I am currently writing this blog from a hotel near UC Davis, where I am staying with the lacrosse team in preparation for our first league game today! Wish us luck! We left USC early Friday afternoon, drove 7 hours, stopped at an In-N-Out along the way for dinner, sang along to wonderful mix CDs of classic Disney songs and songs from middle school and high school to make the car ride fun, and finally arrived in Davis late last night. After our game today we’ll have lunch in Davis before heading back to LA. Quite the 36 hour trip!
Wow what a week! Classes are really starting to pick up as we get into the first round if midterms. Luckily I don’t have any for another week, but I am working on a large project right now for my architecture class – I’ll post pictures when I finish!
The most exciting part of this week for me was finding a new research job on campus! I started doing research second semester of my freshman year through the merit research program, working at the USC Center on Megacities. I worked with the former chair of the civil engineering department investigating the possibility of a megacity powered exclusively by renewable energy sources, solar and wind power in particular. However, I finished the project at the end of last semester, so naturally I needed to find another research opportunity. This semester I am working under Dr. Burcin Becerik-Gerber on a project titled Smart Phone Based Indoor Location Sensing. This project will focus on emergency response systems and the technology and information they use in various emergency situations. We are looking to improve the cost-effectiveness, accuracy and efficiency of localization systems by relying on WiFi sensors in smart phones.
In other news, I just found out last night that I will be studying abroad in Madrid this summer with the Viterbi Overseas program! I am very much looking forward to taking two engineering classes (Writing 340 and ISE 460) while exploring Spain and experiencing the Spanish culture. I had the opportunity to go to southern Spain for two weeks during my senior year of high school with a Spanish exchange program, and I am very thankful for this opportunity to return to Spain for my undergraduate studies!
I got into the Madrid program as well!! 🙂 SO EXCITED!!!