing your thoughts on that and your views.
Thanks. All right.
Yeah, for sure. Well, let's transition then.
So you've now left the perfect job that you never should have
(32:03):
left, but you're getting your PhD.
You're getting your PhD now. I want to know what led you to
decide to get your PhD. You've been in the industry for
a little bit. Yeah, great question.
And we have two people to blame for that.
The first is Kendra Zeeman, and the second is Anne Perry
Whitmer. But, you know, I had to kind of
(32:23):
thought about like maybe gettinga master's or something like
that. But really just because I found
this job that again, I didn't know existed and I thought back
to my undergraduate experience and I felt so often that I was
not the right type of engineer that I, I didn't, you know, care
(32:48):
about the correct things. Or again, like, compared to my
spouse that, you know, I was toosocial for being an engineer or
things like that. And I realized once getting this
job and working it, that my perception of what an engineer
was was so limited. And so part of it was me just
wanting to tell more people, butthere's other options out there,
(33:12):
right? That what we're exposed to is
just so, yeah, so, so little, sosmall amount of engineering that
exists. Again, I'm a first generation
college student. So the idea of, like, going back
to school after I had accomplished and gotten the
college degree was a little strange.
(33:33):
You know, I think my family would attest to this day that
when I was like, I'm being offered a federal position, but
also I might go do this completely unknown thing.
They were like, well, that is a decision that, you know, kind of
thing. I mean, they've been great.
(33:53):
But yeah, I definitely know thatthey kind of looked at me
strange. But to get back to it, I was in
a field one day with my new Co worker, Kendra Zeeman, who had
moved to Michigan after getting her master's in agricultural
engineering from the University of Illinois.
And we were just talking about what we cared about, you know,
(34:17):
and, and our lives and our approaches to engineering as one
of the things that I, you know, have talked about is important
to me. And so we were in a field
surveying, chatting about what was important.
And I was talking about how frustrated I get with engineers
when they are redesigned something and then people don't
(34:37):
adopt it. And we blame the people, right?
Especially when it comes to infrastructure systems.
You know, I was talking about a bit of my international
experience and just talking about how, you know, engineers
would be so much quicker to say,well, they need to be educated
more. They just don't understand the
system, right? And almost like, blame it on
(35:00):
them being like less of a person.
Like, you know, this is the point in time when engineers
give ourselves way too much credit, right?
To think that engineering is something spectacular, that it's
so spectacular that other peoplecouldn't understand, people who
aren't engineers couldn't understand how amazing the
(35:24):
engineering design is, right? And I was like, that's not on
the people. That's a bad design.
If you design it in a way that people can't use it or that they
need extensive training to use it, like that's a bad design.
So I'm talking with Kendra aboutthis.
And she goes, I know someone youshould talk to.
(35:45):
So she introduced me to Doctor Whitmer, who is my now advisor,
and we just had a virtual chat of talking about these things,
talking about life, talking about experiences, the
frustrations we had around engineers, blaming systems on
the people and, and the want of engineering to be different, to,
(36:10):
to be accessible. You know, I talked about my my
work at NRCS and I talked about how much I wish that I had
gotten more of it in undergrad. I did get some of it, but really
only through my international experiences, I would say.
And somehow through the end of our conversations, she was like,
(36:32):
so you're coming down here, right?
And I was like, I guess I am like, I don't know when it
happened. I don't know how it happened.
And then I was like, OK, tell you what, yeah, I'll come down
there, but I'm only getting a master's.
I'm only doing a master's, like APHD.
No one needs a PhD. No engineer needs a PhD.
(36:53):
And she's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's fine.
That's understandable. But if you come in as a doctoral
student, I can fund you. And so, you know, you can come
in and just try it out. If you don't like it, you can
always master out. I was like, OK, OK, yeah, that's
(37:14):
real. And now, five years later, here
I am getting my doctorate. Right.
It was never my plan. Yeah.
So a little wild at the two, butI just got so excited by the
idea that engineering could be different that I think with my
(37:36):
job at NRCSI found that place. And then this idea that then I
could influence engineering as adiscipline, that I could help
other people, other undergraduates see the different
types of engineering existed wasjust so exciting.
Plus then I could get transitioninto doing more water work.
(37:59):
I was doing some at RCS, but that I could focus more on doing
water work and especially international water work.
So those two things and as my spouse will tell you, I'm a, I'm
a sucker for a possibility for like a dream of what something
could be. And so I think just the
excitement of, you know, what this could be was so much that I
(38:22):
was like I was in. And there have been times that
I've maybe not fully regretted it, but definitely questioned
myself. And then other times where I've
been like, yeah, yeah, this was a good decision.
And, you know, I think just because I question myself and
have a hard time doesn't mean that I was a wrong decision,
right? Yeah.
It's just is there. You go, I like that.
(38:44):
It just is. So then tell me about what
you've been doing for the last five years then?
Yeah, that's a great question. What have I been doing?
So I work infrastructure systemsengineering infrastructure
systems and I focus a lot on kind of two aspects, but
specifically around interpersonal power dynamics in
(39:07):
in design. So I've done some work around
how engineers understand ourselves and how to kind of get
a better understanding of ourselves in order to design
better. So making our biases more plain,
making the unknowns that we're do, doing more plain, right?
(39:28):
So sometimes we might have this idea that things like numbers
are completely objective, right?That they are the true.
I don't think that's true, right?
A number is still just an approximation for something.
And so in feminist theories, they have these things called
like situated knowledge. And the idea of situated
knowledge is that we can't say that this one thing is true for
(39:51):
all of time, but what we can do is we can describe the context,
we can describe the situation, and then that thing can be true
for that situation. And so it's not about making
engineering. Maybe it is a little bit less
objective, but it's making. Plain or clear the the aspects
(40:12):
behind the assumptions, right? It's like a stating the
assumptions of any problem that you might do.
It's just some of the assumptions include like my
world view, I as a designer and an engineer approach a problem
in a specific way. And so if someone's trying to
approach a similar problem, theywould need to know how I'm
(40:33):
approaching the problem in orderto understand what might be
similar and what might be different.
Right. And so I've worked a bit on
that. I wrote a paper with Doctor
Whitmer and Doctor Lindgren around teaching positionality to
engineers, which is all about that.
That's one of my favorite thingsto do.
(40:54):
It actually came out of a, a teaching exercise in which I've
had students design bathrooms. And I, I love that.
I mean, I've, I've really fallenin love with teaching is a big
part of it. The bathroom exercise is an
excellent example because I lovewhen engineers discover these
(41:16):
these aspects, discover that life is much more Gray than we
thought it was. And I love being able to be
there in the moments of their discovery and be a part of their
discovery. And so the bathroom exercise is
really fun because I have everyone design A public
restroom. And even though we've all used
public restrooms and we are all humans, everyone's restrooms are
(41:40):
different, right? Because everyone prioritizes
different things, because peoplehave different values and
different experiences, right? Yeah.
