Chemistry...?
I hate to admit this, but sometimes I wonder if I should have majored in engineering instead of chemistry. That's not to say I don't like chemistry... it's a very interesting field. However, the stuff I'm most interested in in chemistry (materials chemistry, inorganic) is of an engineering nature. The traditional chemistry stuff (measuring stuff in a lab and recording data, theoretical calculations with lots of very tough math, organic synthesis, etc.) doesn't really interest me anywhere near as much as engineering (materials, civil, mechanical, structural, etc.). There was actually a time when I was a sophomore here when I considered switching to physics, but I never ended up doing that, obviously. Maybe if I had taken STEMs in my 3rd semester I might have switched to engineering... it's a realistic possibility.
Might not be a coincidence that my favorite research project that I've done over the years was the one at Cornell. And which department was I in at Cornell? Clue - not chemistry... materials science and ENGINEERING.
I also enjoyed STEMs, which a lot of people think is insane. I hated MATLAB, but I liked the material. In addition, this materials engineering class I'm taking this semester might be the most interesting class I've had here. Despite the fact that I didn't take one of the prereqs (continuum mechanics), I'm just enjoying it so much.
I wonder if the route I took was really the best one... or if it would have been better to major in engineering then take chemistry stuff on the side. I could have done without analytical, instrumental, organic, and quantum chem... I loved p chem and inorganic, but the others in the major weren't as good. That's not to say I'm not interested by the content of those classes though. It's just not something I wanna do for the rest of my life you know.
The other thing is that the best graduate school for what I'm interested in is easily MIT. They're #1 in inorganic and #1 in materials engineering (or pretty much any engineering for that matter). I really was perplexed last semester when MIT was the only one of the REU places to reject me out of Stanford/Harvard/Princeton/MIT. Maybe they don't feel like I'm a good fit there? Should I really give them another chance and risk tossing away application fee money? I guess I should ask around and figure out what profs think. Oh well. All I know is that if I apply there again and get rejected, I'm gonna send them a letter with some choice comments about what I think of them.
I need to figure out what I wanna do with my life haha.
Might not be a coincidence that my favorite research project that I've done over the years was the one at Cornell. And which department was I in at Cornell? Clue - not chemistry... materials science and ENGINEERING.
I also enjoyed STEMs, which a lot of people think is insane. I hated MATLAB, but I liked the material. In addition, this materials engineering class I'm taking this semester might be the most interesting class I've had here. Despite the fact that I didn't take one of the prereqs (continuum mechanics), I'm just enjoying it so much.
I wonder if the route I took was really the best one... or if it would have been better to major in engineering then take chemistry stuff on the side. I could have done without analytical, instrumental, organic, and quantum chem... I loved p chem and inorganic, but the others in the major weren't as good. That's not to say I'm not interested by the content of those classes though. It's just not something I wanna do for the rest of my life you know.
The other thing is that the best graduate school for what I'm interested in is easily MIT. They're #1 in inorganic and #1 in materials engineering (or pretty much any engineering for that matter). I really was perplexed last semester when MIT was the only one of the REU places to reject me out of Stanford/Harvard/Princeton/MIT. Maybe they don't feel like I'm a good fit there? Should I really give them another chance and risk tossing away application fee money? I guess I should ask around and figure out what profs think. Oh well. All I know is that if I apply there again and get rejected, I'm gonna send them a letter with some choice comments about what I think of them.
I need to figure out what I wanna do with my life haha.