#vcuengineering

Savannah Singletary

Welcome to the second part of my interview with Meredith Williams. Meredith, who is majoring in dance and minoring in general business, will graduate this spring with a BFA. As someone pursuing an ostensibly non-traditional career path in college, she offers a unique view into the life of an artist at Virginia Commonwealth University.

Savannah: What is your response to someone who disparages your choice to pursue dance professionally as opposed to a more traditional and perhaps more lucrative career?

Meredith: Having known my passion from a young age has definitely driven me and given me confidence in knowing I am working towards the right career for me. Working towards these goals every single day gets me up in the morning. I’ve found that you have to love what you do (at least the majority of the time) or you can’t get through the day. Our economic situation is changing so we will all have to work a lot anyways, so why not spend your time doing something that you love?  Having found a profession that I love gives me the motivation to get through the everyday doldrums that I might not otherwise have gotten through.

S: How has dancing informed your academic studies?

M: It has definitely taught me to be detail oriented. The subtleties in dance, even the seemingly mundane stuff, inform the end product on stage. If I slack off or discount the slight technical details in my classes and rehearsals, my performances end up sloppier and not as good as I would like. I’ve found the same thing to be true in all areas of life, including academics.

Also, understanding the passion I have for one pursuit, dance, helps me transfer that feeling to other areas of focus like school or even jobs like waiting tables in a restaurant. Trying my best to translate my enthusiasm for one thing to other areas keeps me from getting bored or discouraged.

Knowing that I want to achieve something so wholeheartedly is a great feeling. Dancing gives me that, and even on bad days, I know it could be worse if I was working towards a career that I didn’t like or even one that I was simply ambivalent about.

S: What’s one thing you’d want people to know about students simultaneously studying the arts and academics full time?

M: Well, a big problem today with education is that it is very silo sometimes. It’s not healthy to separate out your passion, your education, and your career interests. We aren’t, or we shouldn’t be cogs in the wheel of industry. I’m glad I can use my major to do what I love, work towards my career goals, and inform my education. I’d say don’t be reluctant to let your artistic interests shape your life. Dance, the practice of it, the study of it, the way it has shaped me as a human, spills over into all facets of myself as a student and person.

S: It sounds like your study of dance at VCU has informed your life in general. What’s one big takeaway from your dance studies so far?

M: Genuineness. After immersing myself in this career and spending hours and hours engaged in dance classes, rehearsals, and performances alongside people equally as invested as I am in what we are doing, I’ve learned there is no time or room for falsity of expression, personality, attitude, or even friendships. Also, throwing myself wholeheartedly into my practice creates a genuine experience not only for myself but also for others. As long as I’ve given my best effort, I am happy- maybe not necessarily with the outcome if I’m more tired than usual or maybe I didn’t do as well as I potentially could. But as long as I’ve given my best effort, I’ve got nothing to regret. The same thing applies to all aspects in life.

Mark Overstreet

3. If possible, tackle an angle or assignment or idea or project in which you have interest.

Even better, wrestle with one that you are passionate about. It is a fact that we as humans are more willing to spend more time working on something that we either enjoy or think will better something or someone else. If you’re a journalist, work a beat that you enjoy (crime, politics, economics, etc). If you’re a UNIV 111 student at VCU, put as much spin as you can on the assignment to make it about something or focused on something that you like. If you like whatever it is, that dread that sometimes sprouts from a lack of confidence or familiarity with writing will begin to dissipate.

4. Find the story.

Almost too frequently, writing remains at surface level. Sometimes, a professor or teacher will assign a writing project which has the sole purpose of writing practice. Perfect practice does make perfect. But most classes in your career and most other writing in your future is not just writing for writing’s sake. It has a purpose greater than itself. Finding out that purpose, finding the true story behind the surface is the magic sauce.

How can you find the story?

