Teaching the next-gen engineer with Dr Carlotta Berry
Summary
Dr. Carlotta Berry, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, joins Scott Hanselman to discuss her passionate mission to make STEM education more accessible and diverse. She explains her philosophy “My STEM is for the streets,” which led her to platforms like TikTok during the pandemic to reach young people, especially girls and students of color, outside traditional academic paywalls. Her goal is to spark enthusiasm and show that engineering is for everyone.
The conversation explores the balance between being a consumer and a creator of technology. Dr. Berry advocates for using tools like video games, Minecraft, and Roblox as gateways to creation, while also highlighting the accessibility of public library makerspaces. A significant part of the discussion tackles unconscious biases, such as parents assuming only boys are interested in robots at fairs, and the problematic narratives in toys like early engineer Barbies that undermined women’s capabilities.
Dr. Berry addresses contemporary challenges in education, including student engagement in the age of short-form content and the debate over homework’s role in developing executive function and independent problem-solving skills. She shares her teaching methods, which emphasize active learning and critical thinking over passive lectures, to combat the distractions of constant digital stimulation.
The discussion delves into the role of AI and tools like ChatGPT in education. Dr. Berry is not anti-AI but stresses the paramount importance of teaching critical thinking—evaluating whether an AI-generated solution is correct, efficient, and makes sense within a given context. She parallels this with the calculator debate, emphasizing that tools are aids, not replacements for fundamental understanding and systems thinking.
Finally, Dr. Berry underscores the multidisciplinary nature of real-world engineering and the value of “embracing the bug.” She shares stories of debugging sessions and misplaced breadboard wires to illustrate how perseverance through frustration builds essential technical resilience and deeper learning than simply being given the answer. She argues that engineering is about creative problem-solving, and passions like sewing, art, and music are not separate from but integral to a holistic engineering mindset.
Recommendations
Activities
- Minecraft / Roblox Creative Modes — Suggested as a way to transition young video game consumers into creators by building worlds and engaging in design.
- Taking Apart Household Items — Recommended as a low-cost starting point for STEM exploration—taking apart and reassembling items like pens, can openers, or old electronics to understand how things work.
Concepts
- Systems Thinking — Highlighted as a crucial skill, exemplified by the story of debugging a toaster by checking the house fuse box and even the neighbor’s lights to understand the broader context of a problem.
Platforms
- TikTok — Praised by both hosts as a positive, growth-oriented platform with a welcoming community and a well-tuned algorithm, ideal for educational outreach.
- Public Library Makerspaces — Recommended as a free, accessible resource for communities, offering tools like 3D printers for those who cannot afford personal equipment.
- Hackster.io — Mentioned as one of the many platforms Dr. Berry uses to share her robotics designs and meet learners where they are.
- Instructables — Cited as another online platform used to disseminate DIY project instructions and educational content broadly.
Topic Timeline
- 00:00:00 — Introduction and Dr. Berry’s mission — Scott Hanselman introduces Dr. Carlotta Berry, a professor and expert in educational robotics. Dr. Berry explains her mission, “My STEM is for the streets,” which began during the pandemic. She decided to post educational content on social media to reach a wider, more diverse audience beyond academic paywalls, specifically aiming to inspire girls and Black and Brown children in STEM.
- 00:04:01 — The philosophy of meeting learners where they are — Dr. Berry discusses her strategy of using multiple platforms like Hackster.io, YouTube, and Instructables to disseminate knowledge. She believes in going where the people are, which has led to meaningful interactions, workshop invitations, and even shipping robots to people she met online. This approach breaks down the ivory tower of academia and creates broader impact.
- 00:04:48 — Consumers vs. creators and addressing cost barriers — Hanselman presents a scenario comparing the cost of a gaming console to a 3D printer, questioning perceptions of value. Dr. Berry responds by advocating for a balance: it’s okay for kids to be consumers (e.g., playing video games), but they should also be creators. She suggests using creative modes in games like Minecraft or Roblox, and highlights public library makerspaces as a free resource for access to tools like 3D printers.
- 00:06:18 — Challenging stereotypes and representation in STEM — Dr. Berry shares a frustrating experience at a fair where parents assumed only a boy would be interested in a robot, ignoring their daughter’s engagement. This leads to a discussion about harmful stereotypes, exemplified by the 1970s “Math is hard” Barbie and a later Computer Engineer Barbie whose story portrayed her needing men to fix her code. They agree the solution is simple: let everyone make stuff without gendered assumptions.
- 00:08:22 — The vital role of art in STEM (STEAM) — Dr. Berry passionately defends integrating art into STEM, creating STEAM. She argues from two angles: engineers need awareness of ethics, history, and human interaction (like the uncanny valley in robotics), and designs must have aesthetic appeal to be successful. She notes that criticism often comes from men who also marginalize women in STEM, creating a double bind.