And that's OK. Yeah.
So that's been like the more like teaching side and the more
engineering focused. And then for the community side,
you know, I mentioned the John Perkins Fellowship and that
(42:03):
really introduced me to asset based community development and
community development in this way that really affirms the
power and the agency of local individuals.
And so through this I kind of started wondering how we can
apply those same principles to engineering design.
(42:25):
You know, a big aspect in contextual engineering under
Doctor Whitmer is local place based knowledge, or I think she
refers to as innovative self-sufficiency.
So how people are in ways engineers already in their
everyday life. And so how do we maximize, tap
into that, optimize that and show them a firm that they can
(42:50):
be engineers in other places too, right.
Again, engineering is not that special.
Yeah, so that's my other side. So I've been working with a
community in Honduras and an organization called Humanity and
Hope International and we've been working on how to do this
through infrastructure design. So what the engineer learns
(43:13):
through participatory methods such as asset mapping, such as,
you know, semi structured interviews, storytelling with
communities, as well as what is of affirming the local agency of
a community member when it comesto something like designing an
infrastructure system. So a lot of the plays of power
(43:35):
and then how we like understand these social theories to help us
engineers when we're trying to apply these things because
they've been doing this a lot longer than us.
And so really tapping into the strengths that different social
theories have. Very, very nice.
(43:57):
I have a question that I acknowledge is a little bit
loaded, but earlier you mentioned that you don't feel
like you are the right kind of engineer.
Do you feel like you've become the right kind of engineer for
you? Think my idea of engineering has
expanded. OK.
I think so. So in short answer, yes and no.
(44:18):
I think I can always grow and I am consistently humbled by the
places and the areas. I get to be a part of the
engineering, because it is a really humbling experience to go
to a community and to interact with them and know that, you
know, people's are looking to you for assistance in something
(44:41):
as fundamental as water, right? And I don't think I'll ever feel
good enough for that. And I think that's OK.
I don't want to ever feel like Ihave it all figured out because
I think at that point my hubris would probably be so bad that I
would make 1001 mistakes if I feel like I know it all and I
(45:03):
know how to how to do it all. But I think my understanding of
what an engineer is and what an engineer does has expanded
enough that I now see myself as an engineer.
And it's important to me that people see me as an engineer
because I, I think especially ata place that like Illinois where
things are really focused on or things can seem really focused
(45:26):
on things like big data and stuff like that, that it's
important to know that there arealso engineers that aren't like
that. And that is just as much
engineering as the other things.Yeah, that is really incredible
of of a sentence, to be honest with you.
And that's part of the reason why it's like I the biggest fan
(45:48):
of your work and Doctor Whitmer's work, shadow Dr.
Whitmer past guest on the show. I I had to, but because it's
it's really remarkable stuff. And I think you guys do really
incredible things and that really interesting and excites
me, yeah. You know, institutions will
also, I think, I think we're slowly, we're slowly getting
(46:11):
there. But you know, hopefully there's
a place that will agree with youand give me a job.
Well, you know what? Honestly, on that next fan, I do
wonder. So actually first question, when
are you slated to like when you graduate?
Yeah. So the current plan is to walk
in May of 2026. Got it.
(46:34):
All right, So what are you thinking then?
What do you want your next stepsto look like?
Well, I think it that in itself is a loaded question of.
Course and I. Acknowledge, I think there is my
like dreams and I have a lot of dreams.
So I was really greatly influenced by Doctor Wonder
(46:54):
shout out to him in undergrad and the starting of the Clean
Water Institute. I really loved my undergrad
experience. And so I would really love a
place that I could do research and teach and maybe start
something like the Clean Water Institute.
A place where I can do research and work with communities that I
(47:15):
can have like real collaborations with communities
in a way that also I can bring students along and kind of
expose them to that. That's the dream.
That's the hope. You know, hopefully in in a
place that there's some type of job security and my spouse and
my dog can live with me. That would be, you know, that's
(47:37):
like, and if I'm close to some family, that would also be
great, right? And part of the reason that that
is so, I don't know, like, well,if this happens, why it's so, so
much of AA shady dream. I don't know if that's the right
term is because I look at my life and look at how many
(47:57):
changes there have been and how many times I was so sure that
this is what I should do. And it changed, right?
You know, even getting married was an aspect of that.
I was working in Jordan up to two weeks before my wedding.
Like, you know, just if I've learned anything, it's that I
actually don't know what things will look like.
(48:20):
And I instead kind of take on this, this like personality or
that, this way to view the worldas open, excited, right?
I want to be open to opportunities.
I don't want to be so closed minded as to what I think an
engineer is, as to what I think my career path looks like, that
(48:40):
I miss something beautiful that I missed, something that, you
know, I could have enjoyed and Icould thrive in.
And so while I would love to go into academia, it's a rough time
for academia. Maybe that won't work out, Maybe
I'll get there eventually, maybeI won't.
It'll probably look different than anything I have in mind,
(49:02):
and that's OK, right? I'd rather welcome it with open
arms and and get excited about the possibilities of what could
be, then be grudgingly trudge along and upset at what is
happening. So yeah, that's a long answer to
your question of what does next steps look like.
(49:25):
I have 0 idea. And it's weird because I feel
like I have very little control over it.
I mean, I have as much control as applying and and just putting
myself out there. So yeah, it'll work out, I hope.
100% It feels almost impossible for somebody who has such a
(49:46):
really well grounded idea of what their field looks like and
what their values are for it to not work out for them.
And if you're having this. Conversation a year like well,
and it's it's all based off of like what is our definition of a
timeline and stuff like that like what it all working out
looks like in a year versus, youknow, two years again, right.
(50:11):
Like I, I finished undergrad without a job when I partially
because I, I worked in Jordan over the summer.
So I extended my work because I had to be a student in order to
do that. And so the month of September
2017, it did not seem like life was working out, was spending
(50:31):
every day. I'd walk to the local coffee
shop and get myself a little treat as a reward for applying
to 1020 more jobs. And then I'd walk back and like,
those were my days, right? But now I look back and that was
such a blip and in such a small time that it's crazy to think of
(50:53):
what I was thinking then of thisisn't working out.
Yeah, that's a really lovely wayto put it in perspective.
I think that's that's very, verynice.
It's been really enjoyable talking with you.
Do you have any last things thatyou want to share, whether that
be piece of advice, things you want to promote, anything like
that? I probably should promote the
(51:14):
fact that I need a job. Yeah.
If you enjoy this conversation and want to talk to me more, I'm
also if you don't have a job butyou want to talk to me more.
I love relationships. I mean, as I've mentioned so
much of my life I have just beenprivileged by people letting me
in and letting me see aspects oftheir life.
I love talking to people. I love building relationships
(51:37):
with people. And so if this resonates with
anyone and anyone wants to talk about their journey or what
engineering can look like for them, yeah, hit me up.
