Tag Archives: Teamwork

Interested in Intramurals?

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By Maria Dillman

While Baylor may be known for its amazing Big 12 athletics in football, baseball, basketball and so on, a little less televised but nonetheless important activity is INTRAMURAL SPORTS. I’m pretty convinced these are one of the best activities to take part in at Baylor. Okay, I say that about everything at Baylor but just hear me out.

There are options to play any sport you could possibly think of. Everything from dress-up dodgeball tournaments, flag football, taekwondo, quidditch (yes, Harry Potter would be proud), to rock climbing and ping-pong. I try to sign up for every sport imaginable. Not just because I think I’m sporty or actually semi-decent at any sport, but also because it is

intramuralsjust a good time! You can make a team with your friends or student organization and then compete against other students. There are more competitive teams down to teams that just want try not to break their ankles or make a fool of themselves while getting a little change of scenery from the library. The seasons for each sport last about three weeks depending on the level and what type of sport it is. (For example, the big sports such as basketball and soccer last longer than say, a bowling tournament).

Being on a team is a great way to build comradery amongst your friends. You are fighting for a common goal and working together to accomplish something. It’s fun to cheer each other on and celebrate the wins and even encourage each other in the losses. Plus, if playing sports was something you were really into in high school, participating in intramurals is a great way to carry the tradition forward and continue in something that you love. Through the blood, sweat, and tears, it’s just one more way to make that much more out of your college experience. So no matter if it’s a win or a loss on the field, playing intramurals is definitely a win-win situation.

soccer

Engineers Gone Wild! (by Sophia Cooper)

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Have you ever seen a bunch of engineering nerds yelling at a balls being deposited into a funnel? No? You’re missing out!

The Fall 2012 Junior Design competition was on Thursday afternoon. An entire semester of hard work, late nights, and trips to Home Depot coming to a close. As described in my October 10 post, our design project was to get two balls into a funnel about 29” tall while knocking a third ball off the side of the funnel and into a receptacle.  Throughout the semester we worked on our design, modeling it in the 3D design program SolidWorks, running tests on what parts worked or needed fixes, and constructing the entire assembly. I’m so glad my dad taught me how to use power tools at a young age; using a handheld drill definitely came in handy, as did that drill press!

Wednesday night before the final showdown was stressful. We had a HallEffect sensor at the top of our scaffolding, comprised of a magnet that sensed when its field was disrupted by its sensor counterpart and coded to stop moving, technology decided to not cooperate. We soldered together a PerfBoard for our circuitry, added in a couple extra resistors because our voltage regulator was overheating due to too much current, and re-uploaded the code to our microcontroller. Thankfully, it was a success! With our sensor up and running yet again, a couple adjustments to the ball disposal on our box, and recreating the net to catch the falling ball, we were ready to go to competition!

My older sister came out to cheer us on during the competition and laughed the entire time at how serious our class regarding this project. It really was a bunch of engineers gathered in a circle, yelling at little machines and cheering when our project worked. Elizabeth Davis, the executive vice president and provost of Baylor, even came out to watch the hilarity! Points were given based on how fast your two balls got into the funnel and if you were able to knock the third ball off into your receptacle. My team got first in two rounds and tied for first in a third of the four preliminary rounds, advancing us to the finals!

The finals were stressful! We had a hiccup with our ball disposal system not releasing balls into the funnel, but that was fixed with some duct tape for the second round. Going into the fourth round of the finals, we knew we were going to either get third or fourth. Unfortunately for them, another team’s power supply wire came out from their breadboard so when the switch was pressed, nothing happened to their project. Team Pride Rock got third overall!!

Left to right: Adam Parks, WeiChao Chen, Erin Autry, Doug Ashby, Me, Tyler Simmons

This project, while a lot of work, was definitely one of the highlights of my engineering career so far. It was a very practical application of working with other engineering fields as our team was comprised of mechanical and electrical engineers, a skill that I will definitely use after graduation. We worked hard, competed even harder, but still had a blast and loved cheering on all the other teams. My favorite part of the entire project was not getting third place; it was seeing how creative and smart all of my classmates are as well. There were so many different ideas of how to meet the requirements set by the instructors, and they all worked great! Being an engineer is all about working with teammates to meet the goal set by your client, and this class was a great stepping stone to meeting the goals of our future employers.