- 00:09:31 — The homework debate and developing executive function — Dr. Berry describes a contentious social media debate about homework in high school. She argues that homework is vital for developing problem-solving skills, independent thinking, and the ability to reflect on learned material. She has observed a post-pandemic decline in college students’ ability to self-organize and long-term plan, which she believes high school should help address.
- 00:10:52 — Social media, attention spans, and active learning — The conversation explores the potential causal link between platforms like TikTok and declining attention spans. Dr. Berry shares strategies for combating this in the classroom, such as a strict no-phone policy and employing active learning techniques. She stops lectures frequently to ask questions or have students do activities, ensuring engagement in an era of constant scrolling.
- 00:14:30 — AI as a tool for critical thinking — Discussing tools from calculators to ChatGPT, Dr. Berry emphasizes teaching critical thinking over banning technology. She wants students to evaluate if an AI-generated solution is correct and efficient, not just copy and paste. She shares an example of ChatGPT giving wrong answers to exam questions, underscoring the need for students to maintain a “mind on” approach and understand fundamentals.
- 00:16:12 — Systems thinking and multidisciplinary education — Hanselman asks how to teach systems thinking—understanding how silos connect. Dr. Berry explains her approach through a multidisciplinary robotics minor, forcing students from different engineering disciplines to collaborate. She teaches circuits to non-majors, stressing that all engineers must understand the language of other fields to create successful, integrated designs.
- 00:18:47 — Teaching debugging and embracing frustration — Dr. Berry shares her teaching philosophy of letting students struggle through debugging. She refuses to immediately fix simple errors like an unplugged power supply or a missing semicolon, believing the frustration leads to deeper, lasting learning. She frames this as building technical resilience and a systematic troubleshooting mindset, which is more important than any single technical fact.
- 00:22:36 — Finding the engineering spark through tinkering — The discussion turns to how to help students discover their passion within engineering. Dr. Berry advises hands-on tinkering with simple items like taking apart a pen or a can opener. She shares her own childhood engineering through Barbies and sewing, arguing that there is no single “engineer” profile. Creative hobbies like sewing, drawing, or music are valid entry points and should be embraced as part of a holistic engineering identity.
Episode Info
- Podcast: Hanselminutes with Scott Hanselman
- Author: Scott Hanselman
- Category: Technology Science Education How To
- Published: 2025-01-30T21:00:00Z
- Duration: 00:28:18
References
- URL PocketCasts: https://pocketcasts.com/podcast/b9630eb0-30de-0132-be16-5f4c86fd3263/episode/6123a765-0322-411f-bff9-d9c47ea85501/
- Episode UUID: 6123a765-0322-411f-bff9-d9c47ea85501
Podcast Info
- Name: Hanselminutes with Scott Hanselman
- Type: episodic
- Site: https://www.hanselminutes.com
- UUID: b9630eb0-30de-0132-be16-5f4c86fd3263
Transcript
[00:00:00] Hi, I’m Scott Hanselman. This is another episode of Hansel Minutes. Today, I have the pleasure
[00:00:17] of chatting with Dr. Carlotta Berry. She’s a professor of electrical and computer engineering
[00:00:21] at the Rolls-Pullman Institute of Technology and an expert in educational mobile robotics,
[00:00:26] as well as human-robot interfaces. How are you? I am wonderful. How are you? I am very well. I’m
[00:00:33] thrilled to be chatting with you because I follow you on TikTok. I see you on social media. You have
[00:00:39] an infectious, enthusiastic way of teaching. And I just want you to know that I see you and I wanted
[00:00:45] to have you on the show because I wanted to also get that level of infectious enthusiasm. Thank you
[00:00:51] so much for having me. I’m glad that it translates through the screen.
[00:00:56] It’s challenging because I can see how one could get burned out with tech. I could see how someone
[00:01:02] could get burned out with teaching and combine the two. And I could see where someone could
[00:01:06] get burned out real quick. Is there a way? People ask me how I don’t get burned out. How do you
[00:01:11] prevent burnout when you want to bring enthusiasm to the young people?
[00:01:16] I embrace my mission. So the mission of my company is my STEM is for the streets.
[00:01:20] And I had an epiphany during the pandemic when we were all at home that there’s so much great
[00:01:26] education. But it’s really a shame that only the students with the high, you know, paying the high
[00:01:32] tuition or behind the paywall or the firewall of journals and conferences were the only one to
[00:01:38] benefit from this knowledge. And I just made a mission that I was going to start posting snippets
[00:01:43] online, wherever. Some of my first posts were Instagram, Twitter. And I really wanted to get
[00:01:49] young people excited because I wanted to diversify STEM, get more girls, Black and Brown kids,
[00:01:56] African American, et cetera. And I had a parent say, you got to go to TikTok. And I was like,
[00:02:01] I don’t want to do any more social media. Got to TikTok and loved it. Love, love, loved it.
[00:02:06] Because you could just put up a video and let people, you know, put up a quiz, think what they
[00:02:11] want, answer how, you know, my quizzes don’t have right or wrong answers. I just want you to engage
[00:02:15] with me, to be honest. Yeah. You know, by the time this publishes, we’ll know whether or not
[00:02:20] TikTok will still be around. But I have found TikTok, and I wish people would understand this.
