Ah, poetry in the springtime, love and… materials science and engineering?
Unlikely as it sounds, the WSU student chapter of the Materials Research Society is holding a poetry contest to celebrate materials in engineering.
“For an engineering club to hold a poetry contest is perfect,” said David Field, advisor to the student club and associate professor in the School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering. “It’s sort of like an English club holding a bridge-building competition.
“It seems like it doesn’t really fit, but it’s something that is a lot of fun for us, and we have some tremendously creative people.”
Looking for ways to provide a little stress relief for engineering students, several students in the club decided on the poetry contest after learning about another university’s similar event. Faculty, staff and students in the College of Engineering and Architecture are invited to enter the contest. This year’s categories include: material properties, biomaterials, engineering homework, selecting materials and “why our research group loves… (insert research topic).”
Poems submitted by students will be judged by club advisors, and poems submitted by faculty and staff will be judged by student club members. Awards will be given for first, second and third place in each category.
Last year’s poetry contest, the club’s first, was written up in the “MRS Bulletin,” the Materials Research Society’s newsletter, along with some of the winning entries. In the “Engineering Homework” category, for instance, was the following haiku, by Annette Cavalieri, undergraduate program coordinator:
Headache from homework
Picture graduation day
Math, more math, oh my
Entries for the contest are open through midnight on March 28 and can be submitted to wsu_mrs_chapter@yahoo.com.
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