I was able to spend 6 weeks working in Prudhoe Bay, AK, which is the area where the Alaskan Pipeline begins.
Name: Haley Crock
Major: Mechanical Engineering
Employer: Schlumberger
Location: Prudhoe Bay, AK
Why did you choose to participate in a co-op/internship? I chose to participate in the internship with Schlumberger because it gave me an experience in a career path I had never before considered. It also gave me a great opportunity to travel to areas for work that would provide a work experience and summer like very few other college students get the chance to have!
How has this experience enhanced your academic experience and/or shaped your career goals? This internship has given me the opportunity to consider a full-time career in the oil industry. Because of growing up around DC, I'd previously only considered the defense industry. This internship opened my eyes to a whole array of other opportunities.
Describe any exciting/challenging projects you've worked on at your co-op/internship. The most exciting project I had during my internship was the opportunity to work on the design portion of a vacuum system for some of our dry cement silos. As a mechanical engineer, I was glad to take some of the experiences I had had in my junior and senior design classes and apply it to a real-world problem and project.
Was there anything unique about your experience that you can share with us? It was in the North Slope in ALASKA! I was able to spend 6 weeks working in Prudhoe Bay, AK, which is the area where the Alaskan Pipeline begins.
If your co-op/internship was outside the DC metro area, how did you find housing? All housing was provided for me by Schlumberger. On the North Slope I lived in a camp with all the other Schlumberger employees and when I was in Anchorage I shared a very nice staff apartment with 3 other interns.
What advice, if any, would you give to other engineering students seeking a co-op or internship? An engineering degree isn't just about knowing how to do technical work. Although my project was a design project, the position of a field engineer is more supervisory, and therefore the method of thinking that is developed while obtaining an engineering degree is just as important as the engineering skills that are taught in classes.
Finally, women engineers shouldn’t be intimidated by the men we work with, because most of the time they don't care that we're women, they just care about the job.
Top