[00:02:26] And everyone who doesn’t go on TikTok says, oh, just go to Reels. And Reels is just a soulless
[00:02:35] hellscape. And they don’t understand that the vibes are different. And I don’t know what it is,
[00:02:39] but I just don’t think it’s a replacement. You’re singing my song right now.
[00:02:43] So I’m an engineer, and it’s just very hard for me to understand. Twitter made sense to me.
[00:02:49] TikTok made sense to me. I have migrated from Twitter to Blue Sky, but, or X to Blue Sky,
[00:02:54] but I just…
[00:02:56] Instagram just doesn’t make sense to me. Yeah. And people, and when I say that on
[00:03:01] Instagram, or I say that on threads, like, oh, you’re just being a hater. But there’s just
[00:03:05] something about a well-tuned algorithm. It takes a day or two for it to figure you out. And it’s
[00:03:09] like, okay, it’s giving me the things that I want. And I totally agree with you on the growth
[00:03:13] situation. I have been absolutely flat on Instagram, and I have found TikTok to be a
[00:03:17] growth platform. People are delightful, and the interactions are positive. And there’s something
[00:03:22] about the way they’re making it a positive place, which I think is really exciting.
[00:03:26] And the young people seem to like what we’re giving them.
[00:03:29] Absolutely. I did go to Red Note yesterday, just to test it out.
[00:03:34] I did too.
[00:03:35] I don’t know what’s going to happen with TikTok. And can I just tell you, they are equally as
[00:03:41] welcoming, even though half the time, I don’t know what I’m reading. But the good thing about
[00:03:45] it is you can take a screenshot of it, and you can translate it right on your phone, and then
[00:03:49] go right back in there and answer them. So it has been wonderful as well. It’s only been…
[00:03:54] It’s so funny that we would rather go to…
[00:03:56] To another Chinese video sharing app than go to Instagram. That’s how bad it is. So yes,
[00:04:01] someone needs to acknowledge that. But you’re also on Hackster.io and YouTube and Instructables.
[00:04:07] You and I think share the philosophy of you go where the people are. So you want to get your
[00:04:12] message out. So it’s pretty clear that you just went to wherever they are to make sure that your
[00:04:15] message gets heard. A hundred percent. My STEM is for the streets. I’m trying to meet them where
[00:04:20] they are. I’ve met lots of parents. I’ve met K through 12 teachers. I’ve shared my robot design.
[00:04:26] I’ve shipped robots to people that I’ve met on Mastodon. I’ve met them on Twitter, TikTok,
[00:04:31] YouTube, wherever. Invited people to workshops. I’ve been invited to talks. Things that cannot
[00:04:37] happen with me just being in the ivory tower with just my students and my colleagues that I
[00:04:43] see at conferences. All right. So I want to ask you a bit of a controversial take. I want to share
[00:04:48] one of my spicy takes, and you tell me what you think. I met a family who was a little bit
[00:04:54] interested in 3D printing and robotics, and they felt that it was too expensive. And I said,
[00:05:00] well, you can get a 3D printer for like 399. And they said,
[00:05:05] well, I think that’s too expensive. But behind them was a PlayStation 5 with a dozen games and
[00:05:11] probably 1,200 worth of PlayStation. Is it a fair comparison when I say an Xbox for
[00:05:18] 400? I understand the
[00:05:24] haul of the video game, but I also feel like you can be a consumer or you can be a creator.
[00:05:29] So one of the talks I give to people is I’m okay with young people being consumers,
[00:05:33] but also make them creators of technology. So some examples I give, I don’t judge people who
[00:05:38] do video games. My daughter is one of them. She’s 16. No judgment here. Right. But what I will say
[00:05:43] is if you’re going to have them doing things as a consumer, also make them a creator. Do you have
[00:05:48] them build worlds on Minecraft? Do you have them use Roblox? Have them do some things that engage
[00:05:53] your mind, but also…
[00:05:54] Your public library now has a makerspace and 3D printers. So if you absolutely do not want to let
[00:06:01] go of the Nintendo, the Switch, or the Xbox, get some of the Thingiverse models from online and
[00:06:06] truck yourself to the public library. But don’t give up on that. One of my biggest frustrations
[00:06:11] is I do a lot of book talks, robot talks, exhibits, and fairs is when I go and the kids
[00:06:18] are playing with a robot on the floor and I’ll have a young lady, a little girl come up playing
[00:06:22] and the parents will come up and go, oh, her brother’s going to love this.
