About Me

Hi! My name is Firas and I am a rising sophomore at Will Rice College studying mechanical engineering. I joined SEED because I found it to be an amazing opportunity to work with clients to create real impact and to gain practical engineering experience that is simply absent in the classroom. I am by far the most excited to work with my group to emulate the real life industry practices of working in teams and using each other’s lived experiences to come up with solutions to real world problems. 

 

First Week 

From meeting our team members to setting up client meetings, no time was wasted as we dived deep into our projects in the first week of the 2022 SEED internship. On the first day of the program, we were introduced to the other interns and took a tour around the OEDK to become familiar with a whopping 20,000 square feet of tools and technologies used for endless creativity. We also were able to meet with the project mentors to learn more about the problem and motivations underpinning each project. Moreover, we were able to interact with the mentors to ask questions about each particular project and the parameters set around each one. This was definitely pivotal in learning about each project and influencing my project ranking decisions. To conclude the day, we were left to continue researching the different projects and rank them. 

 

On day two, we started off with a guest speaker from the Rice 360 fellowship program that discussed the work she’s doing and how it’s related to the work we will be doing this summer. Then, it was time for the highly anticipated team reveal. We sat in our chairs, eyes glued to the display waiting patiently for the slide to be shown. I was excited to see that I was placed on my first pick project-The Smart Helmet. The Smart Helmet project is intended to create 3D-printed helmets with several different technologies to assess the users health and cognitive function and increase situational awareness. More specifically, our team was tasked with integrating the haptic feedback system to work with the other components of the helmet. For me, the project enabled endless creative possibilities and was part of the reason why I chose it as my top pick. Wasting no time, we quickly met with our groups and did a stakeholder mapping exercise. On my team was Jun, Hamza, and Jesus. I was very fortunate to be placed in a group of people with diverse backgrounds and interests. It was incredibly valuable to think about the people that will ultimately shape the design of our Smart Helmet.

 

For the remainder of the week, we worked on reaching out to different people to get started on identifying our problem. We met with Zane, a graduate student working at the Mechatronics and Haptic Interface Lab, to learn more about haptic systems and how they can be integrated into the helmet. While we were there we learned how to use an amplifier to create vibrations using tractors. To conclude the week, we had an OEDK handtools workshop, where we learned how to use saws, clamps, and even power tools.  We later implemented what we learned by creating a bat house, which proved to be much more of a challenge that I had anticipated. Regardless, the hand tools workshop was undoubtedly a valuable experience that helped refine my technical skills.  In all, the first week of the SEED 2022 Summer Internship was exhilarating to say the least and I look forward to continuing to work on the Smart Helmet in the coming weeks.