Week 10 Blog

As we come to the due date of Assessment 2, this is my final blog!
As such, it may well be quite a large one, so read on!
This week, John Dyson from Connell Wagner presented a guest lecture to us about Civil and Structural Engineering. This was actually very well done, and very well presented, possibly the best SEP lecture we've had so far this year.
He spoke firstly about what exactly Civil and Structural engineers do, and some of the projects he has worked on in the past, going into quite a bit of detail on one of the biggest projects he has tackled in the past, Education City in Qatar, a huge complex in the middle of the desert. He went through many aspects of his work there, from conception to construction, including all the various problems and things he ran into along the way and how he solved any issues.
Finally he spoke about the different prospects that future Civil and Structural engineers can look forwards to, possible projects that they may be working on, and gave us some good advice about the industry.

On the EWB side of things, we're all working on our finalised pieces, which will all be put together as one in our final report, and for our presentation which occurs in Week 11.
My specific report is on the removal of arsenic from the water and the possible ways to go about doing and working with this.

Also putting finishing touches to the online portfolio for Assignment 2, which is due very soon!

Week 8 Blog

David Hobbs, a Senior Rehabilitation Engineer from Novita Children's Services came to speak to us this week about Universal Design. According to him, Universal Design is "a process that yields products which are usable by, and useful to, the widest possible range of people". This means that the product or service is something that can be used and experienced by people of all ages and abilities, to the greatest extent possible, without adaptation.
He spoke about how Universal Design is not only useful to the elderly or disabled, and how we are all disabled, if only momentarily, in our day to day lives. For example, the same disadvantages of having a broken arm can apply to somebody with armful of shopping.
The principles of Universal Design were explained to us, along with many an example of something incorperating good universal design, such as a set of taps and faucet, with specially designed taps which only need to be nudged to the left or the right to turn them on or off, or an elevator control panel with the buttons in a horizontal row so as to not restrict those who are in a wheelchair or those who are vertically challenged from reaching the top floors.

Mid Semester Break

The mid-semester two-week break is just about over, the second half of Study Period 2 is just about to begin. There have been a couple of EWB Group Meetings during the holiday break, unfortunately I was only able to attend one of them due to prior commitments and rather short notice given for the meeting. Regardless, the ideas of the group are starting come together now and become more refined, we are all getting a better general idea of where we'd like to be heading with this project. Looking forwards to getting into the second half of this semester and finalising the ideas and concepts for the EWB project!

Week 6 Blog

Last week Adrian Ferreretto of the Solar Shop Australia presented a guest lecture to us about the virtues of solar power and the future of the technology in Australia and globally. He spoke about many aspects of solar technology and its expansion in Australia and around the world, and the impact of that on us.
One of the most interesting facets of his lecture was when he spoke about some of the global solar industry statistics, many of which indicate quite rapid growth in the area of solar power, and which countries are taking and adapting to solar power well and which ones are lagging behind. Finally, he spoke about the Reva, an Indian based electric car project, which runs on pure electricity. Of course the idea is still in its infancy and needs to be refined and developed alot more before it is suitable for general usage, but it is a start, and a good one at that.

We are getting into the beginning stages of our EWB project, starting to research different aspects of our chosen area and how we could apply such things to the Kandal Province of Cambodia.
We have created our EWB Project Plan and have begun to plan out what needs to be done each week in order to complete the project to schedule. The next stage is more specific research and the formulation of ideas and solutions to the problems in Cambodia.

We have also received back our first SEP Assignment on "The Role of an Engineer". I wrote mine about the role of a civil engineer.
Holidays next week!

Week 4 Blog - EWB Project

On Thursday the 20th in our Sustainable Engineering Practices lecture, Lizzie Webb from Engineers Without Borders spoke to us about our upcoming EWB Project. We are forming groups and in our groups, we choose a problem in Cambodia (the Kandal Province in particular) and then engineer a solution to that problem and then give a presentation and hand up an accompanying report. This is all due by the end of the first semester.
My group has chosen to tackle the problem of water quality in the Kandal province by engineering a water filtering solution to clean the water of harmful impurities among other things.
We're just getting started for now, will create another blog soon with more details.

Week 2 Blog - Introduction

Welcome to my Wiki.

My name is Robert White, I'm an 18 year old First Year Civil Engineering student at UniSA.

My favourite hobbies include cars (big fan of Ferrari, Alfa Romeo etc), videogames (Gran Turismo and shootemup games are my pick), computers (Mac user!) and socialising with friends (I'll always make time for this). I also quite enjoy mucking around in Photoshop and other graphic design style programs,

Prior to commencing at UniSA, I went through Reception to Year 7 at Athelstone Primary School, and then completed Years 8 to 12 at St. Ignatius College.

In Year 12 I did Chemistry, Physics, Design, English Communications and Philosophy, Design being my favourite subject. I very nearly went on to do Design at Uni (and may still do so!) but in the end I decided to give Engineering a go as it looked like an exciting, fast moving industry with plenty of job opportunities available.

This year I'm quite looking forwards to diving into Engineering @ UniSA and seeing what it is all about and hopefully get a taste of what it might be like to work in the industry.