[00:06:24] Hold on. I’ll go get her brother and I’ll be right back. And they assume the little girl is
[00:06:30] just… And I’m like, she’s been standing here talking to me for 10 minutes. Why are you going
[00:06:33] to get her brother? Not that I don’t love her brother, but it’s this whole changing the model
[00:06:38] and the representation of what an engineer looks like. Let her be excited to play with the robot
[00:06:43] too. It reminds me of a… There was a Barbie doll, I want to say like 1979, 1980, that came
[00:06:50] out and was immediately pulled, but you would pull a string on her back and she would…
[00:06:54] Math is hard. What committee meeting occurred to allow that to ship? And who thought that was
[00:07:01] a good idea? And that’s where you set those things. Do you remember they had to pull this
[00:07:05] too when Mattel had a robotics engineer? It was like a comic book. I have the Barbie,
[00:07:13] the robotics engineer Barbie, but it was like Barbie is a computer engineer and the story had
[00:07:18] to be pulled because in the original story, her software isn’t working. So she has to
[00:07:24] go and get the guys to help her figure out the code and find the bug. And some women engineers
[00:07:29] were like, pull this now. This is so offensive. They thought it was cool because they had made
[00:07:34] Barbie into a computer engineer, but the whole story was about how the guys had to come help her
[00:07:38] fix the problem. And it’s so funny because it’s just not that deep. You just let everybody make
[00:07:45] stuff. How hard is that? It’s just not that complicated. When I did wood shop back when we
[00:07:50] had like wood shop and they’ll send you in with a pair of plastic glasses.
[00:07:54] And you’ve got like a full bandsaw available to you as a child, which was probably a mistake,
[00:07:59] but it was a simpler time. We were not worried about anyone’s gender. We were just cutting wood
[00:08:05] and solving problems because I think it’s about the problem solving mindset. If a little girl or
[00:08:12] a little boy has a problem and they want to solve it with a robot or with engineering, let them play.
[00:08:19] I think another third rail that I have encountered, there’ve been several on social media
[00:08:22] is the intersections of the world. And I think that’s a really good point. I think that’s a really
[00:08:24] good point. I think that’s a really good point. And I think that’s a really good point. I think
[00:08:24] art and STEM, and some people say science, technology, engineering, and math go together.
[00:08:28] Who was the bright person that came up with art? I think art fits with STEM in two different ways.
[00:08:33] One of them being, we want our engineers to have some awareness of history, ethics, how their
[00:08:39] designs will be engaged with by people. For example, the uncanny valley in robotics. So if
[00:08:44] you have a person who is completely technical and has no connection with diverse communities,
[00:08:48] the global community, how good could their designs possibly be? Then looking at it from an artistic
[00:08:54] standpoint, I think that’s a really good point. I think that’s a really good point. I think that’s a really
[00:08:54] aesthetic. If you’re an architectural engineer, for example, designing ugly buildings or bridges
[00:09:00] that are not very appealing, no one is going to give you money for those designs. So I just think
[00:09:04] it’s absolutely offensive for somebody to say that art does not belong in STEM. And some of the people
[00:09:09] who have debated with me about this humanities, arts, and social sciences says it’s typically,
[00:09:14] normally men, who will make fun and say things like, oh God, you’re not an engineering major.
[00:09:18] And I said, well, you know what? They make fun of the women who are in STEM as well. So you’re
[00:09:22] getting it from both ends. They don’t want you there either. So I just think it’s these kinds
[00:09:26] of things. I also had a third reel about whether kids should be doing homework in college. I mean,
[00:09:31] in high school to get them ready for college. I absolutely say, if you’re going to college,
[00:09:35] doing homework in high school to help you to learn how to be a problem solver, an independent
[00:09:39] thinker, how to take something you’ve learned in class and reflect on it is absolutely vital.
[00:09:44] I have gotten into wars on Twitter and on TikTok with K through 12 teachers, as well as parents
[00:09:51] who say, my kids don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to do this.
[00:09:52] My kids have been at school all day and I’m not going to make them do anything when they come
[00:09:55] home or they’re tired after basketball, football, a theater practice. And as a parent, I shouldn’t
[00:10:00] have to make them do anything. I’ve had things with teachers. Teachers are like, you know,
[00:10:04] socioeconomic backgrounds. Some kids have horrible home lives. Parents may be on drugs. Parents may
[00:10:11] not work and they shouldn’t have to do anything when they get home. And I said, it’s about self
[00:10:15] reflecting on what you learned during the day. I’ve seen since the pandemic, it’s actually a
[00:10:22] college engineering majors who don’t know how to self-organize, don’t have any executive function
[00:10:28] to do homework, cannot long-term plan on how to do things. These are things I would like high school
[00:10:35] to start to help them with. I’m not trying to give more work to teachers. I don’t even care if
[00:10:39] the homework is graded. The whole thing is being able to reflect on something. So that was a third
[00:10:43] rail that happened on social media that I was actually shocked about.
[00:10:47] Let me then, just for the purpose of the conversation, jump on that third rail.
[00:10:52] I agree on both sides that TikTok is a joy and that there’s an executive function issue.
[00:10:59] Is there a causal relationship between the two? Because I had my, I had a viral thing on TikTok.
