Evidence of Learning #3 - Primary Learning

Name: Mr. Aaron Paz

Profession: Aerospace Engineer
Location and business name: Phone, NASA
Date of mentor meeting: 2/2/17
Time: 8:00 a.m.

The mentor meeting I just had with Mr. Paz was our first official one to plan the
remainder of our meet-up schedule and discuss more preliminary ideas about my original work.
Coming into this meeting I was incredibly hesitant, because even though we will communicate
through video chat in the future, currently, Mr. Paz and I have never spoken face to face. When
exchanging ideas, and learning a new person for the first time, people always seem to
underestimate the huge impact non-verbal communication makes. With face to face contact,
expressions, hand gestures, and even foot movement, connecting with some is made to be a
much easier task. Knowing this, I was nervous that my first meeting with Mr. Paz would be
awkward, stilted, and unnatural simply due to the lack of in-person interaction. I had a feeling
that we would take much longer to learn to communicate effectively with one another than
normal, but I was wrong.
I cannot deny that there were awkward pauses and fake laughs here and there, but I
underestimated the will that both Mr. Paz and I had to want to make this work. In a seemingly
short one hour, we blew through logistical ISM business and a solid plan to develop an original
work project. Not only has this meeting made invigorated the creative and technical sensors of
my brain, it has also made me so much more excited for the next semester of ISM than I was
feeling before.
Firstly, as I was discussing meeting times with Mr. Paz, we stumbled onto a discussion of
how NASA engineering meetings are conducted and when they are scheduled. This small piece
of information gave a structure to mine and Mr. Paz’s own meeting allowing a more business
type conversation to take over rather than uncomfortable small talk. Mr. Paz explained to me that
in his meetings with his team, some expectations were firstly laid out that covered all of the
topics of discussion for that day. Additionally, workers all took notes about the important points
of conversation about the meeting to look at later. With this information, I created a google docs
where I would plan all topics of discussion every time Mr. Paz and I spoke and took shot notes
during the meeting itself onto the doc so I could remember the impactful ideas we had for longer.
After discussing each point for the prescribed period of time, each engineer would then create a
“call to action” list for him/herself and all would collaborate to create one for the group. My
personal call to action was to research more about the topics Mr. Paz introduced me to, Send him
more ISM information, and come up with 3 specific engineering plans for next week. This
specific structure of meeting proved to be highly effective in tie management and depth of
discussion, and we will use it again.
After logistics were discussed and a meeting schedule was sent, the main portions of the
meeting were spent brainstorming a specific original work project. I firstly told Mr. Paz my
requirements: the project must be done by May, it musn’t cost over $200, it must have something
to do with space exploration, and it must challenge me creatively and technically. I then
introduced him to my best idea which was a dual part project consisting of a self-designed part
online and a paper about the importance of space exploration. The one greatest appreciation that
I had about Mr. Paz through this meeting was that he always gave all of my ideas a fair
consideration. If I told him I wanted to somehow incorporate programming, Mr. Paz would
introduce me to programming projects, and when I said I would love to learn about more of the
complex engineering portions of space shuttles, he led my down that road as well. Never was I
belittled for pursuing things too far out of my reach, but never was I left to wander on my own
either. A true collaboration was felt in this meeting allowing the generation of many great ideas.
Some of the many ideas Mr. Paz and I came up with included designing a part in
Autodesk Inventor (a program that is highly similar to the one used at NASA) completing every
action in a real engineering process (recording research, documenting every design, budgeting,
scheduling, working with a team, calculating expenses, etc.), creating a culmination of
interviews, research and pictures about the important of space exploration, and designing a fully
functional robot from scratch. I liked mostly every idea that Mr. Paz spoke of, especially the
robot one, but we were missing context. We knew what we wanted to accomplish but we needed
a situation, specifics, and a real space-related problem to solve. As we delved more into the
specifics of how I was going to accomplish certain things like programming through mini
computers, and using the Autodesk simulations, we never really talked much about what I was to
make a robot/device for, which is arguably the largest part of my original work project.
Therefore, after our time limit had expired, the most important call to action Mr. Paz and I had
was to brainstorm situations that I could design devices for.
With many ideas and theories buzzing around in my head, this first mentor meeting was a
definite success in helping my growth as a future aerospace engineer. And even though Mr. Paz
and I still have a few hurdles left to jump like communication and the lack of me experiencing
his daily practices, I can feel that this mentorship will still prove invaluable to me.

2/2/18

1. Meeting schedule - how and when

 Fridays? 8:30
 Google hangouts

2. Packet responsibilities - pirtle email, handbook

 Handbook email + website link

3. Original work - CAD, robotics, space exploration important

 Crio, solid works unigraphics, autodesk
 Designing a part in cad , 3d printing
 Requirements in engineering, cost, schedule
 Labdu - arduino- rapsberry pie (action)
 Heat transfer, thermodynamics
 Model rockets?
 Mini engineering project - think about specific problems (by may, less money,
related to space)
 Desirement - should incorporate cad, electronics, software. Robots
 Physics- quantum physics - double slit experiment- pilot wave theory - walking
water droplet (current debate)

4. Call to Action
 Situation
 Email ISM
 Inventor permission