Meet JHU_Peter - Wakefield, MA, Mechanical Engineering Major

Hey everyone! My name's Peter and I'm a Sophomore at Johns Hopkins University. I'm studying Mechanical Engineering here, and I want to pursue an Arts Certificate, which is the equivalent of an Art Minor. So far I love Hopkins, and although I may be from the Boston area, I am glad to be back in Baltimore (I did actually miss it, somehow...). As a Sophomore I'm living in McCoy, and I did group housing in which me and 11 friends all chose to live right near eachother, and it's nice to be right there with your friends.

As for some stuff that I do here, I'm a member of SAAB, which is mainly why I post on these forums and my blog. Also, I'm a member of the Men's Club Lacrosse team at Hopkins. Woo! Go Bluejays! On top of that I'm also an officer of DSAGA, the Diverse Sexuality and Gender Alliance. AND, I recently decided to try Capoeira, and I love it, so I'm going to continue with that.

As far as classes go, I'm currently taking Thermodynamics, Statics and Mechanics of Materials, Intro to Animation, and Differential Equations. I was taking Intermediate/Advanced Portuguese, but it became too much to handle so I dropped it to eliminate stress. I still wonder if I should've but it was nice to be able to relax every once in a while.

And as for why I chose to come to Hopkins, I honestly forget. I know however that I love it here, and would have probably made it my top choice before.

If you'd like to read my blog, you can find it here: http://hopkins.typepad.com/peter/

Thanks!

So I figured it would be nice to give you guys an idea of the classes I've taken and are currently taking here, so here ya go!

Fall 2008 - Freshmen Year
Intro to Materials Chemistry - Mainly the Intro Chemistry course except it's geared towards certain majors that only need to know about certain parts of Intro Chem.

Freshmen Experiences in Mechanical Engineering - An introduction to Mechanical Engineering and the basic principles of it. Includes a lab that had us making different machines and other examinations of Physics concepts.

Portuguese Elements 1 - Mainly the intro to Portuguese course, it was a very small class, and very interesting/fun, and actually it's helped me a lot, at least in life and work, haha.

Calculus II - College math, 'nuff said.

Studio Drawing 1 - Mainly for beginners, this class covers the basic drawing skills and techniques. It's a nice relaxing class especially if you have a ton of math/science classes.

Spring 2009 - Freshmen Year
Physics II + Lab - Physics II goes over Electricity and Magnetism which is interesting in concept, but tends to be very hard to actually figure out how to do.

Freshmen Experiences in Mechanical Engineering 2 - Continuation of the fall semester, and the lab continues as well.

Portuguese Elements 2 - Continuation of the fall semester.

Calculus 3 - More college math, involving 3D graphs and complexing integration. Actually really helpful in engineering

Fall 2009 - Sophomore Year
Thermodynamics - Mainly how heat flow varies for systems. This is the class made for Mechanical Engineers, so there's a heavy focus on hydraulics as well as engines.

Statics and Mechanics of Materials - Ever wonder what is really happening to that pencil when you break it in half from the stress? Yeah, that's this class, except with bridges and supports. It's really interesting.

Differential Equations - It's like Calc 4, but not. I'm still confused as to what we're actually doing with this stuff, but it models some sort of real life problem. No idea what though, haha.

Intro to Animation - Although a film class, this is very hands on and in my opinion could also be considered an art class. Consisting of stop motion, puppet and hand drawn animation, short films are made and different animation techniques are seen. Pretty much I cringe whenever I watch an animation now because I realize how long it really takes.

6 months after this post, I must say, I'm really loving Hopkins. Sure, there are the occasional rough patches mainly caused by stress and what-not, but I am really enjoying my time here. I really love it.

I'm not sure how the different major works exactly. I know with the Engineering Mechanics degree it is easier to Double Major in the engineering school, but I'm not quite sure. I'm in the same classes with some Engineering Mechanics majors since it's so similar to MechE, but I don't know the complete logistics of it.

I had never heard of EM before coming to the open house as well, so I honestly have no idea how that would go for grad school. I mean, Hopkins is one of the few credited colleges for EM (I think there were 6 or so when I went to my open house), so it can't be too obscure. If you're really concerned, you could always e-mail the professor who gave the info session (was it Lester Su? He gave the lecture at my open house, and he really got me excited for MechE).

As for your passion for Physics, you would still be able to take classes, but maybe not double major. For all you know, you could really hate college physics, just take that into account as well.