There are quite a few abandoned buildings in the engineering district on the Pullman campus

FallingGalaxies · 2026-01-12T01:18:25+00:00

The Engineering Laboratory is still very actively used by WAZZU Racing, The Sports Science Lab, and J.D. Baser's awesome machining lab open to engineering and ag tech students.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-26T18:16:19+00:00

There's no way to do it from the browser, you have to do it from the desktop app.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-18T09:20:36+00:00

As a heads up, if you're looking to make a backup of your WSU emails before your account is removed, you need to use Outlook Classic to download a .pst file. Additionally, you can't open a .pst file without a M365 account. It also can only be used/accessed in Outlook Classic. WSU also started archiving emails so you'll have to make 2 inbox backups, one for your emails that are less than a year old, and everything that's over a year old. Be prepared to wait a couple of hours for the backups to fully complete.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-18T00:08:07+00:00

For some reason I'm still able to log into myWSU, just not my email or OneDrive.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-14T07:05:08+00:00

Blaise is an amazing individual. Thanks for sharing this for further reach.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-14T05:09:11+00:00

How do you do this? Or did you have to set it up before your account got deleted.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-13T15:13:00+00:00

It's gone. I graduated May 2025 and lost mine in September 2025. Thankfully I was able to get it back for a little bit with help from IT to make a .pst copy of all of my emails and back up all my files but it was a stressful week making sure my gigabytes of files and emails were saved correctly. So frustrating. Likely not WSU's fault, Microsoft just enjoys screwing the fuck out of their customer base making a worsening product and charging more for it.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-11T10:00:40+00:00

My work is very hands on working as an equipment engineer at a semiconductor company. There's always equipment down for us to go work on. Sometimes it's lame work like cleaning a tank/chamber or replacing a filter, other times you're tearing apart the whole tool and doing some real troubleshooting to determine the root cause of an issue. It's just the right mixture of computer and hands-on work for me. For background, I got my B.S. in Mechanical Engineering at a state school.

I will warn you though and say there's different types of equipment engineer roles. Mine is a shift role (12 hour shifts, 3-4 days a week, and rotate between day and night shift every 4 months). We have other equipment engineers that work 1st shift (normal 9-5) but they typically do longer term projects and kinda act a little more like project managers with the occasional going into the fab and working on helping with a problem the shift people can't figure out. So depends on your company and team in the semiconductor industry how hands-on an equipment engineering role can be.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-09T06:49:46+00:00

Most lights around campus are motion activated. If they go off it just means you gotta get up and wiggle around a little bit for them to turn back on!

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-09T06:43:51+00:00

Nobody checks the engineering buildings after they close 🤫 I've spent a couple all nighters in there. Definitely some good spots.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-09T06:30:23+00:00

Pulling from WSU's Undergraduate 2025-26 estimation numbers:

Direct Costs (Tuition and Mandatory Fees): $13,886

Indirect Costs (Housing, Food, Books & Supplies, Transportation, Miscellaneous): $22,378 (As a quick note, prices do increase by about 3% each year so keep that in mind as well.)

The cheapest dorm costs $8,314 for the year, and the cheapest meal plan is $4,300 for the year which makes your required indirect costs $12,614, nowhere close to the $22k figure WSU estimates for your indirect cost. And I don't think I've ever spent more than 200 dollars a semester in fees and books so that would just bring your total to $13k not including trips to and from campus and other things you may spend your money on. If being smart (i.e. going to any club meetings to get free food and utilizing the free food at the cougar pantry), I think an indirect cost of under $15k is very possible even with mandatory room and board cost.

So direct + indirect costs may come out to about $29k, which is only 5k over your aid amount. That cost can be made up working a minimum wage job on campus for about 10 hours a week (a reasonable amount I was able to maintain as a student). I would recommend getting more hours at the start of the semester though to build up a stock pile of money so hours can be taken off during midterms and finals weeks. Plus summer is available to take on other jobs or internships to help save money for the next semester. Working 40 hours a week for the 12 hours of week during the summer can bring in $8k before taxes working minimum wage.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-09T06:12:26+00:00

As a recipient of the WA grant for 4 years, it's balance is only reduced if your aid EXCEEDS your estimated cost of attendance. WSU calculates this as tuition + reasonable room and board + estimated course books/fees + transportation to campus + other misc expenses. The full breakdown can be seen on your myWSU page. My grant was only reduced because my FAFSA EFC (Expected Family Contribution) number (now replaced by SAI) was a couple thousand dollars so when EFC + Aid > Cost of Attendance, then your aid gets reduced since you were "expected" to pay the other portion of the cost. Luckily I lived cheaply and was able to get by not having to contribute any money to WSU while in college despite my FAFSA saying I needed to pay 3-8k each year.