My e-mail is Emily, JL 3. And I will put that in the show
notes as well, if that's OK withyou, of course.
Yeah, go ahead. I guess you did just share, it
(51:59):
would be kind of weird if you were like Nope, no thank you,
they must listen until the. One hour, 1 minute and. 28
second mark until that invert itdown.
So OK, anyways, well, all right,thank you so much, Emily.
This has been a really fun conversation.
Yeah, that's been so great, actually.
Can I say one more thing? Of course.
(52:19):
OK, no. You can figure out where to
where to put this or thing. I do just want to shout out on
that, that realm, just like how many people, engineers or not
engineers, have just taken a moment to really pour into my
life. And I think that being open to
(52:40):
people, pouring in and learning from other people has really
shaped me to who I am. And there's been connections
that have happened years to decades later, whether it's
someone I grew up with at the Ethiopian church being able to
connect with them, or last year my spouse and I went and visited
(53:02):
an old professor in Hungary and he was the director of our
service Learning Center. And I learned so much from him
around servant leadership. I was able to take social
science classes and I loved being a part of the
International Development studies program at Calvin, which
is unfortunately cut. There's no longer there.
(53:24):
But the, the time, the amount oftimes that people have looked at
this overly enthusiastic, completely unqualified, you
know, woman before them and said, like, yeah, you can come
along, had changed my life. And so I, I really just want to
(53:45):
shout out, shout out them and, and thank everyone that that's
done that for me. Because whether it was a moment
or or a larger period, it it's been very influential.
What a way to end it off Very very nice.
And thank you. Thanks so much for coming on.
This has been really fun to like, reminisce and think about.
(54:06):
Yeah, I'm really my career. Path.
I'm really glad you enjoyed it. I also had a blast, so that's
perfect. Thank you very much for coming
on. I hope you enjoyed the episode.
If you have any thoughts, feedback, guest recommendations,
or just want to say hi, shoot mean e-mail at
nick@reroutedpod.com. If you like the show, leave a
review, give us a follow or subscribe.
In addition to Emily's e-mail address, you can find links to
(54:28):
our website and socials in the description below.
I'm looking forward to seeing you next week.
Welcome back to Rerouted where we explore unique career paths
to give you the tools you need to create the life you want.
On today's episode, I talked with Emily Lawson Bolton, who
was about to finish her PhD under former guest Doctor and
Perry Whitmer. We talked about Emily's early
career as a civil engineer to how she got to starting her PhD,
becoming a well-rounded professional in her field, and
dealing with what it means to bethe right kind of engineer.
(00:20):
Later in the episode, Emily looks forward to what is next as
she looks to graduate from her PhD program in May.
Let's hop into the episode. Emily, thank you so much for
joining me today. It's great to have you.
Great to be here. Happy to be here.
I want to get started. I just want to ask you on the
surface level, what do you do right now?
Yeah, so currently I'm a doctoral candidate at the
(00:41):
University of Illinois Urbana Champaign.
So how I explained to my 7 year old niece when she asks why I am
still in school is because my job is currently school.
So I'm completing up my researchhopefully this year.
And so that's the majority of what I do is around my research.
(01:02):
I as well TA and then MAA teaching assistant.
So yeah. All right, and we're gonna talk
a little bit more about your research later, cuz I personally
think it's very interesting and I think other people will as
well. So can we start off?
Can you tell me a little bit about your undergrad experience?
Yeah. So for undergrad, I went to a
smaller private or a small private university in Michigan
(01:26):
called Calvin University. And there I got my BSE in civil
environmental engineering as well as International
Development studies. And compared to a place like
Illinois, it was quite a different experience because we
had 4000 students total about just over 100 engineers, I think
(01:47):
120. And in the civil area, there
were fourteen of us that come junior and senior year took most
of our classes together. So quite different.
I personally really loved it. I got quite close with my
professors there and, you know, could still name the 14 people I
(02:11):
went to college with. So as well as I got this really
great experience to be a part ofthe start of the Clean Water
Institute there at Calvin University.
So I was able to do research through that and travel a decent
amount, working on different water systems internationally,
(02:32):
partially because it was such a small university and I was able
to be a part of so many things, right?
Can you tell me a little bit more about that, those travel
opportunities that you got? Yeah.
So my first one was when I was afreshman to Kenya.
So I was a part of this thing called the John Perkins
Leadership Institute, Servant Leadership Institute, which was
(02:54):
for first generation college students, but focused around the
life of John M Perkins, who was a civil rights activist and one
of the founding members of the Christian Community Development
Association. So it was really focused on
community development with a Christian kind of theology put
into that. And so because I was a part of
(03:17):
that, I took what my school had this thing called interim.
So in between the fall and spring semester, the month of
January, you could take just oneclass for interim.
And I took the freshman class during the fall semester as a
part of the Perkins program, which meant that I didn't have a
class to take in my freshman year.
(03:39):
And so there was a group of halfengineer, half going under
engineering professor, half going under a geography
professor headed to Kenya. I grew up in an Ethiopian
immigrant church, so I was rearing to go.
And the geography professor, hisname was Jonathan Bascombe.
(04:02):
He saw my energy and was like, Iguess she will not be denied.
And I was really privileged to be able to go on that, that
first trip to Kenya. And that one was really
interesting as well because eventhough I was an engineer and
there was so much engineering onit, I actually went as a part of
(04:25):
the social sciences geography group under Doctor Bascombe.
And so I was exposed to all the engineering items, but was
focused on the social sciences items while we were there.
What were some of like the takeaways for you through that
trip? What were some things?
(04:45):
Were there any moments on that trip that were like aha moments?
Was there anything that kind of really inspired what you want to
do in the future? Because now a lot of what you do
is about clean water and water equity.
So was there any parts of that trip that kind of inspired you
to do what you're doing now? Yeah, I mean, I definitely cared
about water before that. I grew up in Colorado where it's
a really water scarce, scarce area.
(05:08):
People are kind of flabbergastedwhen I make the comment that
growing up we weren't allowed legally a rain barrel because
the water that fell on our ground wasn't ours, right.
So I already cared about water. But that situation really, it
really helped me kind of call into question at first
(05:28):
engineering and then really cement a lot of the things I
cared about. South, significant amount of the
trip we spent with the Samburu tribe in the northern part of
Kenya and we were in a really remote area.
I mean, the car we took spent multiple hours not on roads,
just on dirt land or maybe they were dirt roads and I just
(05:51):
couldn't tell at that point. It spent a significant amount of
time on this. So we were we were quite remote
and the Samburu tribe is a semi nomadic tribe.
And so one of the first things that kind of struck me was they
were actually only in this situation of water scarcity
(06:12):
because they were forced to be less semi nomadic.
Traditionally, they would have grazed their livestock and
traveled them around towards water sources.
And you know, we can go into thehistory of conversation, right?
