How Will I Use My Engineering Degree To Better My Future?
I chose industrial engineering as my major because I feel capable of changing the world with my knowledge and skill. I graduate in May 2021 from the University of Houston, and seeing as this is my last year, I have already started planning for my future away from school. In 5 years, I plan to work for a fast-paced company; nurturing skills and talent. I hope to get into a company that will help me grow. I have applied to different companies and accepted into any one of them is a dream comes true. In this company, I am willing to share my input to help the company grow and grow with it. I want to be able to achieve my goals while simultaneously building my career.
My main area of focus is STEM research. Not many minorities pursue the STEM field and as an African American woman, I plan to change that. There is an increase of female engineers and I want to name myself among the greats in this field. In doing so I hope to aspire to other young girls from all walks in life especially the minorities to become engineers and prove to them that everything is possible and no dream is hard to achieve. I want to offer scholarship opportunities to the less fortunate and intelligent students in my country and provide paid internships to struggling engineers to help them kick-start their careers and relieve some financial burden.
If and when I succeed I want to travel to different institutions and share my story on how despite all the hurdles in my life, I did not give up. I hope to aspire each and everyone I meet and become a role model to some and get more women interested in industrial engineering. I want to build a company that will provide graduates with job opportunities in other areas like social media, communications, etc. I hope to start a non-profit organization that will focus on STEM research that will spread worldwide. During this period, I am also hoping to make charitable donations to all that are involved in STEM research.
Five years is ample time for me to achieve my dreams, and hopefully, with the right people in my corner, they will come true. I am not oblivious of the problems along the way, but I am well prepared for them and with every new challenge that arises, I am ready to face every one of them head-on.
Family Circumstances That Have Affected My Need for Financial Assistance.
I come from a family of six children. My mother is a nurse at LifeWay Health Care, which is mostly home-based care. My father is retired. My mother does receive financial aid, but she is only eligible for loans it helps my parents pay for my brother’s tuition at UT El Paso, where he studies pharmacy and takes care of my other four siblings. My semester’s tuition is about 8,000 USD, but I have taken up student loans, so it’s reduced to about 3,000 USD per semester.
My mother struggles in feeding the family, seeing as she is the only one with a steady income, and so to help out at home, I got a job, but it is mostly part-time and not always guaranteed. It eases the burden on my parents as I try and pay for my tuition fees and my apartment bills and take care of my basic needs. I have taken out several loans to ease this financial burden for my family seeing my mother is almost retiring herself. The piling up of these loans has forced me to work double shifts while still juggling schoolwork as Industrial Engineering is a very demanding course.
I have constantly been applying for scholarships in the hopes of being able to help, but I have not been as successful. My parents are my best friends; they are courageous, confident, kind, and loving. They took care of each of us and made sure that we never went to bed hungry. They are tough and always taught us that hard work does pay and that giving up is never an option. Without my parents, I wouldn’t be able to pursue the career of my dreams.
Nothing would make me happier than seeing my parents finally relaxed and enjoying their lives. They are not getting younger, and soon, providing for my siblings, and I will become a task. Finances are the leading problem in our home, and in securing a scholarship, I know it will help lift a load off my parents, and the money can be channeled into other pressing matters.
A scholarship would go a long way in helping me focus more on my schoolwork. It will help relieve some pressure in my debt and let me finish my schoolwork on time. i
I am in my final year, and taking a loan right now will be horrendous. I am already into so much student debt. Making my parents take on any more debt would also be a disaster as their money is already limited. A scholarship would be a blessing right now as it will help me finish my education and keep my family afloat, for now.