Tag Archives: Mathematics

Zhi Zheng ’20: ChangJiang Securities

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Name: Zhi Zheng
Class Year: 2020
Major: Mathematics
Hometown: Wuhan, China

Internship Organization: ChangJiang Securities
Job Title: investment management internship
Location: Wuhan, China

What’s happening at your internship?

This summer, I work as an intern at a securities company in Wuhan, China.
As a math major, I was assigned to the investment management department, where they need people to analyze data.

Why did you apply for this internship?

This company is a very famous securities company in China. As a math student minoring in economics, I feel like the financial industry is the right place for me. So I decide to apply for the role at a securities company, which I think would be helpful for my later career choice.

Can you talk about the skills you are learning and why they are important to you?

Communication plays a very critical role in investment management, especially when you negotiate with your clients. After participating in several meetings with my supervisor, I realized how people talk is much more complicated than I thought, such as how to persuade your colleagues and supervisor to support your strategy, how to negotiate with clients to make a win-win deal. Speaking is another kind of art; sometimes the way you express your statements can decide the outcome of the whole thing.

What has been the biggest challenge you have faced at your internship?

Our job is to find the potential companies which will be listed in the future and decide to invest a certain amount of money to help them speed-to-market. It is a challenge for me because as an analyzer, you not only need to understand data, but you also have to know quite well the industry to which your target company belongs. So for the first two weeks of the internship, I started studying the laser industry, reading numerous economic reports every week, and writing an industrial summary to my team. Thanks to the economics classes I took at Bryn Mawr, this work was not as hard as I thought.

After we got to know enough about the domestic laser industry, we started looking for some local laser companies which will be listed soon. This is a long process. Right now, our team is still working on it, and we have a list of potential companies which satisfy our requirements. Next step, our team will have a direct meeting with each company to further discuss our investment.

Adzo Fiagbenu ’20: Physics Research Assistant, Colorado State

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Name: Adzo Fiagbenu
Class Year: 2020
Major: Physics; Mathematics
Hometown: Tema, Ghana

Internship Organization: Colorado State University
Job Title: Research Assistant
Location: Fort Collins, Colo.

What’s happening at your internship?

I spent the summer characterizing the magnetic properties of a sample that had been sent to my supervisor. This process involved the use of the MPMS (Magnetic Property Measurement System) and the PPMS (Physical Property Measurement System), both of which were designed to detect and quantify the magnetic moment of samples by applying Faraday’s law and the concept of Electrical induction — topics that I had encountered in my Electromagnetism class the semester prior to my internship.

adzo

Why did you apply for this internship?

I applied for this internship because I wanted to develop my experimental skills. I wanted to hone my lab etiquette and improve on my ability to understand and effectively analyze data. Furthermore, I found the prospect of experiencing life in a university in another state of the U.S. appealing.

Was there anything special about how you found this internship?

Bryn Mawr College’s Physics Department has a fellowship called the Katherine B. Blodgett 1917 Summer Research Fellowship and I was awarded the funding this summer. At the time, I had no internship planned. But after receiving the fellowship, I spoke with one of my professors who, based on my preferences, suggested that I work with her collaborator at CSU.

What has been your favorite part of this internship?

My favorite part of the internship has been troubleshooting the unexpected issues that arose in my experiments: a characteristic trait of experimental physics. A faulty measuring equipment, a contaminated sample, and environmental disturbances for instance, sometimes turn simple tasks into complex and involving projects. This experience has taught me to not only be calm and rational when things go wrong, but also to not let successes impede my judgement.

adzo

mountains

 

Nora Cahill ’21: Institute for Research on Poverty, UW-Madison

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Name: Nora Cahill
Class Year: 2021
Major: Economics/Math minor
Hometown: Madison, Wisc.

Internship Organization: Institute for Research on Poverty, with Tim Smeeding, Professor of Public Affairs and Economics at the UW-Madison La Follette School of Public Affairs
Job Title: Project Assistant
Location: Madison, Wis.

What’s happening at your internship?

My boss, Tim Smeeding, is writing a book on economic inequality, different ways to measure it, and potential policy solutions for the financial problems faced by hundreds of thousands of people in the U.S. Tim has spent his career studying, writing about, and influencing policy about economic inequality. This book will specifically focus on the pros and cons of different datasets and measures of well-being, issues that are keeping American society highly unequal, and how to improve our measurement in the future.

cahill

Why did you apply for this internship?