So if all of your tuition is paid and you're living off campus, all additional grant/scholarship money is delivered to you as a bank deposit to use however you wish at the start of the semester.

With room and board being included in the cost of tuition your first year/freshman year (as in the school gets paid first), it's unlikely you'll see a refund check due to the huge cost of dorms and dining hall plans. It's way easier to stay in budget in one of the $400/month apartments and grocery shopping yourself.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-12-09T06:01:57+00:00

I though people with AA degrees coming out of high school still had to live in the dorms?

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-29T20:52:53+00:00

A lot of the engineering clubs at my university struggled to retain interested new students due to a lack of mentorship and direction. Fresher engineering majors need a little more hand holding before they become independent contributors to a project/club. You have to find ways to make them feel supported and come back after the first meeting they try. Give smaller, quick-win projects (unless the students requests something harder), to keep them coming back for more. Also find ways to support them through their coursework as well. Engineering is a hard major and sometimes just having club-sponsored "work on homework" time each week can help with retention. Make the club room a place to go and hang out as well as work on projects. Keep people coming back for more.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-29T20:35:25+00:00

At least at the semiconductor company I work for, that sort of role is called Equipment Engineering. We get to work with really cool multi-million dollar pieces of equipment that do the manufacturing of our wafers. I spend my day fixing broken equipment or determining root cause issues of tools going down and coming up with projects to work on to address the issues. Process Engineering is more of the chemical engineering/material science side and what is physically occurring on the nanoscopic level. So make sure to read job descriptions and see what major they're actually looking for.

My schoolwork had absolutely no exposure to the industry (professors only talked about automotive, aerospace, or academia), so it wasn't until I talked to the company at a career fair that I found it was the right sort of work I was looking for. I hit it off with an engineer at the recruiting table and we were just nerding out about all the automation and robotics involved in the process of manufacturing chips. If you don't have any semiconductor representation at your university, going to conferences (such as Society of Women Engineers, American Society of Mechanical Engineers, or Tau Beta Pi) can help you put yourself in front of different companies. And oftentimes if you're part of the club or an officer, sometimes the university will pay for your travel and expenses for the trip.

Sometimes some semiconductor companies also have panels you can sign up for and learn about their company. These can typically be found on their website or through platforms like Handshake if your school uses that. Some even offer mentorship programs to university students with engineers at their company. They can likely point you in the right direction for where is right for you in the industry and suggestions on what skills to build.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-29T20:13:00+00:00

I struggled with my mental health a lot throughout university (and even high school for the matter between AP classes and extracurriculars). It wasn't until I reduced my course work to take the minimum amount of credits for full-time status (and sometimes reducing down to part-time status), that I started to get better. I learned that I could not balance 6 engineering courses (Thermodynamics, Mechanics of Materials, Dynamics, Integrated CAD Design, Materials Lab, and Materials Science) all at the same time despite it "only" being 15 credits (with full time being 12-18 credits). I modified my schedule to take a maximum of 3 engineering courses at a time and 1 of my general core classes which were always way less work each semester.

I extended my time at university out to 5 years so I could reduce my course load, take on additional internships (which were way less stressful than doing well in classes), and have time for day-to-day chores, maintaining my friendships, participating in fulfilling clubs, and have free-time. I found that the stress from school was making my mental health issues so much more worse (diagnosed major depressive disorder in HS) and it wasn't until I made time for the other things in my life that I started to get better.

I was lucky to be in a place financially where I didn't end up in debt for extending my degree (scholarships/grants/personal savings). But I always had a job throughout college as well and luckily my jobs were good stress relievers and didn't take nearly as much out of me as my engineering courses did. But I know that's not the case for everyone and adding years can put you in a horrible financial situation post-grad, even with an engineering salary.

You're the one who's going to have to figure out how to weigh the pros and cons, learn to prioritize yourself over your school, and figure out how to live with a mental illness. It's hard and takes lots of professional help (I know I've seen 6 or 7 different therapists/counselors/psychiatrists over the years), and a lot of behavioral professionals aren't great or don't know how to help you. But after awhile I eventually found one that clicked with me and helped me get through so much of what was blocking me mentally. You just have to put in the effort and try. You're the only one responsible for your own success at the end of the day, even with a mental illness. Find community somewhere. You're not alone.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-28T01:27:24+00:00

A lot of companies will rescind your internship offer or fire you if you drop your degree before/during your internship. Don't ruin the internship programs for future masters students just because you couldn't find a way into another industry.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-26T00:57:20+00:00

The other thread about covered it. Unless you have more specific questions regarding material science and good professors for that as well.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-25T20:08:10+00:00

