The Writing Engineer
When I planned to pursue a career in engineering I was convinced that I had had my last of English and writing. Was I gravely mistaken! Every technical profession today requires extensive writing in different forms for different purposes. Naturally this writing would be incomprehensible without specific writing techniques and a strong command of the English language. Having declared myself as a Biomedical Engineer here at Case Western I decided to look into the writing that students, professors, and researchers do in this field of engineering.
Several upperclassmen and sophomores mentioned the term paper they had to write in their Introduction to Biomedical Engineering class and how much trouble at gave them. Luckily the term paper was optional this year. James, a sophomore, said that the term paper gave him insight into the areas of Biomedical Engineering that he was interested in. To his amazement a professor read his term paper and recommended he join a research group here at Case Western that was engaged in the topics his term paper addressed. James is now training a post doctorate student to take his position in the research group, and that only as a sophomore.
Other students mentioned the amount of lab and instrumentation write-ups required in the introduction courses. These included physics, biology, chemistry and a few Biomedical Engineering courses. The rudimentary concepts in the introduction labs, such as physics one and two, initially appeared redundant, but the write-up and lab processes did end up useful one student mentioned.
Besides the basic writing done in earlier classes, some students were involved in the writing of research proposals. A senior in the Biomedical Engineering program said that writing a research proposal allows the prospective researcher to quantitatively evaluate the work that he or she plans on engaging in. Researchers, but in some cases students, in any technical field write, in conjunction with their research proposal, a grant proposal requesting a person, group, society, or even the University itself to provide monetary assistance for the research.
Seniors in the Biomedical Engineering major have to complete a senior capstone research project which involves all the writing and research that an experienced researcher would have to conduct. This requirement gives students the opportunity to get valuable experience. The final result of the project is a technical research paper, a piece of writing meant to document and present the findings and research conducted by the student. It is the final combination of science and language, because the combination of the two allows the spread of ideas.
From the little that I heard from professors and students about their writing I see that science without writing is like Bonnie without Clyde. Ideas would never make it further than the spoken word and even though I had initially expected to be done with writing, I appreciate it even more now as I read through technical journals, textbooks, and articles. Engineering and writing go hand in hand and as a prospective engineer I will capitalize on the effectiveness of writing.
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