I’m really interested in economic inequality and how it relates to policy, and Tim’s work is exactly up that alley. This internship seemed like a great way to gain some practical experience with research and analysis, while become more familiar with research that’s already been done on subjects related to economic inequality. Now, at the end of the summer, I can say that it’s turned out to be a great step towards my goals!

What has been your favorite part of this internship?

My favorite part of this internship is how open-ended it is. Tim gives me a project every week, and I work on it on my own, going back to him if I have questions or have something to show him. Some weeks I’m looking at the connections between family wealth and education, some weeks I’m sifting through data to find important trends in consumer debt. I get to go down a lot of rabbit holes — if I think something is interesting and relevant, I’m always free to include it in my report!

Can you talk about the skills you are learning and why they are important to you?

I’m gaining a lot of hard research skills — like finding the papers that are most relevant to whatever I’m working on; learning R, a coding language used in data analysis; and creating graphics that help illustrate whatever I’m writing. These skills will help me when I’m doing research in the future — these are tools that economists use every day to make their work better. More broadly, I’m practicing working independently and using what I already know about economics to inform my work. These are skills that I’ll bring to whatever I do next, both during and after college.

Saumyaa Mehra ’21: Energy Office, Philadelphia City Government

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Name: Saumyaa Mehra
Class Year: 2021
Major: Mathematics
Hometown: Delhi, India

Internship Organization: Energy Office, Philadelphia City Government
Job Title: Summer Research Intern
Location: Philadelphia

I’ve always been somewhat of a math geek, and really wanted to understand how math and data are used to solve real-world questions. When I got a taste of it in Professor Victor Donnay’s Differential Equations class while using equations to solve sustainability related questions, I approached him to explore the application of math to sustainability more extensively. He told me about the various projects that the Philadelphia city government is doing to work toward cleaner energy sources, and this opportunity immediately caught my interest.

At the Energy Office, I am working as a summer research intern on the Indego Philadelphia Bike Share program. The program is a part of the Municipal Energy Master Plan, which lays out a roadmap of how we could reduce carbon emissions by 80 percent by the year 2050. The goal of my project is to calculate the reductions in carbon footprint when people switch to bike-share for travel in place of public and private transport.

As of now, I spend most of my days working with data and my project-head on the next steps to calculate the carbon emissions. The project just kickstarted and I have used some old data to calculate the distance covered by the bikes from 2016-2019 given latitudinal and longitudinal coordinates. Now, after using data from surveys on the shift in mode of transport, I am calculating the associated carbon emission savings. We’re also working on figuring out strategies such as, ways to make bike share more accessible to low-income communities, provide access to urban biking and new-rider lessons to ensure success of the program. And oh, at times, we also collectively treat ourselves to a batch of iced coffees to get those credits on Ritual 😉

Overall, it’s a lot of fun because I am getting a chance to really work on my analysis and excel skills, ask the right questions given a certain research area, and utilize data sets appropriately to help me answer those questions. I am also learning how to network with people and put myself out there in an office environment.

As far as living in a new city goes, living in a city even if it is just 15 miles away from where you’ve spent (and slogged) the last two years is a whole new adventure. While I wouldn’t necessarily call Philadelphia a “new” city for me given its proximity to Bryn Mawr, visiting the city during the cold winter months in the middle of the semester for some dim-sums, as compared to living here during the summer and spending Sunday afternoons in Rittenhouse Square, are completely different experiences. While living in Philadelphia on my own has been a slight challenge, it’s been nothing short of great. The feeling was a lot more unsettling, unfamiliar and scary at first, but as soon as I learned to get comfortable in my own presence, manage money well, started cooking as a way to de-stress and bond with my roommates, summer in the city has started to look wonderful.

Zhuoran Hu ’21: Tsinghua Urban Planning Institute

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Name: Zhuoran Hu
Class Year: 2021
Major: Mathematics, Growth and Structure of Cities
Hometown: Beijing

Internship Organization: Tsinghua Urban Planning Institute (THTF Co.)
Job Title: Intern
Location: Beijing

What’s happening at your internship?

