Spring 2014: The arduous countdown to graduation!

I am so happy to be starting my last semester at USC. It seems as though my four years have gone by so fast and I cannot believe I will be graduating in four months. However, before I graduate, I gotta make it through my last semester at USC. And it is NOT an easy one. I am taking twenty units this semester, consisting of six classes. Thankfully, I got some great downtime during my winter recess in order to prepare myself for this tough upcoming semester.

Before I got home for winter break, I actually went to Las Vegas for the Royal Purple Vegas Bowl with the USC Trojan Marching Band. Unfortunately, my first two years at USC, the football team was banned from attending bowl games, and last year, I was not able to go. Therefore, I knew I had to go this year, and I cannot complain about getting a trip to Vegas! It was a really fun trip and I am so happy that we beat the fresno state bulldogs!!

After getting back from the trip, I drove home and immediately secured my place on the couch. I really enjoyed spending time with my family and decompressing from the past semester. Even though I spent a lot of time at home, I was able to get out for a couple fun trips. On New Years Day, I went skiing up at Alpine Meadows. The conditions were not the best, but at a big resort like Alpine, there is a lot of snowmaking, so it was still very enjoyable. It didn’t hurt that it was a beautiful day…

A couple days later, my dad, sister, and I headed down to San Francisco to go for a city hike. We have kind of made it a tradition to do a hike in San Francisco every year, and this year, we tried exploring some different neighborhoods we have not seen before. We drove over to West Portal and met with my dad’s cousin and his wife. We enjoyed walking over to Grand View Park. We then walked through the Sunset District, Golden Gate Park, the Presidio, and had lunch over at the marina. We then walked up Russian Hill, down Filbert Street, through North Beach, and down to the Embarcadero. In total, it was around 16 miles. What a great hike!

Even though I had a good break, I was somewhat eager to begin my last semester at USC. This semester, as I said above, is going to be pretty difficult. I am taking six classes, five of which are technical. CHE 446 is called Mass Transfer and it covers essentially what its name implies – mass transfer. The past two semesters, I have taken a class on fluid mechanics and heat transfer, so this is the last of three transfer classes. CHE 460 is called Chemical Process Dynamics and Control. This class essentially looks into industrial process systems and how to optimize and automate these processes. CHE 480 is called Chemical Process and Plant Design and it is my senior capstone class. In this class, I will work on my senior design project, which should be challenging, but hopefully very rewarding as well. CHEM 430b is a physical chemistry class focused on quantum mechanics. This class seems extremely challenging so far, but should be very interesting and applicable to my pursuits in nuclear fusion research. ANTH 315 is called North American Indians. This is my category II general education class and is focused on looking into modern native american culture and the impact other, outside societies have had on this culture. MATH 245 is called Mathematics of Physics and Engineering II. This class dives into partial differential equations. This class is not a part of the required chemical engineering curriculum. However, I am interested in attending graduate school for Nuclear Engineering and these programs want to see that I have a knowledge of partial differential equations. I am actually really enjoying this class so far. It’s been three years since I have taken a math class, but I think it will be a fun class.

I have a very busy semester ahead of me, but I am very excited to graduate in May and move on to the next chapter of my life!