Chemical Engineering Students, we salute you.
As we look at all the options listed in a long bond piece of paper, we are given these courses that could determine what our lives will be for the next five years. Some would choose to stick with arts because they have the talent to draw while some would pursue a degree in business because they know how to manage well and eventually grow an empire. Some of us would choose engineering because of our dreams to “efficiently” make things happen.
Of course, we are not limited to just one field of engineering. Once someone decides to pursue engineering, he/she must choose which type of engineering to take. I know every field is hard but I believe that chemical engineering is one of the hardest degree programs there is in the world. I’d know because I’ve enrolled with the hopes of becoming a chemical engineer but I didn’t graduate with the degree. For the first two years of my college life, all I was focused on was to survive the program. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t for me. I ended up shifting to a different degree in a different college. But as for those who persevered and worked hard to survive chemical engineering, here’s a salute to you.
How hard it must have been to study for exams while worrying over a coding project that still doesn’t work. You have thesis and plant design in just one semester while you have to deal with the smartest professors in the college. I’ve seen them walk around the campus and I could say they’re the most intimidating kinds of teachers I’d be afraid to go to class to. You also have to work on the electrical engineering class project that demands a lot of your time. Oh, don’t forget your majors that most of us couldn’t even understand. It’s like you have your own language and only the really smart ones can understand them.
I know you have a lot on your plate most of the time. I couldn’t even compare the struggle you face as you try to make it through the semester to the struggle I face in my new college. I just know yours is harder and more stressful. I’ve had plenty of chemical engineering friends who spent sleepless nights in the cheapest fast food chain stores just to learn a little more the night before the exam. I’ve seen so many of you break down the night before, thinking you’ll never be ready to take the exam, yet still find the courage to fight in the battlefield the next day. Your department is usually competitive and you have professors who discourage those who can’t understand the lessons easily – telling them to quit the course instead of wasting their time.
I really don’t want to sound bias but maybe I already am. Those who managed to be chemical engineers just have the “wow” factor for me. To have survived and come out alive and well from the rigorous chemical engineering program is just amazing. How I wish I could have done the same. I guess the course just wasn’t for me but here’s a salute to all the chemical engineering students out there who are doing their best to survive. You’re an incredible breed and may you prosper in the field that I would have loved to be part of. May you make a difference in your community once you become the chemical engineers you’ve worked so hard to be.
A salute to all chemical engineering students out there!