5. Brainstorm

Pre-writing is essential. Without preparation, performance suffers. Procrastination on a writing assignment can often lead to surface level writing that fulfills the requirements and makes an average grade. Masterful writing illuminates the heart of the topic and tackles it from every angle. If you’re struggling with mastering writing, then pre-write to find out what the actual “story” is. Similar to how most stories that appear in the news or that our friends tell us have something deeper going on, writing assignments or topics frequently are “getting at” something deeper than the writing itself. The fear of the blank page or the fear of the assignment requirements can sometimes take away from the beauty of putting your finger right on the pulse of the issue. If an assignment is asking you what “professionalism means to you,” it isn’t asking for the definition of professionalism (they know what that is), they are asking about you. Brainstorm the topic, the reasons for the topic’s existence, ways to answer it, pros and cons of those answers, and anything else that seems relevant before ever even thinking of writing a thesis statement and outlining your research. This exercise can save you from finishing your assignment and still needing two pages as well as from submitting surface level writing.

Sometimes, I reflect on my high school education and two years working as a photojournalist in my hometown and wonder how it would have been different had somebody taken the time to sit with me and work with me on these things. Most of my writing preparation until deep into my undergraduate career involved none of these 5 things, and I always wondered why I received sections of feedback that begged for improvement.

This is the tip of the writing iceberg, but an important tip all the same.

Cheers.

Dr. Gad-el-Hak is the Inez Caudill Eminent Professor of biomedical engineering and professor of mechanical and nuclear engineering at VCU. He developed a writing course for undergraduate and beginning graduate science and engineering students. We interviewed Dr. Gad-el-Hak to learn more about his thoughts on writing in the sciences.

Where do you see engineering and humanities intersecting for engineering students?

The humanities teach students how to learn and communicate. Science teaches why everything works. Engineering teaches how to make things work. But scientists and engineers need to communicate their ideas amongst themselves as well as to everyone else. Say a scientist presents an argument to show the size and age of the universe. Unless that scientist convinces the layperson of the relevance of this information, the taxpayer will balk at spending billions of dollars on answering the big questions. This is why I strongly felt the need of engineering and science students to learn the art of writing, of expressing their thoughts in a coherent, comprehensible way that can be understood by any educated person.

Can you tell us about the class on the art of writing that you developed for science and engineering majors?

I felt the need for a technical writing class for all those not fortunate enough to have a liberal arts education. I found that the majority of engineering and science students lack communication skills. Even some of the top students suffer from this malady. Americans have twelve years of English plus at least three more courses at the college level. The students can read and speak well, but putting their thoughts on paper or in a presentation is difficult for them. About half of the students are English Language Learners. I assure these students that the art of writing is more than learning the rules of grammar and establishing a sufficient vocabulary. It is about expressing ideas coherently and comprehensibly.  It is about engaging the reader so that he or she will continue with what one wrote or presented orally.

In the class, we read numerous short novels, essays, and op-eds. Some of the reading materials are technical but many are not. The students also have writing assignments. When the first assignment is returned to the students with a grade of 20–30%, their first reaction is, “how come I did not receive my usual 80–90%?”  I retort, “you reach that level only when your essay is ready to be published in The New York Times.” What is emphasized in the class is the process of creating something to write about, researching that something, putting it on paper, or today on a computer screen, then endlessly editing your essay.

What roles do writing and communication play in engineering both during the college years and beyond once students enter their careers?

Both engineers and scientists need to communicate their ideas.  An engineer with an invention needs to convince first his boss, perhaps the boss of his boss, and ultimately the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. A scientist who answered one of the big questions needs to communicate her findings to other scientists and ultimately to the public at large who pays the bills.

Both engineers and scientists must cultivate written as well as oral communication skills.  The communication must be clear, concise, and engaging. Students must learn to trim their work to the point that every word counts. Engineers and scientists must write factually. The best scientific journals restrict article size to 4–6 pages, in which the author summarizes her four-year effort.