Lohman delivers Jordan Award address at Engineering Awards Ceremony

4/26/2016

As this year's Jordan Award recipient, Hannah Lohman delivered the feature address at the Student and Alumni Awards Ceremony on April 16.

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The Harvey H. Jordan Award recognizes the scholastic achievement and character of an outstanding senior. As this year's Jordan Award recipient, CEE at Illinois student Hannah Lohman delivered the feature address at the Student and Alumni Awards Ceremony on April 16. Below is the text of her speech: 

 

Hannah Lohman

I can honestly say that choosing to attend the University of Illinois has led to some of the best years of my life. When I was interviewing for this award, the committee asked me what I thought I would talk about for this speech. This was a difficult question, and thinking in the moment, I said that one of the greatest takeaways from my experiences at Illinois will be the memories I made with friends and the relationships I developed with my professors. It’s the people that I will look back on and cherish, but maybe I’ll remember a little bit of the engineering coursework, too. Today I will share with you three ways the University of Illinois has impacted my perceptions of engineering and what I will take with me throughout my career.

The first lesson I learned early on was that it is almost impossible to accomplish anything alone, and I discovered the importance of comradery. Looking back, the only reason why I chose to study engineering was because I knew it applied math and science. But during that first year, we all began to realize just what we had gotten ourselves into. We were stuck sitting in review sessions and writing lab reports while our friends from other majors were throwing footballs on the quad and getting more than a few hours of sleep each night. I tried to do my work alone and overcame many failures during that first semester, but over time, I realized that reaching out to others for help was the only way I could make it. This was a turning point for me because I found resources such as tutoring and mentoring programs through the College of Engineering. So for that, I want to thank my family, friends, and professors for keeping me grounded and helping me finish these years at Illinois. It was because of these experiences that I eventually became an Engineering Learning Assistant for the College of Engineering to mentor freshman so they too could discover their passions and to help them foster relationships with their fellow engineers. As an Illini, we will always be a part of this community of scholars.

The second lesson I learned at Illinois was how to position myself to have a global impact. The College of Engineering provides many opportunities that help students discover their passions, and for me this was international development work because I really wanted to help people through my engineering work. We were taught how to apply technical designs while considering social implications such as community ownership and understanding contexts. Through the College I was able to travel to Honduras to implement a drinking water system I helped design in class. While on the trip we surveyed the community and were able to use what little Spanish we remembered from high school to get by. I’ll never forget the host family that served us meals every day for a week. I also had the chance to travel to Rwanda to complete field tests to bring clean water to a refugee camp. It was only through the support of the college that I was able to develop myself as an engineer and learn how to apply engineering in a real situation. As an Illini, we are all positioned to have a global impact on society.

The final lesson I learned at the University of Illinois was how to solve meaningful engineering problems. As engineers from Illinois, we have the opportunity to take part in solving the world’s engineering grand challenges such as addressing our global energy problems and decreasing climate change. The possibilities are endless, and we will be the future engineers to tackle these challenges to develop a more sustainable global environment. Our education at Illinois has prepared us to enter the world to tackle these problems because we were taught how to work together to approach problems with a creative solution. We also had the chance to take the lead on challenging projects that will take us far once we leave Champaign-Urbana. As an Illini, we are all taught to solve meaningful problems.

To wrap up, I am so lucky to be an Illinois engineer because I will always be a part of a community of scholars, am positioned to have a global impact, and was taught to solve meaningful problems. I can’t wait to see what new advancements our new generation of engineers can achieve. It’s been an incredible experience here. Thank you once again for selecting me for this award and congratulations to everyone that received an award today. Thank you.


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This story was published April 26, 2016.