![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
My 30th MIT reunion was my nominal reason for the trip, so I should write something about it.
There were fewer tours to choose from this time than there had been at my 25th. I decided to do the Super Duck tour since I had heard good things about it. I was rather disappointed. I had expected something funny and kind of cheesy, with everyone being instructed to blow duck whistles periodically. Instead, the driver / guide focused on two things - the Zakim bridge (which is architecturally interesting and which we passed several times) and celebrity gossip. I really don't care where Johnny Depp had his yacht two summers ago and where Ben Affleck was filming a few months ago and so on. They didn't even give out duck whistles until after we got off.
The tour ended about an hour later than it was advertised to, which meant I had just a short time to stop by the Hillel reception. I'd met the new rabbi in December when she was visiting down here and it was nice to see her again. I also met a few graduating students and a new professor (an Israeli woman who will be teaching Computer Science.)
My class had our Friday night dinner in the Barker Engineering Library, which is kind of an odd venue. The area we were in had been where the magazines were back in the day and is, apparently, now just a lounge area. (They took the sofas out for our event.) The point of these things is, however, the mingling and conversation. My class seems to be reasonably free of people who have overachieved to the point of making the rest of us feel inadequate. In fact, I was a bit surprised by how many of my classmates are looking for work. I had several interesting conversations, but won't write much here since they involve other people's stories. (Some conversations are likely topics for future entries, however.)
Saturday morning was Tech Day. This year's topic was "Against the Grain: The Power of Thinking Differently." Susan Hockfield (MIT's president) kicked thngs off, talking mostly about how MIT is doing. She had interesting statistics about the success of students at finding jobs after graduation - numbers which are a pretty good counter to the people who say that brand name universities aren't worth it. Then came Ann Graybiel, speaking on "Our Habitual Lives: How the brain makes and breaks habits." The topic was interesting, but she had some vocal traits that made it hard for me to focus on what she was saying. Anantha Chandrakasan spoke on "Next Generation Energy Efficient Systems" and pretty much said that the key was to think about systems, not just components. The final speaker was the best. Donald Sadoway's topic was "Innovation in Energy Storage: What I learned in 3.091 was all I needed to know," but he talked as much about his philosophy of education as about materials science. He was a dynamic, passionate and entertaining speaker. I was very impressed and I hope freshmen who take his class appreciate the opportunity.
The Tech Day luncheon followed, with the accompanying announcements of class donations. Having been on my class reunion gift committee, I think we did okay, but we did fall a bit short of the goal we had set for ourselves.
After that was the Tech Challenge games. These were moved indoors, due to threatening weather, which eliminated a couple of the competitions. We had an interesting approach for the design competition but needed a bit more time to have tested and adjusted our concept. We suffered at trivia from the acoustics of the room, with at least a few times when other teams were called on even though we had shouted out "Beaver!" sooner. But we did win the poetry contest. (That involves limericks and haikus on specific subjects. I will post my haikus in a separate entry, when I find the slip of paper I had scribbled them down on.) Overall, we finished solidly in the middle of the pack (3rd out of 6 teams).
There were two other class events (a dinner at the Stata Center and a brunch in the Student Center). There was also time for meandering around campus and seeing what had changed. The main difference is that a lot of things are locked up that hadn't been back then. There is also the deplorable trend towards glass everywhere in the corridors, putting students in labs on display. I commented to one of the people I was with that I supposed that prepares people for working in cubicles.
After brunch, I went up to the MIT Museum with a couple of folks. There was nothing particularly notable about any of the exhibits I saw, but I could not resist a purchase in the gift shop. We could all use a brain cell, no?
Then I raced off to bring my bag over to the Hilton at Logan Airport and, from there, to South Station to catch a train to Wellesley. My friend, Penny, met me there and we went to a potluck dinner and story swap in Framingham. We had to stop along the way for an intense storm, but it passed over quickly. The story swap was excellent, with a wide mix of personal stories and folk tales (and even one historic story). I told "Berel the Baker" which went over well. It is always nice telling to a responsive audience.
After the story swap, Penny was going to drive me to the T, but had an inspiration and remembered the Logan Express bus from Framingham. This was an excellent idea - much faster and still reasonable value. I pretty much collapsed as soon as I got to my room, but still didn't get quite as much sleep as I'd have liked before having to get up for my flight home. All in all, it was a great trip and I am glad I went.