But a part of that included kindof having tribes be more
(06:36):
cemented in a place. And so we were at a small tribe
that actually had a borehole, but it wasn't working and it
hadn't been working for for two years.
And what struck me about that was, again, as an engineer, I
would have seen this village as taken care of, right?
They have a borehole, they're good, they're connected to
(06:59):
water. But for two years it hadn't
worked because there was a screwloose.
And so I first started thinking about like, I think that's when
as an engineer, I started thinking about maintenance and
like long term, I think that's something that as engineers,
when we're being trained, we actually don't often think
about. We think so much about the
(07:20):
design that we don't consider what maintenance looks like.
And then because I was with the social sciences group, I was
privileged enough to go on a water walk with a, with a
community member. I mean, we, we only went to a, a
shorter, a shorter water source that was about two kilometers
(07:44):
where in the really dry seasons they would be walking three to
five kilometers one way to get to their water source.
You know, they talked about how they would save their donkeys
for the really dry seasons to goget water.
But, you know, we would joke about how I was ready to get
married because I could carry 10gallons on my back and 5 gallons
(08:06):
in each hand. So because I made the, you know,
the minimum 15 gallon mark, I I could be married.
And I mean, it was so much work and it took the entire morning.
Yeah. And I think that that was kind
of the other reason that I was more cemented into the caring
(08:27):
about water and water work and water equity because of
experiencing that water walk with her and being in this
village that, you know, they were so welcoming, they were so
loving. And we were able to fix the
borehole. But The thing is like, it's
going to break again, right? And we left and there was no
long term solution put in place.And so it's kind of this like
(08:50):
acknowledgement now that I don'tknow what's happening there and
I don't know if they have water there or not.
And I feel like as an engineer, these are things that we should
know, like the lifespan, right, of our technologies that we're
designing. What would be your advice for
somebody, whether they're an engineer or not?
If they're a college student, they have an opportunity or they
(09:13):
can get an opportunity to do a trip like this.
What would be your advice to them?
I mean, I love it. You know, some people say that
I, I do too many trips. And actually my, my sophomore
year, in between my sophomore and junior year, I was looking
at I, I traveled to Peru with our, our version of Engineers
(09:34):
Without Borders. We called it Engine Engineering
Unlimited because we were such asmall school.
So we were working on a a project in Peru and I was trying
to decide should I get an internship in Michigan or should
I go and play soccer? Because I was a college soccer
player at that time. And there was this opportunity
(09:55):
to be a part of a summer Soccer League that also did soccer or
soccer camps for kids that we played in Brazil.
And then we also came back and played around Chicago and, and
did camps around there. And I remember talking to the
professor that I was going to Peru with, trying to decide what
(10:16):
to do and, and kind of get his advice.
And he was like, you know, for the rest of your life, you'll
have this opportunity to be an engineer.
And, like, it'll probably be an opportunity to be an engineer in
Michigan, but when, again, will you have the opportunity to go
play soccer in Brazil? And I was like, say less, right,
(10:39):
Like, and I think, you know, when I look at traveling, for
me, I've really been blessed by the opportunity to be a part of
so many people's stories and hear from so many different
voices. And I think that that's, you
know, even if you're traveling as an engineer, right, during a
semester abroad as, as some of those are doing, you know, it to
(11:02):
me, it's it's an opportunity to start hearing different voices,
to hear different perspectives. And it it's just so valuable.
Yeah, in our society today. And yeah, definitely changed me
the the travels that I completedwell in college.
OK, even if you're not an engineer, it's still not just
(11:22):
for your engineering knowledge but for the for perspective in
general. Doesn't just help as an
engineer. Well, yeah, that's fair enough.
Although I will say there's something weird about engineers
where like from so early. I feel like everyone's so
serious. Yeah.
It's really not that serious. And honestly, I love what you
mentioned as well about the you have the opportunity to be an
(11:44):
engineer for the rest of your life for that internship between
sophomore and junior year. I feel like, you know, I talked
to, I mean, I was in this position because I'm a junior
now. So now I'm looking at the summer
between junior and senior year for internships.
But I mean, talking to people who are in their sophomore year,
they really feel that pressure. And I mean, I was there last
(12:05):
year. There's we definitely can get
quite serious. And I don't know if that's just
the Illinois culture, but it is.I mean, yeah, that makes a lot
of sense. Yeah, that's.
So I do not appreciate a single industry internship in
undergrad. Really.
Yeah. OK, So what did I even do
(12:25):
between my junior and senior year?
I did something. Mm.
Hmm. But then I, I, then I went and I
worked as a research fellow. I, I actually did research on
water policy between my junior and senior year in the political
sciences department. Very interesting.
So I did that between my junior and senior year and then during
(12:50):
my senior year, and actually thesummer passed my senior year, I
worked as a a research intern, research fellow at the Clean
Water Institute. But that meant I got to go to
Jordan. So I mean, for me, again, no
brainer. And yeah, I graduated without a
job, but I found one in less than a month and it was fine.
(13:14):
Yeah. So there you.
Go. I am curious also as well,
internship or not the not the research that you did with part
of the political science department with clean water.
Do you feel like that research experience that wasn't
necessarily engineer made you a better water engineer in any
way? Oh, I definitely think that
understanding policy makes you abetter engineer, To put a poor
(13:40):
metaphor on it. Again, as a soccer player, when
I, one of my first jobs was as areferee and a big part of it, my
father was like, yeah, you know,you're going to make at that
point I was like 13. So like it was decent money for
a 13 year old. Oh.
For sure. But the other thing that my
(14:01):
father was like, you're going tounderstand the game in a
different way because you're looking at it from a different
perspective. I really got that while working
on the policy. The first part of it was
actually focused on Christian perspectives towards water.
So we did an entire biblical inventory of every time water
(14:21):
was referenced in the Bible. And then we started looking at
policy because the work was focused around water rights in
the western United States. And so moving, you know, again,
I got got a theological perspective of water, then I
started getting this policy perspective of water.
I started understanding international policies and
(14:44):
politics around water as a humanright and what that means.
And I think it does make you a better engineer because you
understand the context or the background of what you are
designing in. OK.
I want to extrapolate that out alittle bit and say it seems like
that would make that fair to say, even if you're not a water
resources engineer, being able to understand your subject but
(15:08):
from a different angle seems like generally that would be
useful. OK.
Yeah, right. And then you also know how to
interact with people from different perspectives that
aren't just on the technical side.
You understand the lingo of policy makers, and you might
even understand a bit more why things happen the way that they
(15:28):
do. Then when I'm an engineer and I
have to get approval for something, I understand kind of
the process of why the approval system is this way, which also
means that I understand when I can challenge that process.
Yeah, Yeah, that seems like a bit of a superpower honestly to
have on an engineering team or any team.
(15:50):
And I not even. Just we wouldn't go that far.
