“I visited a whole bunch of schools, but the moment I got here I fell in love with the campus,” says Kristen. “Also, Cornell has a lot more women engineers than the national average, and I liked that.” She has the opportunity to recruit more women as a member of Cornell’s Society of Women Engineers and as an Engineering Ambassador, giving tours and leading info sessions for prospective students.
Chemical engineering, explains Kristen, can lead in a variety of directions. “Pharmaceuticals and other consumer products, research into oil and petroleum; it’s a fairly broad field,” she says.
Growing up “all over the country,” Kristen attended high school in Iowa, where a pre-college class in engineering steered her in that direction. “I saw I wanted something technical,” she says. “When I got to Cornell, my Intro to Chemical Engineering class made me realize I’d made the right choice.”
Kristen did an internship for two summers at Bemis Company, working in product development and manufacturing for clients such as Kraft and Oscar Mayer. “It was really interesting to work on new packaging materials. A lot of what we were developing was biodegradable, environmentally friendly plastics made out of corn,” says Kristen. “Wal-Mart wants it, so it’ll definitely hit the market.”
She describes the atmosphere at Cornell as challenging but cooperative. “You get to work a lot with other students, professors, teaching assistants; Cornell pushes you to work really hard,” Kristen says. “Overall, I’ve been surprised by how much Cornell expects from students; it’s a whole life, not just during the day. You’re responsible for everything, not like high school.”
“My advice to freshmen is to start out on the right foot: Take advantage of all the opportunities here. So much of it can slip by if you don’t. And that includes having fun!" she says. "I know I made the right choice—I wouldn’t go anywhere else.”
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