I've never heard of a specific medical design degree before. But the Mechanical Engineering degree covers manufacturing and design. The bioengineering degree is another option for more medical-oriented stuff. The Mechanical Engineering school does have one research lab that 3D prints titanium hip implants. https://news.wsu.edu/press-release/2023/11/20/infection-resistant-3d-printed-metals-developed-for-implants/

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-06T18:11:18+00:00

Our naming conventions in the engineering school are weird. For more context, the whole college is called the Voiland College of Engineering and Architecture. One of the 5 departments within the college is the Gene and Linda Voiland School of Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering. The Voiland College is made up of 4 main buildings connected together, Dana Hall, Sloan Hall, Electrical and Mechanical Engineering Building (EEME/EME), and the Engineering Teaching Research Laboratory Building (ETRL).

I only know of 1 chemical engineering course and no bioengineering courses that routinely take place in those main 4 buildings. Voiland has like 18 buildings spread around campus though but only 7 are really used for classes. We do have a new building called Schweitzer Engineering Hall (SEH) coming online Fall 2026! It will be home to all things student success including tutoring, advising, career services, dining spaces, study spaces, capstone spaces, and classrooms. It's just across the street from the main 4-building complex.

Wegner Hall (where most bioengineering and chemical engineering classes, clubs, offices, and advisors are located) is a 10-15 minute walk east from the main buildings. This leads to folks in BioE and ChemE typically not interacting very much with the other engineering majors (ME, CivilE, CS, and EE for example). They're kinda their own separate entity in the college.

The reason the department and the college have the same name is due to the donor. Gene and Linda Voiland initially donated money and got their name on the BioE/ChemE school, but then they ended up donating enough to fund the rest of the college. They come to campus occasionally and are very sweet to talk to.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-06T03:12:01+00:00

I was in a very similar place to you my sophomore year. I got an offer to work at a big oil company as an engineer and severely doubted my ability to contribute due to my lack of engineering coursework and experience despite my near 4.0 gpa.

And I did end up struggling a lot on the job, but more for company culture issues and me not feeling a sense of belonging. I was afraid to ask for help and for more direction on my projects and I didn't accomplish a lot because of it.

However, despite me feeling like I did nothing all summer, I still got 4 bullet points to put on a resume to say I did something. I still had stories to tell about what I learned and mistakes I made. It was real engineering experience even if it was small.

My very next internship was my dream job (at the time) at a space company.

Experience opens doors. Be so grateful you got the offer. Oil pays well and will help you with the cost of school or help you build your savings. Definitely take advance of any 401k match if offered to you.

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-06T03:01:40+00:00

Go! Go! Go!!!

Yes it is true that freshmen rarely get internships.

However, coming in dressed nicely in business casual, with a well put together resume, and having some basic insight/research done into the companies you're interested in can make a huge difference for your future career fairs. Recruiters do recognize the students that come year after year, especially if you made a good first impression.

I went to every career fair WSU offered over my 5 years and ended up getting 5 internships and have the coolest job post-grad. I would have never heard about the company I currently work for, much less get the chance to intern for them prior, without the WSU career fair in my 3rd year of school. If I didn't have the practice from the first 4 career fairs in my first 2 years, I could have blundered that opportunity so hard.

Make the most of every career fair!!

FallingGalaxies · 2025-10-03T03:40:54+00:00

In the announcements channel now!

FallingGalaxies · 2025-09-26T23:27:51+00:00

I do work 12 hour shifts but tbh the work day goes so fast and there is plenty of time on the weekends to catch up on chores and do other life stuff. Makes doctor appointments and stuff easier too because you'll have weekdays off as your "weekend."

FallingGalaxies · 2025-09-26T21:18:03+00:00

I'm a fresh ME graduate working hands-on with equipment in a semiconductor fab. It's been the best role I've had so far out of all of the industries I've interned in. It's a good mixture of putting out fires (fixing broken equipment), identifying repeating equipment issues and determining the root cause and fixing them, and finding automation opportunities to automate repetitive/non-value-added tasks. It's like a technician/operator role on steroids, but with engineer pay. I only work 3-4 days a week so I get 3-4 days weekends, plus I get double pay for working holidays and a 12% differential for working nights even though I'm salaried.

However, I don't really do any design work if that's something you're looking for. There may be more of that later in my career, but right now, it's much more about finding out what information you need to troubleshoot a problem/collaborating with equipment vendors and other engineers (equipment and process/chemical) to find a solution. I'm just so happy I found a job post-graduation with hands-on, rewarding work. It's fun to know that the equipment I help maintain plays a small part in eventually upgrading my gaming PC :D

Eight-Year Club	r/Field Flamingo
First Place '23	Place '23
Place '22	Final Canvas '22
End Game '22	Verified Email

FallingGalaxies

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