Well, honestly, you know, you were saying that engineers are
very, very serious. So quite honestly, even just
being able to talk with other people might be a superpower for
an engineer. So you know this.
Is true, Yeah. We don't give ourselves enough
credit. We really don't.
I completely agree with you. I think that we can be a lot
more social than we than we giveourselves credit for 100%.
(16:14):
But OK, I feel like we got a well, engineering talks not
going to stop, but this engineering talk will, I fear.
OK, so you mentioned you graduated, you didn't have a
job, but you got one like a month later.
Can you tell me a little bit about that first job out of
college? Yeah, for sure.
So my first job out of college was in industry.
(16:34):
I was a staff engineer for a small private development firm.
I worked on natural gas distribution, environmental
inspection. I got to design these fancy
things called like horizontal directional drilling when they
need to take a pipe like across a big area and they don't want
(16:55):
to dig through it. So they essentially make like a
giant U giant loop. It was a good job.
I definitely learned a lot. It was not the job for me.
I was there, I don't know, a year and a half, just under 2
years. And I learned a lot in that job
of what I cared about in a job. And that included, you know, we
(17:19):
had short cubicle walls and kindof a more open space.
And I loved that. I learned that I care a lot
about who I work with. I am a pretty social person and
so I loved talking with my Co workers.
You know, sometimes a Co worker and I would have to go to Ohio
to go check out some natural gasdistribution there and we'd both
(17:43):
get in the truck and drive for hours upon hours of time.
And I actually loved it. I loved being able to talk with
my Co workers and hear more about their lives.
And I didn't realize that that was something that you might
look for in a job until that point.
I really loved my boss. He was a great manager.
(18:05):
He managed really well for me where he gave me space to try
and fail and also was like supportive of me even when I was
failing, to then kind of pick myself back up and try again.
And I think that was so important at my first
engineering job to be able to get that kind of experience and
(18:29):
have a boss like that. I think I wouldn't have done
well with a job that was really with a boss that was very
micromanaging. It just wouldn't have worked out
well because I can be kind of anindependent person.
So yeah, I'm, I'm grateful for that job and also understand
(18:49):
that it wasn't me. I learned that I care a lot
about what the job is doing, notjust my work in it, because I
did enjoy my work. I like design.
I liked environmental inspectioneven.
But I cared who my clients were and I cared what the larger
picture of things that we were doing.
(19:11):
And so for me, working in that setting didn't work as well
because I often wasn't interacting with the clients.
I even if I knew who the client was, the client would be a large
organization like DTE. And so it was harder for me to
get behind the designs and really care deeply because of
(19:33):
that. Got it.
I can understand that. So then you've gotten this first
job. You've kind of figured out some
of your likes and your dislikes,what you do and you don't want.
How did you go about optimizing the things that you did like and
the things that you didn't like for your next role?
Yeah, great question. I don't know how, but I just
definitely did optimize those things.
(19:55):
I started looking at other jobs and at first I was like, I don't
even need to be an engineer anymore.
I was like, I'm I'm done with this.
I'm done with being an engineer.I applied to be a youth pastor,
which I mean, it would have beengreat, just wasn't my path.
And then I would just randomly scroll LinkedIn or Indeed like
open jobs. And my next job I ended up
(20:16):
getting a position with the conservation district that then
made me working for the nationalresource.
Conservation Society. And it really did start to, as
you said, optimize those things that I loved about the job.
You know, I remember, like, Calvin didn't have agricultural
engineering, so I didn't even know what NRCS was.
(20:40):
I'd never heard of it, right? And so it was like this new
experience of looking into a jobthat I didn't even know existed.
And then as I started talking tothe individuals, even in the
interview, it was crazy to thinklike that can be a job, Like
that's an engineering job. You know, at, at NRCS, you often
(21:05):
are working with a private landowner because the National
Resource Conservation Service works on private lands.
So you're working with private land owners that want to do
environmental improvements to their land and you work with
them from start to finish. So you're going out to their
land. You're talking with them about
(21:25):
the challenges that they're experiencing.
You have like the district conservationist who's been
working with them. That might suggest a couple of
technical practices to do. You as an individual are going
to go out with your survey rod and survey the space.
And then you're going to take that information and you're
going to take it to your office and you're going to upload it
(21:47):
and you're going to, you know, look through CAD.
You might have to do a watershedmap in which you pop over to the
USGS office and see if you can find their topographic maps of
the area you're in. You're going to design it and
then send it out to bid. And then if it gets, if it gets
(22:07):
approved, you're going to prepare the construction
documents and then you're going to meet with the contractors
that the landowner hires and you're going to talk them
through what's expected. And then you're going to be
there for inspection as well of construction inspection.
And so it was so cool because again, as an engineer, to see
(22:28):
something that I got to be a part of the entire process from
start to finish, right? Yeah.
And see the impact of it and know what the impact's going to
be in that land owners life was just, yeah, I mean, it was
invigorating, right? I didn't even realize how much I
didn't enjoy my previous work until I was doing that work.
(22:50):
And I was like, this is awesome.I get to, you know, talk with
land owners as a part of my job.Like, that's crazy.
Sometimes they bring you cookies.
I don't know. It was great.
That's nice. And then my Co workers, we were
really small group and it did expand a little bit more through
(23:13):
my time there. But my Co workers, there's four
of them that to this day are some of my best friends and I
still like will go up to Grand Rapids and hang out with them.
I went to one's lake house the other day a couple months back.
And so for me, that is again, really important that I'm
(23:35):
connected to the people that I'mworking with.
And I don't think this is a thing for everyone.
My spouse works remotely and he loves being by himself and
working remotely. He's also an engineer, right?
But as they say, different strokes for different folks.
For me, I'm the type of engineerthat wants to be with people,
(23:56):
wants to see the impact of that.And so upon that I started
learning like again, what thingsI loved about a job.
And so I learned that I loved being able to be a part of the
whole of a job that I loved a bit more of the designing and
and problem solving because thatexisted much more when working
(24:19):
for the conservation district than working in industry.
Because often times in industry,people kind of already know what
they want, especially in naturalgas distribution, there's not a
lot of room to play. I would say sure.
Yeah. And then NRCS, I got to do that
(24:41):
more. I got to problem solve more and
I think that that's something that I learned that I really
love. I love the problem solving the
challenge of it of like. Not sure what exactly works.
It seems like in this role, you really, you really did it all
right. You were saying you did it from
start to finish all the way through.
(25:04):
You obviously at some point you learned how to do all those
steps, but what were some thingsthat you learned generally from
having ownership of that whole process?
What were some what was some value that you got from having
to learn how to do all these things and really taking control
of the whole thing? Yeah, I think one of the keys is
like, again, what often makes a good engineer and a good
(25:25):
designer is how much you can seeand understand the context, the
larger aspects of what's happening.
And I think right now with the way that we often use standards
in the US engineers so quickly as they're starting a project or
ready have the standard outcome like prescribed, right.
