Students Welcome Return of In-Person Art of Engineering Event
Nov. 12, 2021 – UC Irvine’s Engineering Student Council hosted its eighth annual Art of Engineering on Wednesday, Sept. 29, with the new Stacey Nicholas Dean of Engineering Magnus Egerstedt welcoming students to the event. “Take advantage of the opportunities outside of the classroom too,” said Egerstedt. “Those are the moments you will remember.”
With over 140 attendees, including more than 16 engineering student organizations, the networking event was successful, despite the change of venue and return to in-person gatherings.
“It was very exciting to attend an in-person experience again, be able to physically engage and make connections with the UCI engineering community,” said Tiffany Lee, ESC vice president of relations and event co-host.
The annual event aims to showcase engineering clubs and groups, and recruit new students to the 40 campus engineering student organizations. Structured like a talent show, the evening included performances by the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers at UCI (SHPE), who showcased group dances to Latinx pop music, and MAES: Latinos in Science and Engineering, who performed Baile Folklorico, hosted networking, and gave away raffle prizes.
New additions to the event were two socially distanced games that ESC conceptualized. Students participated in a partner game where the pairs had to carefully complete a set of exercises while maintaining a pool noodle between their temples. The first pair to successfully complete the exercises without dropping the pool noodle was the winner. The audience enjoyed the game so much that it was played twice. The second game was called Paper Plane Engineer. Three students folded paper airplanes and had one minute to land their planes onto a target spot on the floor. Landing an airplane into the designated spot won the contestant a ticket for the prize raffle.
“The vibrant atmosphere of all the organizations as well as the live performances were aspects that I missed coming from an online experience,” said Lee.
– Megan Sosa
