Written by Shelby Marter
I like my degree, and I like applying my specific skillset to the projects we are working on here. But what I really like is meeting people from halfway around the world with the same degree and interests!
On Tuesday, May 31, I met with Lars, a 3rd year science communication student from Rhine-Waal University of Applied Sciences. He is in Malta working as an intern with Dr. Edward Duca on organizing projects like Science in the City (a huge, hands-on science festival held in Valletta each September) and developing the website for STEAM (a 10-day international, collaborative science communication school for students from participating universities). Dr. Duca gave me his information, and eager to learn about what science communication students in Germany are up to, I reached out to him.
His program is the only undergraduate science communication degree in “mainland” Europe that is taught entirely in English. His major is actually called Bionics and Science Communication, and even though he is a B.A., he take more intensive STEM courses than I do as a B.S. As we compared notes, it was cool to see how the challenges and goals related to our studies were so similar. We might have met on a random island and came from two different cultures, but we were both passionate about our capability to find engaging work that lets us interact with science, without being chained to a desk or a lab. I hope to run my own consultant firm, and it was awesome to hear him say that he wanted to do the same.
His internship sounds really exciting- a combination of writing, design, organizing, and reaching out to experts and the public. An opportunity like this with one of Dr. Duca’s various projects could be an awesome way for other students in Scientific and Technical Communication to gain some international experience. If only our cohort (and future cohorts) had more time here to do just that!
We talked a lot about school, but it quickly moved to the other, even more interesting (gasp!) aspects of student life like: travel goals, cultural food (if you consider the US’s fast food cultural), and of course, Donald Trump...I don’t think we’ve had a candid conversation yet with a local where this infamous politician’s hasn’t come up…
Lars was awesome, and our 3 hour conversation made me excited to keep reaching out to hear other people’s stories...as well as their personal theories on how to “make America great again.”
I like my degree, and I like applying my specific skillset to the projects we are working on here. But what I really like is meeting people from halfway around the world with the same degree and interests!
On Tuesday, May 31, I met with Lars, a 3rd year science communication student from Rhine-Waal University of Applied Sciences. He is in Malta working as an intern with Dr. Edward Duca on organizing projects like Science in the City (a huge, hands-on science festival held in Valletta each September) and developing the website for STEAM (a 10-day international, collaborative science communication school for students from participating universities). Dr. Duca gave me his information, and eager to learn about what science communication students in Germany are up to, I reached out to him.
His program is the only undergraduate science communication degree in “mainland” Europe that is taught entirely in English. His major is actually called Bionics and Science Communication, and even though he is a B.A., he take more intensive STEM courses than I do as a B.S. As we compared notes, it was cool to see how the challenges and goals related to our studies were so similar. We might have met on a random island and came from two different cultures, but we were both passionate about our capability to find engaging work that lets us interact with science, without being chained to a desk or a lab. I hope to run my own consultant firm, and it was awesome to hear him say that he wanted to do the same.
His internship sounds really exciting- a combination of writing, design, organizing, and reaching out to experts and the public. An opportunity like this with one of Dr. Duca’s various projects could be an awesome way for other students in Scientific and Technical Communication to gain some international experience. If only our cohort (and future cohorts) had more time here to do just that!
We talked a lot about school, but it quickly moved to the other, even more interesting (gasp!) aspects of student life like: travel goals, cultural food (if you consider the US’s fast food cultural), and of course, Donald Trump...I don’t think we’ve had a candid conversation yet with a local where this infamous politician’s hasn’t come up…
Lars was awesome, and our 3 hour conversation made me excited to keep reaching out to hear other people’s stories...as well as their personal theories on how to “make America great again.”