(25:50):
And so I think like that was really powerful that, you know,
even if I didn't get to see it being able to work and shadowed
those that had been working in it a lot longer than I, my boss
Chris, or there were two other engineers, Aaron and Juanita
that had been there a lot longerand then one other engineer,
(26:12):
Lexi, who had been there a shorter time.
And it worked out quite well forme in the fact that I could get
kind of the Longview from those that had been there for 20-30
years. And then I could then turn to
Lexi and be like, OK, so now like, what does that look like
(26:34):
today, right? Because those that have been
there for 20-30 years didn't even necessarily want to use
CAD, right? And it's like, OK, I could use
CAD. Like, I know how to use CAD, but
they're going to be able to point things out that I wouldn't
have known, right? I'm working on a composting
facility and my boss might say, did you ask, did you ask the
(26:55):
landowner how big his skid steeris?
Be like, no, what, why would I need to do that?
And he's like, well, because that will determine if he can
stack it to 4 feet or if he can stack it to five feet and which
would be like best for his practice, right?
And so it was this process of learning all of these things to
(27:17):
optimizing the design, fitting the design into how land owners
were already, you know, often farming their land that I'm, I'm
doing a grassed waterway across the land.
Well, Juanita might point out, how can we get this to minimize
the size of the grassed waterwayso that we're still dealing with
(27:39):
the erosion, so we don't have erosion, but also so that we're
not impacting the farmer and taking, you know, every foot
lost of their land is money lost, right?
And so if you have a really large grassed waterway, they're
going to lose a lot of money. And so starting to think about
those other aspects, right? The context of it all, seeing in
(28:03):
person working with contractors is the best and most frustrating
and most humbling and like a combination of best and worst
that exists in my opinion. I mean, contractors are, they're
so knowledgeable and they're also so cocky.
This is obviously an over exaggeration.
(28:24):
Not every contractor is like this.
But to know when to stand up to a contractor, right?
And argue about like a cement ratio versus when to be like,
oh, you know more than me. Like I may be the designer, but
like, you know that this isn't even realistic to build was a
(28:47):
really valuable experience, right?
Seeing how to actually like twist rebar or tie rebar
together and things like that. Then when you're going to
design, you start considering these things.
And so then it changes how your construction documents look.
It changes how you do the designin general.
(29:08):
And so I do think it's a really powerful thing to be able to be
a part of the whole process. Yeah.
You start seeing what matters ina process.
Yeah, I really, I did really love it so.
I can tell by the way you're talking about it almost makes me
wonder to be honest. I'm like man, why are you still
not working not to? Of course I'm not.
Into career. Shaming here, but but it's
(29:29):
still, it does make me wonder because, you know, you're
talking about the so passionately, which is really,
really incredible to hear. Honestly, that's one of my
favorite things about doing thisis that I get to hear things
like this. It's really enjoyable for me
personally. But yeah, it seems I can see how
what you're saying. It's just being able to
understand and empathize a lot more with different stakeholders
really helps you become better at what you're doing.
(29:50):
Whether or not you're an engineer, just being able to
understand the process, understand where that affects
different things leads to you becoming really good at what you
do. Because also as well, I am so
early, it doesn't even feel right to say that I've started
my career as an engineer at thispoint.
But I can tell just from the, you know, the people that I've
spoken to and what I've seen at this point that that is how you
become a good engineer. And I can where I'm talking with
(30:13):
other people know that that's how you can become really good
at really anything as well. Past guests on the show have
also backed this idea. So that's really, really
exciting just for me as well to see this very specific part of
how a really specific example ofexactly what you're doing and
how you become really good at it.
So yeah, that's really and it's.Interesting what you said about.
(30:35):
Yeah, it's kind of crazy how much I love that job and that
I'm not in it because I think that this also to me, when
thinking about career and careertrajectory, like I do think I
could have stayed at that job and been really happy.
And that doesn't mean that what I'm doing now is like a mistake,
right? I think that for some reason, at
(30:56):
least for me growing up in like high school, I would have
thought that there's like a perfect job out there.
There's like my calling. This is what I'm supposed to be
doing. And I just don't think that's
true anymore. I think that there's a lot of
things that I could do that I would enjoy my life during, and
there's not one special thing out there that I could be doing.
(31:18):
But instead it's kind of the decisions along the way of,
yeah, how do I optimize what I want to do?
How am I enjoying the period of time I'm in now?
And knowing that it could change, it could not change, and
either way it'll probably be OK,is really helpful for me to
think about at this current, very unknown stage of my career
(31:43):
trajectory. Yeah, that's really awesome.
Thank you. That also as well, pretty much
like everything you've been saying, that's wisdom that can
be very easily extrapolated to alot of people's lives.
So thank you for sharing your thoughts on that and your views.
Thanks. All right.
Yeah, for sure. Well, let's transition then.
So you've now left the perfect job that you never should have
(32:03):
left, but you're getting your PhD.
You're getting your PhD now. I want to know what led you to
decide to get your PhD. You've been in the industry for
a little bit. Yeah, great question.
And we have two people to blame for that.
The first is Kendra Zeeman, and the second is Anne Perry
Whitmer. But, you know, I had to kind of
(32:23):
thought about like maybe gettinga master's or something like
that. But really just because I found
this job that again, I didn't know existed and I thought back
to my undergraduate experience and I felt so often that I was
not the right type of engineer that I, I didn't, you know, care
(32:48):
about the correct things. Or again, like, compared to my
spouse that, you know, I was toosocial for being an engineer or
things like that. And I realized once getting this
job and working it, that my perception of what an engineer
was was so limited. And so part of it was me just
wanting to tell more people, butthere's other options out there,
(33:12):
right? That what we're exposed to is
just so, yeah, so, so little, sosmall amount of engineering that
exists. Again, I'm a first generation
college student. So the idea of, like, going back
to school after I had accomplished and gotten the
college degree was a little strange.
(33:33):
You know, I think my family would attest to this day that
when I was like, I'm being offered a federal position, but
also I might go do this completely unknown thing.
They were like, well, that is a decision that, you know, kind of
thing. I mean, they've been great.
(33:53):
But yeah, I definitely know thatthey kind of looked at me
strange. But to get back to it, I was in
a field one day with my new Co worker, Kendra Zeeman, who had
moved to Michigan after getting her master's in agricultural
engineering from the University of Illinois.
And we were just talking about what we cared about, you know,
(34:17):
and, and our lives and our approaches to engineering as one
of the things that I, you know, have talked about is important
to me. And so we were in a field
surveying, chatting about what was important.
And I was talking about how frustrated I get with engineers
when they are redesigned something and then people don't
(34:37):
adopt it. And we blame the people, right?
Especially when it comes to infrastructure systems.
You know, I was talking about a bit of my international
experience and just talking about how, you know, engineers
would be so much quicker to say,well, they need to be educated
more. They just don't understand the
system, right? And almost like, blame it on
(35:00):
them being like less of a person.