[00:11:04] You may have seen where my 17 year old bought a flip phone because he came to me one day and he
[00:11:09] said, I think TikTok is rotting my brain. And the idea was it’s an infinite scroll. Like there’s no
[00:11:16] end of the scroll and he would lose time. And he said, I don’t want to lose time. So I’m only
[00:11:21] going to do TikTok on these days. And I said, I don’t want to lose time. And he said, I don’t want
[00:11:22] to lose time. So I’m only going to do TikTok on these days. And he would switch between his flip
[00:11:25] phone and his other phone. I was really proud of him for doing that, but I don’t know if everyone
[00:11:29] has that level of self-reflection to be able to say like, and my, my, my 19 year old said,
[00:11:34] I’m, I want to borrow your Kindle because it doesn’t have a browser. He acknowledged that
[00:11:39] there was no way to like get distracted on a Kindle, you know, on a, on a black and white
[00:11:44] Kindle. So what do you, what do you think about that? Like you’re saying, yes, they need to have
[00:11:48] executive function, but you, we also love TikTok.
[00:11:51] I love that.
[00:11:52] Level of maturity. I have a colleague who recently said their sophomore in high school
[00:11:55] said the same thing that she now gets up in the morning and doesn’t pick up her phone because she
[00:12:00] was losing an hour every morning. I’m scrolling. I also do the same. My daughter at 16 did not
[00:12:06] get a cell phone until she was in ninth grade. She’s now a junior and she did not get her first
[00:12:13] social media account, which is now Instagram until a month ago. So because of that, she does
[00:12:19] not understand that the mindless scrolling, she does not understand.
[00:12:22] The addiction to the phone. It really is just a tool for her to communicate with mom and dad. Hey,
[00:12:26] come pick me up from wherever. I think I agree with you. I think I now have also become a little
[00:12:32] bit of that at my old age because I did not do social media to about 10 years ago at all. And
[00:12:38] then, you know, during the pandemic, when we were at home, I started doing it a lot more. So I do
[00:12:42] lose a lot of time with it, which is why I now try to make value added contributions. Cause my
[00:12:47] husband sometimes like, what are you doing? Take talking again. I said, I’m actually doing
[00:12:50] marketing materials right now.
[00:12:52] It’s not always just me goofing off. Sometimes I’m actually aiding content, but I agree. I think
[00:12:59] that level of maturity is missing from a lot of students. And I also think that YouTube and that
[00:13:04] scrolling makes it difficult for some of them to sit there and get anything out of a 50 minute
[00:13:09] lecture. Most universities, including myself, have a no cell phone in class policy. Unless if
[00:13:14] you’re taking it out, you have an emergency, a medical emergency, you’re a doctor, you need to
[00:13:17] run out and deliver a baby, et cetera. But because of that, some of them really
[00:13:22] struggle to just sit there for 50 minutes and get something out of it. So the way I have to do that
[00:13:26] is I do active learning in class, no, at any moment, I’m going to stop and ask you a question
[00:13:31] I’m going to have you do something. I don’t do the chalk talks where I just stand there for 50
[00:13:35] minutes while you stare at me and we leave. So you need to be engaged hands-on and minds on so that
[00:13:40] you get something out of that talk because they’re so used to the flashing colors and things
[00:13:46] spinning and every 10 seconds scrolling. I can’t just stand up there and just talk and expect some
[00:13:51] of them to get anything out of it.
[00:13:52] Well, then you can’t do it again. And so I removed theático and kept the button force for three hours.
[00:13:52] of what I’m saying. Yeah. It is such a challenge and a balance, and it is going to be really
[00:13:57] interesting to think about my kids’ kids and what is this doing to brains? Because I’m not sure how
[00:14:04] old you are, but I assume that we are within a couple of decades of each other. So we are
[00:14:08] contemporaries in that we remember a time before the internet and our kids don’t remember a time
[00:14:14] before the internet and their kids won’t remember a time before they could just talk to their
[00:14:20] computer and it wouldn’t have the sum of all human knowledge. There are externalized brains
[00:14:25] now. Then why would you bother learning math? Remember when calculators came out and they were
[00:14:30] like, oh, if you carry the calculator around, then you’ll never know how to do math. So it’s
[00:14:34] going to rot your brain. No, absolutely not. And now we have pocket supercomputers, right?
[00:14:38] I talk about tools. Your calculator is a tool. ChatGPT is a tool. Garbage in, garbage out. So
[00:14:44] a more important thing to teach is because some professors are absolutely anti-AI, anti-ChatGPT,
[00:14:50] on all assignments, especially I was on social media and there were some English professors
[00:14:54] talking about, you cannot teach someone the structure of writing critical thinking and
[00:15:00] developing their ideas if they’re getting their essays from ChatGPT. As an engineer,
[00:15:04] my thoughts are a little bit different because we want to teach critical thinking and problem
[00:15:07] solving. I would rather them to think about, is this solution correct? Does it make sense?
[00:15:13] Is it solving this problem in a way that is the most efficient? Is that the way you would do it?
