Skill Sets and Aspirations

Hey everyone, my name is Connor Swanson. I’m a senior here at CU and I’ll be graduating this May with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and a certificate in Engineering Management. I am originally from San Francisco but have loved it here in Boulder and will be staying for a couple years, at least, following graduation.

As far as my skills go; I’ve picked up all the basics from my mechanical engineering courses such as solidworks modeling, machining (mill and lathe), woodworking, 3-D printing, later cutting and then of course the less hands on stuff like math, physics, etc. Seeing as a majority of the students in this class are mechanical engineers, we all possess these skills.

The skills that I’ve picked up on my own/through internships are mostly centered around project management, data analysis, and statistical modeling. I spent last summer learning these skills and the programs associated with them (mostly Tableau). I don’t know that these skills will be of much use in an aesthetics class unless someone is looking to do some statistical analysis on their project (hopefully no one takes it that far).

My biggest aspirations in life are centered around traveling. A majority of my family/extended family lives in various countries around Europe and as a result we’ve spent a lot of summers traveling to see them. One of my biggest dreams is to live abroad for a year or two either to work or go to school. I’ve learned so much from other cultures, I can’t imagine how much I’d learn from spending a longer period of time there. I do speak German, so that narrows the countries down to Germany, Switzerland, and England unless I really want to challenge myself and go somewhere where I don’t know the language.

Outside of traveling, I love the outdoors and playing sports which was a major reason for coming to Boulder in the first place (I’m sure is true for many of you guys as well). Snowboarding and lacrosse probably top the list in the sports categories. If I could center my projects or work around some of these aspirations that would be amazing. Working on projects that align with your interests almost always leads to a better product. Let me know if you guys have any questions, I’d love to help out with some of your projects.