Like, you know, this is the point in time when engineers
give ourselves way too much credit, right?
To think that engineering is something spectacular, that it's
so spectacular that other peoplecouldn't understand, people who
aren't engineers couldn't understand how amazing the
(35:24):
engineering design is, right? And I was like, that's not on
the people. That's a bad design.
If you design it in a way that people can't use it or that they
need extensive training to use it, like that's a bad design.
So I'm talking with Kendra aboutthis.
And she goes, I know someone youshould talk to.
(35:45):
So she introduced me to Doctor Whitmer, who is my now advisor,
and we just had a virtual chat of talking about these things,
talking about life, talking about experiences, the
frustrations we had around engineers, blaming systems on
the people and, and the want of engineering to be different, to,
(36:10):
to be accessible. You know, I talked about my my
work at NRCS and I talked about how much I wish that I had
gotten more of it in undergrad. I did get some of it, but really
only through my international experiences, I would say.
And somehow through the end of our conversations, she was like,
(36:32):
so you're coming down here, right?
And I was like, I guess I am like, I don't know when it
happened. I don't know how it happened.
And then I was like, OK, tell you what, yeah, I'll come down
there, but I'm only getting a master's.
I'm only doing a master's, like APHD.
No one needs a PhD. No engineer needs a PhD.
(36:53):
And she's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's fine.
That's understandable. But if you come in as a doctoral
student, I can fund you. And so, you know, you can come
in and just try it out. If you don't like it, you can
always master out. I was like, OK, OK, yeah, that's
(37:14):
real. And now, five years later, here
I am getting my doctorate. Right.
It was never my plan. Yeah.
So a little wild at the two, butI just got so excited by the
idea that engineering could be different that I think with my
(37:36):
job at NRCSI found that place. And then this idea that then I
could influence engineering as adiscipline, that I could help
other people, other undergraduates see the different
types of engineering existed wasjust so exciting.
Plus then I could get transitioninto doing more water work.
(37:59):
I was doing some at RCS, but that I could focus more on doing
water work and especially international water work.
So those two things and as my spouse will tell you, I'm a, I'm
a sucker for a possibility for like a dream of what something
could be. And so I think just the
excitement of, you know, what this could be was so much that I
(38:22):
was like I was in. And there have been times that
I've maybe not fully regretted it, but definitely questioned
myself. And then other times where I've
been like, yeah, yeah, this was a good decision.
And, you know, I think just because I question myself and
have a hard time doesn't mean that I was a wrong decision,
right? Yeah.
It's just is there. You go, I like that.
(38:44):
It just is. So then tell me about what
you've been doing for the last five years then?
Yeah, that's a great question. What have I been doing?
So I work infrastructure systemsengineering infrastructure
systems and I focus a lot on kind of two aspects, but
specifically around interpersonal power dynamics in
(39:07):
in design. So I've done some work around
how engineers understand ourselves and how to kind of get
a better understanding of ourselves in order to design
better. So making our biases more plain,
making the unknowns that we're do, doing more plain, right?
(39:28):
So sometimes we might have this idea that things like numbers
are completely objective, right?That they are the true.
I don't think that's true, right?
A number is still just an approximation for something.
And so in feminist theories, they have these things called
like situated knowledge. And the idea of situated
knowledge is that we can't say that this one thing is true for
(39:51):
all of time, but what we can do is we can describe the context,
we can describe the situation, and then that thing can be true
for that situation. And so it's not about making
engineering. Maybe it is a little bit less
objective, but it's making. Plain or clear the the aspects
(40:12):
behind the assumptions, right? It's like a stating the
assumptions of any problem that you might do.
It's just some of the assumptions include like my
world view, I as a designer and an engineer approach a problem
in a specific way. And so if someone's trying to
approach a similar problem, theywould need to know how I'm
(40:33):
approaching the problem in orderto understand what might be
similar and what might be different.
Right. And so I've worked a bit on
that. I wrote a paper with Doctor
Whitmer and Doctor Lindgren around teaching positionality to
engineers, which is all about that.
That's one of my favorite thingsto do.
(40:54):
It actually came out of a, a teaching exercise in which I've
had students design bathrooms. And I, I love that.
I mean, I've, I've really fallenin love with teaching is a big
part of it. The bathroom exercise is an
excellent example because I lovewhen engineers discover these
(41:16):
these aspects, discover that life is much more Gray than we
thought it was. And I love being able to be
there in the moments of their discovery and be a part of their
discovery. And so the bathroom exercise is
really fun because I have everyone design A public
restroom. And even though we've all used
public restrooms and we are all humans, everyone's restrooms are
(41:40):
different, right? Because everyone prioritizes
different things, because peoplehave different values and
different experiences, right? Yeah.
And that's OK. Yeah.
So that's been like the more like teaching side and the more
engineering focused. And then for the community side,
you know, I mentioned the John Perkins Fellowship and that
(42:03):
really introduced me to asset based community development and
community development in this way that really affirms the
power and the agency of local individuals.
And so through this I kind of started wondering how we can
apply those same principles to engineering design.
(42:25):
You know, a big aspect in contextual engineering under
Doctor Whitmer is local place based knowledge, or I think she
refers to as innovative self-sufficiency.
So how people are in ways engineers already in their
everyday life. And so how do we maximize, tap
into that, optimize that and show them a firm that they can
(42:50):
be engineers in other places too, right.
Again, engineering is not that special.
Yeah, so that's my other side. So I've been working with a
community in Honduras and an organization called Humanity and
Hope International and we've been working on how to do this
through infrastructure design. So what the engineer learns
(43:13):
through participatory methods such as asset mapping, such as,
you know, semi structured interviews, storytelling with
communities, as well as what is of affirming the local agency of
a community member when it comesto something like designing an
infrastructure system. So a lot of the plays of power
(43:35):
and then how we like understand these social theories to help us
engineers when we're trying to apply these things because
they've been doing this a lot longer than us.
And so really tapping into the strengths that different social
theories have. Very, very nice.
(43:57):
I have a question that I acknowledge is a little bit
loaded, but earlier you mentioned that you don't feel
like you are the right kind of engineer.
Do you feel like you've become the right kind of engineer for
you? Think my idea of engineering has
expanded. OK.
I think so. So in short answer, yes and no.
(44:18):
I think I can always grow and I am consistently humbled by the
places and the areas. I get to be a part of the
engineering, because it is a really humbling experience to go
to a community and to interact with them and know that, you
know, people's are looking to you for assistance in something
(44:41):
as fundamental as water, right? And I don't think I'll ever feel
good enough for that. And I think that's OK.
I don't want to ever feel like Ihave it all figured out because
I think at that point my hubris would probably be so bad that I
would make 1001 mistakes if I feel like I know it all and I
(45:03):
know how to how to do it all. But I think my understanding of
what an engineer is and what an engineer does has expanded
enough that I now see myself as an engineer.