There were fewer tours to choose from this time than there had been at my 25th. I decided to do the Super Duck tour since I had heard good things about it. I was rather disappointed. I had expected something funny and kind of cheesy, with everyone being instructed to blow duck whistles periodically. Instead, the driver / guide focused on two things - the Zakim bridge (which is architecturally interesting and which we passed several times) and celebrity gossip. I really don't care where Johnny Depp had his yacht two summers ago and where Ben Affleck was filming a few months ago and so on. They didn't even give out duck whistles until after we got off.
The tour ended about an hour later than it was advertised to, which meant I had just a short time to stop by the Hillel reception. I'd met the new rabbi in December when she was visiting down here and it was nice to see her again. I also met a few graduating students and a new professor (an Israeli woman who will be teaching Computer Science.)
My class had our Friday night dinner in the Barker Engineering Library, which is kind of an odd venue. The area we were in had been where the magazines were back in the day and is, apparently, now just a lounge area. (They took the sofas out for our event.) The point of these things is, however, the mingling and conversation. My class seems to be reasonably free of people who have overachieved to the point of making the rest of us feel inadequate. In fact, I was a bit surprised by how many of my classmates are looking for work. I had several interesting conversations, but won't write much here since they involve other people's stories. (Some conversations are likely topics for future entries, however.)
Saturday morning was Tech Day. This year's topic was "Against the Grain: The Power of Thinking Differently." Susan Hockfield (MIT's president) kicked thngs off, talking mostly about how MIT is doing. She had interesting statistics about the success of students at finding jobs after graduation - numbers which are a pretty good counter to the people who say that brand name universities aren't worth it. Then came Ann Graybiel, speaking on "Our Habitual Lives: How the brain makes and breaks habits." The topic was interesting, but she had some vocal traits that made it hard for me to focus on what she was saying. Anantha Chandrakasan spoke on "Next Generation Energy Efficient Systems" and pretty much said that the key was to think about systems, not just components. The final speaker was the best. Donald Sadoway's topic was "Innovation in Energy Storage: What I learned in 3.091 was all I needed to know," but he talked as much about his philosophy of education as about materials science. He was a dynamic, passionate and entertaining speaker. I was very impressed and I hope freshmen who take his class appreciate the opportunity.
The Tech Day luncheon followed, with the accompanying announcements of class donations. Having been on my class reunion gift committee, I think we did okay, but we did fall a bit short of the goal we had set for ourselves.
After that was the Tech Challenge games. These were moved indoors, due to threatening weather, which eliminated a couple of the competitions. We had an interesting approach for the design competition but needed a bit more time to have tested and adjusted our concept. We suffered at trivia from the acoustics of the room, with at least a few times when other teams were called on even though we had shouted out "Beaver!" sooner. But we did win the poetry contest. (That involves limericks and haikus on specific subjects. I will post my haikus in a separate entry, when I find the slip of paper I had scribbled them down on.) Overall, we finished solidly in the middle of the pack (3rd out of 6 teams).
There were two other class events (a dinner at the Stata Center and a brunch in the Student Center). There was also time for meandering around campus and seeing what had changed. The main difference is that a lot of things are locked up that hadn't been back then. There is also the deplorable trend towards glass everywhere in the corridors, putting students in labs on display. I commented to one of the people I was with that I supposed that prepares people for working in cubicles.
After brunch, I went up to the MIT Museum with a couple of folks. There was nothing particularly notable about any of the exhibits I saw, but I could not resist a purchase in the gift shop. We could all use a brain cell, no?
Then I raced off to bring my bag over to the Hilton at Logan Airport and, from there, to South Station to catch a train to Wellesley. My friend, Penny, met me there and we went to a potluck dinner and story swap in Framingham. We had to stop along the way for an intense storm, but it passed over quickly. The story swap was excellent, with a wide mix of personal stories and folk tales (and even one historic story). I told "Berel the Baker" which went over well. It is always nice telling to a responsive audience.
After the story swap, Penny was going to drive me to the T, but had an inspiration and remembered the Logan Express bus from Framingham. This was an excellent idea - much faster and still reasonable value. I pretty much collapsed as soon as I got to my room, but still didn't get quite as much sleep as I'd have liked before having to get up for my flight home. All in all, it was a great trip and I am glad I went.