[00:15:18] I’ve actually gone in ChatGPT and put in some of the things that I’ve learned. I’ve actually
[00:15:20] done some exam questions that it was giving the wrong answers. I need to make sure my engineering
[00:15:24] students would recognize that and not just swipe, cut, paste, and turn it in. So I’m not anti-AI at
[00:15:30] all, but I am about critical thinking with any kind of tools you have. Similarly with a calculator,
[00:15:36] it is a tool, not a crutch. There needs to be some level of mind math that you can do. I’m
[00:15:42] currently teaching AC circuits, which requires complex number math. Depending on what kind of
[00:15:47] calculator you have, because I do TI calculator, I’m not going to be able to do that. I’m going to
[00:15:50] some can do systems of equations and some cannot. Don’t tell me you can’t do anything in your head
[00:15:56] to understand if it gives you an answer of 350 volts. Does that really make sense for what the
[00:16:02] circuit gave you to begin with? You have to think. Mind on anything you do.
[00:16:08] So one of the things that I’m interested in your thoughts about are a thing called systems
[00:16:12] thinking. One of my most popular podcasts ever was with an engineer named Keshaw Rogers. Keshaw
[00:16:18] is out of Virginia. He’s a professor at the University of Michigan. He’s a professor at the
[00:16:20] University of Virginia. She has a whole software consultancy. She says that people keep learning
[00:16:24] in silos, but they don’t think about how those silos connect. They don’t think about the context
[00:16:28] and the systems within which they exist. You’re teaching electrical engineering, but also computer
[00:16:35] engineering and also software engineering, and then the ethical system and the larger system
[00:16:40] in which these things exist. How do you get that into a brain of a teenager? How do you get that
[00:16:44] in the brain of a 19-year-old? I push a lot multidisciplinary connections, especially in
[00:16:48] robotics. I teach in the multidisciplinary world. I teach in the multidisciplinary world. I teach in
[00:16:50] the multidisciplinary minor in robotics. So my robotics course actually has students from
[00:16:53] electrical and computer engineering, computer science and software engineering, and mechanical
[00:16:57] engineering, engineering design, biomedical engineering. And I talk to them about things like
[00:17:03] there’s no design you’re ever going to build where you don’t have to understand the language
[00:17:07] of some other discipline. A mechanical engineer could design something that works great mechanically,
[00:17:13] but if they don’t understand how to power it, they need to talk to the electrical engineer.
[00:17:17] I teach circuits for non-majors. Sometimes they give you a lot of flack because they don’t want to
[00:17:23] take this class. It has civil engineers, chemical engineers, and mechanical engineers in there.
[00:17:28] And I talk to them about things like you have to have some not only appreciation for electricity,
[00:17:33] but understand how it works even in your discipline. And I think that goes both ways.
[00:17:37] I need an electrical engineer who can write some software. I need an electrical engineer who
[00:17:42] understands at least something about kinematics. How are you going to design a robot if you don’t
[00:17:47] understand anything about it? I need an electrical engineer who can write some software. I need an
[00:17:47] electrical engineer who understands everything about Hartenberg parameters or how the things have
[00:17:51] to move together. So that’s how I sell it to them is you are not going to go anywhere where you work
[00:17:56] in a cubicle and never have to talk to other disciplines. Multidisciplinary approach is the
[00:18:01] key to any design that you’re going to create that’s ever going to be useful.
[00:18:04] I love it. I love it. I’m definitely, I’m picking up everything that you’re putting down.
[00:18:09] I use this analogy when I teach to younger kids like 13, 14, and they’re like, hey,
[00:18:15] we’re going to learn about robotics. Hey, we’re going to learn about whatever. And I say, all
[00:18:17] right, everybody, let’s do this. Let’s do this. Let’s do this. Let’s do this. Let’s do this.
[00:18:17] Before we start, my toaster is broken. What should I do? And then I just let it hang in the
[00:18:24] audience. And I’m like, wait, what should I do? And they say, well, you should probably buy a new
[00:18:27] toaster. I said, well, no, no. I mean, like, why? How do I debug this toaster situation?
[00:18:33] And you let it steep and you let it steep. And one of them will say, well, are the lights on
[00:18:38] in the house? And then it’s like, okay, now you’re thinking about the context in which the
[00:18:41] toaster exists. Check the fuse box. We start debugging the toaster and getting out of that.
[00:18:47] Oh, just replace it.