And it's important to me that people see me as an engineer
because I, I think especially ata place that like Illinois where
things are really focused on or things can seem really focused
(45:26):
on things like big data and stuff like that, that it's
important to know that there arealso engineers that aren't like
that. And that is just as much
engineering as the other things.Yeah, that is really incredible
of of a sentence, to be honest with you.
And that's part of the reason why it's like I the biggest fan
(45:48):
of your work and Doctor Whitmer's work, shadow Dr.
Whitmer past guest on the show. I I had to, but because it's
it's really remarkable stuff. And I think you guys do really
incredible things and that really interesting and excites
me, yeah. You know, institutions will
also, I think, I think we're slowly, we're slowly getting
(46:11):
there. But you know, hopefully there's
a place that will agree with youand give me a job.
Well, you know what? Honestly, on that next fan, I do
wonder. So actually first question, when
are you slated to like when you graduate?
Yeah. So the current plan is to walk
in May of 2026. Got it.
(46:34):
All right, So what are you thinking then?
What do you want your next stepsto look like?
Well, I think it that in itself is a loaded question of.
Course and I. Acknowledge, I think there is my
like dreams and I have a lot of dreams.
So I was really greatly influenced by Doctor Wonder
(46:54):
shout out to him in undergrad and the starting of the Clean
Water Institute. I really loved my undergrad
experience. And so I would really love a
place that I could do research and teach and maybe start
something like the Clean Water Institute.
A place where I can do research and work with communities that I
(47:15):
can have like real collaborations with communities
in a way that also I can bring students along and kind of
expose them to that. That's the dream.
That's the hope. You know, hopefully in in a
place that there's some type of job security and my spouse and
my dog can live with me. That would be, you know, that's
(47:37):
like, and if I'm close to some family, that would also be
great, right? And part of the reason that that
is so, I don't know, like, well,if this happens, why it's so, so
much of AA shady dream. I don't know if that's the right
term is because I look at my life and look at how many
(47:57):
changes there have been and how many times I was so sure that
this is what I should do. And it changed, right?
You know, even getting married was an aspect of that.
I was working in Jordan up to two weeks before my wedding.
Like, you know, just if I've learned anything, it's that I
actually don't know what things will look like.
(48:20):
And I instead kind of take on this, this like personality or
that, this way to view the worldas open, excited, right?
I want to be open to opportunities.
I don't want to be so closed minded as to what I think an
engineer is, as to what I think my career path looks like, that
(48:40):
I miss something beautiful that I missed, something that, you
know, I could have enjoyed and Icould thrive in.
And so while I would love to go into academia, it's a rough time
for academia. Maybe that won't work out, Maybe
I'll get there eventually, maybeI won't.
It'll probably look different than anything I have in mind,
(49:02):
and that's OK, right? I'd rather welcome it with open
arms and and get excited about the possibilities of what could
be, then be grudgingly trudge along and upset at what is
happening. So yeah, that's a long answer to
your question of what does next steps look like.
(49:25):
I have 0 idea. And it's weird because I feel
like I have very little control over it.
I mean, I have as much control as applying and and just putting
myself out there. So yeah, it'll work out, I hope.
100% It feels almost impossible for somebody who has such a
(49:46):
really well grounded idea of what their field looks like and
what their values are for it to not work out for them.
And if you're having this. Conversation a year like well,
and it's it's all based off of like what is our definition of a
timeline and stuff like that like what it all working out
looks like in a year versus, youknow, two years again, right.
(50:11):
Like I, I finished undergrad without a job when I partially
because I, I worked in Jordan over the summer.
So I extended my work because I had to be a student in order to
do that. And so the month of September
2017, it did not seem like life was working out, was spending
(50:31):
every day. I'd walk to the local coffee
shop and get myself a little treat as a reward for applying
to 1020 more jobs. And then I'd walk back and like,
those were my days, right? But now I look back and that was
such a blip and in such a small time that it's crazy to think of
(50:53):
what I was thinking then of thisisn't working out.
Yeah, that's a really lovely wayto put it in perspective.
I think that's that's very, verynice.
It's been really enjoyable talking with you.
Do you have any last things thatyou want to share, whether that
be piece of advice, things you want to promote, anything like
that? I probably should promote the
(51:14):
fact that I need a job. Yeah.
If you enjoy this conversation and want to talk to me more, I'm
also if you don't have a job butyou want to talk to me more.
I love relationships. I mean, as I've mentioned so
much of my life I have just beenprivileged by people letting me
in and letting me see aspects oftheir life.
I love talking to people. I love building relationships
(51:37):
with people. And so if this resonates with
anyone and anyone wants to talk about their journey or what
engineering can look like for them, yeah, hit me up.
My e-mail is Emily, JL 3. And I will put that in the show
notes as well, if that's OK withyou, of course.
Yeah, go ahead. I guess you did just share, it
(51:59):
would be kind of weird if you were like Nope, no thank you,
they must listen until the. One hour, 1 minute and. 28
second mark until that invert itdown.
So OK, anyways, well, all right,thank you so much, Emily.
This has been a really fun conversation.
Yeah, that's been so great, actually.
Can I say one more thing? Of course.
(52:19):
OK, no. You can figure out where to
where to put this or thing. I do just want to shout out on
that, that realm, just like how many people, engineers or not
engineers, have just taken a moment to really pour into my
life. And I think that being open to
(52:40):
people, pouring in and learning from other people has really
shaped me to who I am. And there's been connections
that have happened years to decades later, whether it's
someone I grew up with at the Ethiopian church being able to
connect with them, or last year my spouse and I went and visited
(53:02):
an old professor in Hungary and he was the director of our
service Learning Center. And I learned so much from him
around servant leadership. I was able to take social
science classes and I loved being a part of the
International Development studies program at Calvin, which
is unfortunately cut. There's no longer there.
(53:24):
But the, the time, the amount oftimes that people have looked at
this overly enthusiastic, completely unqualified, you
know, woman before them and said, like, yeah, you can come
along, had changed my life. And so I, I really just want to
(53:45):
shout out, shout out them and, and thank everyone that that's
done that for me. Because whether it was a moment
or or a larger period, it it's been very influential.
What a way to end it off Very very nice.
And thank you. Thanks so much for coming on.
This has been really fun to like, reminisce and think about.
(54:06):
Yeah, I'm really my career. Path.
I'm really glad you enjoyed it. I also had a blast, so that's
perfect. Thank you very much for coming
on. I hope you enjoyed the episode.
If you have any thoughts, feedback, guest recommendations,
or just want to say hi, shoot mean e-mail at
nick@reroutedpod.com. If you like the show, leave a
review, give us a follow or subscribe.
In addition to Emily's e-mail address, you can find links to
(54:28):
our website and socials in the description below.
I'm looking forward to seeing you next week.
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