My internship is related to smart cities, transportation, and big data. The team that I joined is currently working on an artificial intelligent system named Insight (or called Hui Yan Da in Chinese). This product is mainly used to improve or further solve some existing problems in China’s highway network system, such as lack of hardware equipment as well as intelligence. Currently, a large number of monitoring video images can only be observed and identified by human eyes, so some emergencies cannot be timely detected, which leads to under-reporting. At the same time, some traffic information is not interconnected and shared.

A large number of real-time traffic data collected by the system are sealed and idle. The current situation makes it difficult for the government and the police to manage traffic networks effectively. It is hard to make predictions as well as to identify and deal with emergent traffic accidents at first. The team is able to use machine learning techniques to form some models that can automatically analyze traffic problems. The goal of the product is to improve intelligent traffic management and service capabilities. Most of our clients are local government and some police offices or security departments. People in our group have pretty diverse backgrounds and have different responsibilities. There are people in charge of collecting, selecting, and categorizing different types of data (mostly images of roads or highways). There are also people who build models and test those models. My work is more similar to the first type because of my lack of knowledge in computer science, especially in algorithms. My other work includes preparing materials for conferences, taking notes, and organizing some team-building events. I also make phone calls, participate in group discussions, and brainstorm with other team members. We are trying to train and improve the model so that it can detect more kinds of traffic accidents even under a dark environment with a bad network connection.

Why did you apply for this internship?

I applied because I want to explore what kind of jobs that I can do with my background in both math and cities. I find organizations or occupations related to smart cities will be a good fit because it is interdisciplinary. I am interested in cities and how people circulate around the city. This internship touches many topics that I am interested in, including transportation and data.

What is something you have learned from your internship that you didn’t expect?

Before I came to this internship, I thought the concept of smart cities is more related to the field of urban planning or urban studies. But actually, the concept of smart cities is based more on computer science instead of urban studies. To succeed in this field, people not only need to have some knowledge about cities, but also need to become an expert in computer science as well as have a deep understanding of algorithms. I believe that if I am good at coding, I will be able to explore more in this internship.

Can you talk about the skills you are learning and why they are important to you?

I am learning the company’s own software that is used for data annotations. I am also learning the company’s own chat tool that people can use to send large documents and images to each other. I think this experience provides me inspirations and gives me a better understanding of software developments.

What has been the biggest challenge you have faced at your internship?

I think the biggest challenge is to wake up early. I need to wake up at 7 a.m. and leave my home at 7:30 a.m. in order to arrive at the company before 8:30 a.m. The fast pace of the company is also a challenge, because everyone needs to finish a lot of work in a limited time. I think my experience at Bryn Mawr prepared me for the work. I already learned how to work efficiently and multi-task.

Blossom Jeong ’20: IonFarms

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Name: Blossom Jeong
Class Year: 2020
Major: Mathematics and Comparative Literature
Hometown: Anyang, South Korea

Internship Organization: IonFarms
Job Title: Marketing & Sales Intern
Location: Incheon, South Korea

What’s happening at your internship?

I’m working as a marketing and sales intern at IonFarms, a trading company that exports a variety of eco-friendly and well-being products. The core products that the company develops are hydrogen water generators and water ionizers. My task really depends on the day, but my primary job involves researching and translating various materials for the company. For example, I looked for online journal articles on the health benefits of hydrogen water and alkaline water to be posted on the company’s website, and I also researched and studied the technology behind water ionizers to be used in promotion materials. Other than research, I helped translate user guides and administration manuals for the new products that the company will be launching soon. Because IonFarms is a trading company that reaches out internationally, I definitely use my language skills a lot.

Why did you apply for this internship?

I applied for this internship because I wanted to understand what the marketing field was like. I’m still debating whether I want to go to graduate school or start working right after graduation, so I wanted to use this summer to explore these possibilities. I’ve developed an interest in marketing after working as a student manager for a varsity team here at Bryn Mawr College, but I wanted to expand that experience further and actually work in a professional setting. I also thought participating in an internship would help me evaluate what skills I have and what skills I might want to develop further, since professional skills might be different from what I learn in school.

What is something you have learned from your internship that you didn’t expect?