[00:18:47] Replace it solution. And then one young lady who always sticks with me, I always use this
[00:18:52] analogy. She says, are the neighbor’s lights on? And I freaking love that because I want hot
[00:18:59] toasted bread and she’s looking out the window to see if the neighbor’s lights are on. If that’s
[00:19:04] not systems thinking and that’s not an engineer right there, ready to go. Yes. Then I don’t know
[00:19:09] what is. So that’s one of the things I teach in circuits because they do breadboarding. They build
[00:19:13] circuits on breadboarding. And even if they can follow my instructions in a lab,
[00:19:17] being able to step back for the instructions and say, I need a systematic approach to
[00:19:23] troubleshoot and problem solve and figure out why this is not working. Sometimes it is as simple as
[00:19:28] they forgot to flip the power supply on, but more likely they will raise their hand and they will
[00:19:34] ask me, my teaching assistant to help them. And I always tell them, please stop doing that first,
[00:19:39] because if I come over and tell you, you forgot to flip the power supply on next lab, you will
[00:19:44] forget to switch the power supply on. If it takes you five minutes to do that, you’re going to have
[00:19:47] five hours to figure out you forgot to flip that power supply switch on. You will never forget that
[00:19:52] again. Same when I’m doing programming with my students, I will tell them, stop asking me to
[00:19:58] debug your poorly commented and badly organized code. Just so three hours later, you can realize
[00:20:03] in Python, you forgot to put a semicolon because if I tell you that you forgot a semicolon,
[00:20:09] you will do it again. If you forgot to put a semicolon, you will check every semicolon for
[00:20:14] the rest of your life. So although they will do that, they will never forget to do that.
[00:20:17] That is actually more important in engineering school than sometimes the technical things I’m
[00:20:23] teaching you, because there’s lots of things I do that I have no clue how to do from the beginning,
[00:20:28] but I know how to break it down into subsystems and go, I need to check the hardware. I need to
[00:20:34] check the software. I need to check the electronics. I need to connect that the
[00:20:38] connections are speaking to each other. So being able to take this system, break it down into
[00:20:43] subsystems, troubleshoot it in subsystems and figure out what’s wrong is key to doing that.
[00:20:47] And the technical resilience to be able to do that for a half an hour, two hours,
[00:20:54] 17 hours. Like I have, I had a 17 hour long debugging session that ended up being a carriage
[00:21:00] return. I love it. I love it. And, and, but, and like, that was a waste of time. Why didn’t
[00:21:06] you ask me? But I will never make that mistake again. And that carriage return has sat with me
[00:21:11] for decades. I had a student yesterday in Maple. I hate Maple by the way, but we use Maple.
[00:21:15] Sometimes we’re very complicated.
[00:21:17] And I had checked over her code. She had checked over her code. Both of us were adamant. We could
[00:21:23] not figure out what was wrong. And she found it right before I did. She had for, she had put a
[00:21:30] variable next to a number and forgotten to put a dot. So if you don’t want a dot, it looked like
[00:21:35] a function instead of multiplication. It’s those little things that she will never same, same in
[00:21:41] lab yesterday, had a circuit that beautiful to me. They had a wire going one row over,
[00:21:47] on the breadboard off one row, which means there was no connection. It’s just those little things,
[00:21:54] but to get them to appreciate that and stop becoming frustrated and mad about it is important.
[00:21:58] Like when they, they raised their hand and they go, it’s just not working. And they have all
[00:22:01] this anxiety vibrating. I said, we’re going to figure it out. I always do start to embrace the
[00:22:07] bugs and not let the bugs take you outside your box. You’re learning through that, right?
[00:22:13] Uh, see as an engineer, when you’re telling me this story,
[00:22:17] I am, I feel her pain, but I also love that because we have all had a wire, one slot over
[00:22:24] on a breadboard. And that is delightful. That is fantastic. That’s like, Oh yes, I, I hear you.
[00:22:31] I feel that. How do you get a person who says, well, this isn’t for me. How do you make them
[00:22:36] embrace the bug, the off by one error? Cause that’s all engineering is. It’s just a series
[00:22:41] of off by one errors. You want to find that thing that rings their bell. Um, I’ve had students come
[00:22:47] back from an internship and decide, I don’t want to be a computer scientist. I think I’m more
[00:22:52] astute to be a computer engineer. I’ve had students go to internships and come back and say, I don’t
[00:22:56] think I should be an engineer at all. Well, you know, it’s not made for everyone. And sometimes
[00:23:00] it’s that one class I’ve had students take circuits and go, I think I’m changing my major
[00:23:04] from mechanical to electrical. It goes both ways. So I really asked them, what do they like about
[00:23:09] robots? Do they like programming robots? They’re like building robots. Do they like designing them?
[00:23:15] Do they like the electronics? Do they like
[00:23:17] controls? Because I was a controls engineer before I was a roboticist. Because what I find
[00:23:22] is that because a lot of them do first robotics competition in high school, they all gravitate
[00:23:26] to mechanical engineering because in their mind, they think mechanical engineers are roboticists
[00:23:30] when really computer science, software engineer, social psychologists, lots of people study
[00:23:35] robotics from different perspectives. So I think that’s a big part is a lot of kids show up in
[00:23:40] engineering school because mom or dad said, I want it to be an engineer, but they don’t have any
[00:23:44] self reflection or affinity for what they like to do. And they’ll say,
[00:23:47] I don’t know what I want to do. Well, the first thing I need you to do is go tinker,
[00:23:51] get your hands on some stuff and figure out what you like, because it’s hard for me to guide you
[00:23:55] as an advisor to where you want to go in your career when you cannot even tell me whether you
[00:23:59] like to code or you like to build electronics. So that’s another part of talking about being
[00:24:04] creators, not just consumers, because you need to know thyself. You know, I’m agreeing with you.
