Quote:
Originally Posted by stinglikeabee
These questions should reflect on what you want to do and where you want to go, not necessarily your present strengths.
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That's really good advice. On my teams, I always love designing the mechanisms themselves, but end up programming and wiring because no one else will. As such, I've gotten really familiar with the innards of the robot…but absolutely hate it. I sort of always knew that, but the way you put made me realise the extent of my issue.
For a career, all I truly know is that I want to work with robotics, in some way, outside of medicine or warfare. I'm the first to admit I couldn't handle a surgical theatre, and as a pacifist I couldn't accept the responsibility military drones would place on me. Bomb squad, industrial, NASA, something along those lines. Taking into account how I fit into robotics, I'm still left with two (seemingly very divergent) options: control systems or mechanisms.
On one hand, I've been playing around with automating things for as long as I remember. Every lego I owned was turned into a Rube Goldberg machine at some point, and working on a mechanical level would be kid me's dream job. On the other hand, the concept of programming something which has a function in the real world, of refining the controls to the point where the simplest construct can operate with surgical precision, is just so awesome to me. It's like living in the future! Digital data changing the real world…it just has a 'cool' factor that I can't shake. And I've gotten way too familiar with a bunch of languages for my own good.
As for college, I'll be going to the Virginia Commonwealth University next year (well, August). It's a quickly rising school in STEM, and it's affordable. Plus, it has one of my favorite local teams literally a block away - not something I'll pursue next year, but definitely before I graduate. I've talked to the professors, and they have some really interesting stuff going on, especially with UAVs.
I couldn't agree more with your statement about focusing your efforts, and I recognise that I have to make a choice. Still, I'm not sure which one will pay off in the long run. My dad taught me three rules to job satisfaction: do what you love, do what you're good at, and do what makes you money. Any two and you'll at least be able to know you made the right decision for yourself. However, both options are fairly fulfilling, and it might come down to which is more likely to result in success in the business world. I'm not sure, and I hate to ramble - do you think I'm on the right track, or am I missing something that could factor into this as well? Thank you so much for the response, it's definitely a lot to think about
PS: I love the link you posted, I'll definitely have to investigate it more after IB exams.