From this internship, one thing I learned was that language used at work is much different from the language for everyday use. There was a lot of technical terms that I had never encountered, and I struggled especially when I tried to translate them and always needed to reference a dictionary. And every little detail mattered when I worked in the marketing department. I also realized that working in the marketing department meant that I had to first completely understand the product in question. Even simple jobs like translation and research required that I comprehended the system behind the product I was promoting. If I didn’t understand and appreciate the product, I wouldn’t be able to persuade the customers.

Was this internship what you expected it to be?

Yes and no. I’m really experiencing what it’s like to work at an actual company, and the experience both meets and differs from my expectations. I’m still familiarizing myself with the company’s system, working individually but always having access to others. I also had an opportunity to sit in one of the department meetings, and I was fascinated by the interaction between different employees and the different ideas on the table. It excited me to witness all the energy in the room, people passionately giving their opinions. It made me think about what kind of passion I have, and how I can connect it to my future career.

Shannon Fisher ’20: Energy Office, City of Philadelphia

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Name: Shannon Fisher
Class Year: 2020
Major: Mathematics
Hometown: Chadds Ford, Pa.

Internship Organization: Office of Sustainability: Energy Office
Job Title: Data Management Intern
Location: Philadelphia

What’s happening at your internship?

At my internship, my main task is reviewing and creating spreadsheets that detail the municipal commodity usage. Thus far, I have used my knowledge of Excel to process, report, and analyze the usage of commodities such as water, steam, electricity, and gas. This data is necessary for the different types of decisions that are either made internally at the energy department in partnership with other government department or at the City Council level.

Why did you apply for this internship?

I have always been interested in the sustainability aspect of power and how that works at a professional level. Considering my mathematical background, I figured this was the perfect internship for me because it combines the analytic skills that I have and applying them towards sustainability efforts.

Was there anything special about how you found this internship?

I found this internship through connections that I made through a Bryn Mawr course, particularly Math Modeling and Sustainability with Professor Victor Donnay. We had a Praxis project with the energy office to determine the solar potential for the rooftops of each city facility and from there I expanded my professional network to get this internship.

What has been your favorite part of this internship?

My favorite part of this internship has been creating and coding solutions to streamline processes so that I can focus on the more pressing projects rather than generic data scraping. I enjoy the creative thinking that goes into this type of problem solving and it always brings me closer to what I am passionate about.

What is something you have learned from your internship that you didn’t expect?

I have learned a lot about local government, such as processes and the chain of command that determine outcomes of projects and final decisions. To the public it seems that the city government is very slow, which can come across as laziness or indifference. This perception does not consider the multiple levels of meetings, contracts, and permissions that are necessary to complete most tasks.

Living in a new city? What has that experience been like for you?

This summer I am living in Center City Philadelphia, which is very new to me because I have always lived in very suburban/rural areas that are much less populated. I really like living in a city because I bike or walk everywhere I go, which means I get more physical activity and I greatly lessen my carbon footprint. There are many resources all in the same place, so the accessibility is much better than I am used to. I have a second job working at a rock climbing gym and I have met many people who live in Philly, which has been good for creating a social circle.

Can you talk about the skills you are learning and why they are important to you?

I think the most valuable skills I have learned has been practical application of the educational materials to a professional atmosphere. In math class, we tend to learn the theory and calculations of different principles, but it is much different in a professional world because nobody is using pure mathematics and they use more technology.

What has been the biggest challenge you have faced at your internship?

I think the biggest challenge I have faced so far at my internship has been understanding the nuances and inconsistencies of billing. For instance, not all start and end dates for a service of a certain commodity are the same, which confuses billing periods. These billing periods are important when considering fiscal and calendar year reports for different buildings. Therefore, one must work around these inconsistencies and try to consider the best options and sometimes there is no best option, and the data has to remain incomplete. In school, they often teach you that every problem has an answer, but when it comes to mass collaboration and thousands of accounts, there are sometimes errors that you can’t fix.

Can you give us three adjectives and three nouns that describe your internship experience?

Adjectives: analytic, precision, and flexibility
Noun: Problem solving, moving parts, and Excel

What is most rewarding about your internship?

Contributing to policy that will improve the environment and the climate for not just Philadelphia but for the world. By providing data to inform these innovative policies, other cities decide to also undertake similar initiatives.

Was this internship what you expected it to be?

I had a very good idea of how I would be spending my time in the Energy Office from the Praxis project as well as my independent study from spring semester 2019.