[00:24:10] I’m just nodding fervently here because my parents are not technical. They were never technical.
[00:24:15] But my dad, on a positive note, he was a computer scientist. He was a computer scientist. He was a
[00:24:17] he took stuff apart. So we would like, you know, replace a headlight in a car. And I would say,
[00:24:23] Oh, wow, I didn’t know you knew how to do that. And he’d be like, I don’t. But like, how hard can
[00:24:27] it be? So like, you next thing you know, you’re underneath the hood of a car and you’re pulling
[00:24:30] things off, right? Like, they take apart the toaster. More kids should have the ability to
[00:24:36] do that. Just Yeah, flip it over. Let’s figure out what the screws are. And let’s take the thing
[00:24:41] apart. So I remember taking apart Atari 60, you know, Atari 2600s and Commodore 64s.
[00:24:46] And my parents were okay with that. But I feel like today, you can’t really take apart a TV
[00:24:53] anymore and fix a TV. It’s so complicated. But this is what I took. I get a lot of how can I get my
[00:24:58] kid in STEM? This is what made me make the blog post because I was getting the question so much.
[00:25:02] So I have it on my blog on my website. And I also had one about parents asking what kind of things
[00:25:08] to get their kids. I said, let’s take this out of buying expensive robots from Target and start them
[00:25:14] with.
[00:25:16] Lincoln. Tinker toys, take a pen apart and figure out can you put the pen back together? Take a can
[00:25:23] opener apart. It doesn’t you don’t have to start with the TV. Start with something like that.
[00:25:27] Because it’s about getting them to be creative. When I was a little girl, my mom was a kindergarten
[00:25:31] teacher. I didn’t really know my dad. So mine wasn’t electronics. Mine was Barbies. A lot of
[00:25:37] stuff I did is because I wanted my Barbie to have it. I learned to sew because I wanted my Barbie
[00:25:41] to have a cute little outfit. I wanted to figure out how to make my dream house and Barbie’s dream
[00:25:46] car. I wanted to make my Barbie’s dream car. I wanted to make my Barbie’s dream car. I wanted to
[00:25:46] make my Barbie’s dream car better. So I used to use household items to make things. I was using a
[00:25:50] mop for doll hair. So you don’t have to start there. I do a presentation for Girl Scouts. And I
[00:25:55] had a parent run up to me in the airport. I don’t even remember him being there. And he said,
[00:25:58] I saw you. And I just had to come up here and say, thank you. Because during your presentation,
[00:26:02] you mentioned sewing. And my daughter got so excited because she sews. And I said, because
[00:26:08] engineers do not look one certain way, they are not excited about any one thing. I do cross
[00:26:14] stitching, creative hobbies. And I said, I’m going to do a lot of things. And I said, I’m going to do
[00:26:16] do not disconnect you from being an engineer. My daughter loves to draw. I talked to her about
[00:26:21] media, arts, and science. She likes that along with video games. So there’s no certain way to
[00:26:26] be an engineer. If you are creative and want to create things to solve problems, we just need to
[00:26:31] figure out where that intersection is, which is why I got so offended about this young lady talking
[00:26:35] about who was the stupid person who decided to put art into STEM. It absolutely belongs there.
[00:26:42] In fact, that may be the hook for more young women, because you don’t,
[00:26:46] you don’t want them to feel like they cannot be an engineer because they also like dolls or they
[00:26:52] also like sewing or playing music or dancing or theater. My son has a Depop and he sells
[00:26:58] vintage clothing and he bought a sewing machine. That was the most obvious thing for him to do.
[00:27:04] He’s like, well, I can’t keep buying this clothing at bulk and it’s all broken up. So I need to learn
[00:27:08] how to sew. If sewing is not engineering, then I am not an engineer because that sewing machine
[00:27:13] is complicated. And the stitching- Threading that
[00:27:16] button.
[00:27:16] The bobbin, oh my God.
[00:27:17] The bobbin threading is, it’s been a year and we’re still having trouble with that bobbin.
[00:27:21] But yes, I appreciate that. Well, I appreciate you chatting with us today and giving us a new,
[00:27:25] fresh perspective on how people can think about these things. It’s fantastic to chat with you.
[00:27:30] Thank you so much for having me. I love talking about the stuff I love talking about.
[00:27:34] That’s great. Well, your enthusiasm is infectious. And if you’ve enjoyed listening to Dr. Carlotta
[00:27:40] as much as I have, you can check her out at noirsteminist.com. We’ll put a link in the show
[00:27:45] notes.
[00:27:45] You can see her blog, her children’s books, and learn about places where you might hear her
[00:27:51] and the speaking section of her website.
[00:27:54] This has been another episode of Hansel Minutes, and we’ll see you again next week.
[00:28:15] Bye.
[00:28:16] Bye.
[00:28:16] Bye.