Michele Annibal chose Cornell Engineering because she thought she wanted to do something in the science field that would be practical, but she wasn’t sure. “I realized that Cornell overall had a lot to offer besides engineering if it didn’t work out,” she says. “I’d have a lot to fall back on—it’s not just a technical institute.”
She was also looking for a challenge. “Pretty much everyone here was a superstar at their high school and they come here and they’re average or below average,” she says. “I wouldn’t be happy with myself if I settled for an education that didn’t require hard work and effort.”
Sharing the burden with others in her major results in what Michele calls “ChemE bonding.” “We’ve become so close,” she says. “Even though it’s competitive and grades are curved, everyone is constantly helping each other out.”
Being graded on a curve can mean getting used to low test scores. Michele recalls a physical chemistry exam where the mean score was in the 40s, which didn’t sit well at first with her middle school teacher mom, but she says a low score doesn’t necessarily mean she didn’t learn the material. “The professor is really pushing us to come up with a higher application of the knowledge,” she says. “The test scores are not truly indicative of everything we’ve learned.”
Michele has used some of what she learned at a Proctor & Gamble paper plant in Mehoopany, N.Y. where she had a co-op job. She had to wear steel-toed boots, a hard hat, and goggles. “I absolutely loved it,” she says.
Michele worked with P&G’s glue supplier to reformulate the glue that holds the last sheet of a roll of Bounty paper towels and a new way to apply it. It must have properties opposite those of most glue—it should be strong when wet so paper towels don’t unroll on the assembly line, but weak when dry so consumers can easily break it.
Co-op is better than an internship, says Michele, because the staff at the college’s Co-op and Career Services makes sure students aren’t just making copies or fetching coffee. “I also like that it’s 28 weeks total,” says Michele. “I wouldn’t have been able to do the glue project in a smaller amount of time.”
Doing co-op also gave her a chance to spend a summer in Ithaca while she was taking classes she would miss while working. “I took sailing lessons on the lake, visited the gorges, and ate outside,” she says. “I tell people now to spend at least one summer here.”
Michele is considering going on to earn her MBA, which P&G would pay for if she worked for them. “Engineering is a great stepping stone to anything you want to do,” she says. “It gives you a great set of learning tools.”
