{"id":203893,"date":"2018-11-12T13:26:21","date_gmt":"2018-11-12T13:26:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/d45h139.public.uconn.edu\/sites\/news\/?p=26110"},"modified":"2018-11-12T13:26:21","modified_gmt":"2018-11-12T13:26:21","slug":"ilooklikeanengineer-menna-elfouly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2018\/11\/ilooklikeanengineer-menna-elfouly\/","title":{"rendered":"#ILookLikeAnEngineer: Menna Elfouly"},"content":{"rendered":"
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(Christopher Larosa\/UConn Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

1) Why did you decide to attend UConn Engineering?<\/strong><\/p>\n

To start with, UConn seemed to have an amazing Engineering program with a great Senior Design reputation that inspired me to be a part of the UConn community. Besides academics, I simply fell in love with the beauty of the campus as soon as I visited it, and I appreciated the diversity of students, which was visible from day one. Also having such delicious ice cream on campus is definitely a plus!<\/span><\/p>\n

2) When you\u2019ve told people you were studying engineering, what kinds of looks or reactions have you gotten?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Luckily people always try to say something nice such as \u2018Good for you!\u2019, \u00a0however, most of them seem to get surprised. They are surprised when I say I am studying engineering and even more surprised when they know it is mechanical engineering. I just don\u2019t appreciate comments such as \u2018Isn\u2019t it a hard major?\u2019 because it may question my abilities. Still, some people say it with good intentions because they may want me to take it easy. On the other hand, I have got such great reactions too. Some people get so excited and happy for me that I am studying engineering, isn’t that adorable?<\/span><\/p>\n

3) Why did you decide to pursue engineering? Was there a specific moment or person who inspired you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was raised in a family that had a couple engineers and just seeing them talk so passionately about it made me passionate about engineering as well. Then I took multiple advanced courses in high school to explore engineering further. I enjoyed these courses a lot and I did well in them. That’s when I knew engineering could be a good fit for me. Sometimes I had doubts that it may be too challenging but my father always helped me to get over my doubts.<\/span><\/p>\n

4) Tell us about your background. Where do you come from and what\u2019s your family like?<\/strong><\/p>\n

My parents are Egyptians and I lived in Egypt for a while, then we moved back to the U.S. for school. My father is a UConn Ph.D. student alumnus, he studied computer science is currently a university professor. My mother is a kindergarten teacher. I also have three brothers, two of them go to UConn as well. The first one is a sophomore mechanical engineering major, and the second one is a freshman political science major. My youngest brother is in elementary school. I am also married and I live with my husband, who is a hospital pharmacist. Overall, I have an amazingly supportive family that helped me accomplish all the things I have accomplished today. They are loving, well-meaning and generous. They gave me strength and independence, and I am forever grateful to have them.<\/span><\/p>\n

5) What are your career goals?<\/strong><\/p>\n

As I am currently a senior I have been looking for full-time jobs to gain some experience in the aerospace field that I have always been passionate about. Maybe later down the road, I may consider graduate school depending on which discipline I choose to specialize in.<\/span><\/p>\n

6) What\u2019s your favorite experience been so far in your time at UConn Engineering?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I appreciate every experience I have had at UConn Engineering because it made me the engineer I am today. However if I would classify one of them as a favorite, it would definitely be my senior design project.<\/span><\/p>\n

7) If you could start over, and go back to your senior year of high school, do you think you still would have chosen to pursue engineering?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Definitely, I wouldn\u2019t even change a slight detail. Engineering is not only an education that you get, but it is also a way of thinking that you learn to master that carries on with you for the rest of your life.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Menna Elfouly, a senior mechanical engineering major, shares her story in a new series called “#ILookLikeAnEngineer.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":122,"featured_media":26111,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1866],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-203893","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-engr"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-21 05:25:53","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203893","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/122"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=203893"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203893\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/26111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=203893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=203893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=203893"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=203893"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=203893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}