"Engineering is a field that benefits immensely from a diversity of people solving problems, and it’s important to introduce engineering as an opportunity early and often."
Katherine Westerlund
- Degree:
- Bachelor of Applied Science
- Grad year: 2020
- Program:
- Campus: Vancouver
Katherine Westerlund is a 2020 graduate with a BASc in Geological Engineering. She has interests in rock mechanics, numerical modelling and groundwater modelling. In her spare time, she enjoys running, hiking and everything coffee. After UBC, she will be working as a Tunnelling EIT at Mott Macdonald.
She served as an Engineering Undergraduate Society executive for three years as the VP Admin, VP Finance and stepping up to the role of Interim President during her last term at the university. Throughout her tenure at the EUS, she dramatically expanded their awards program by introducing awards for program club and design team involvement. The EUS was awarded Constituency of the Year during her presidency.
During her last year at UBC, she also served as one of two Engineering representatives on the UBC Alma Mater Society's Board of Governors. She was appointed chair of the AMS' Governance Committee and served as a councillor on several other committees. She was awarded Councillor of the Year in 2020.
She was also involved in the design team community itself. In her first year she joined the UBC Concrete Canoe team working on their concrete mix design sub-team. Later in her degree she joined SUBC, working as both their treasurer and Hull team lead.
Mott Macdonald Engineering Undergraduate Society
What has made your time at UBC memorable?
This is probably a cliché for engineering students, but my Capstone project was one of the most memorable things I did at UBC. Our group of 4 people managed to take on a project of relatively large scope, successfully navigate our way through endless decisions and revisions and not murder each other in the process.
Our project was the pre-feasibility assessment of a water conveyance tunnel in Norway. Our project scope was relatively large, with many more engineering design elements than any of us initially considered when selecting the project. I had limited experience working on a project of this magnitude before Capstone, so it taught me a lot about all the different considerations that go into a large-scale engineering project. It also taught me a lot about what to do when you don't know something.
It also taught me a lot about what to do when you don't know something.
There were many instances throughout the project when we would reach an impasse and not know how to proceed. Fortunately, our sponsors were very thoughtful in showing us the process of how to solve problems like these (even though it was more complicated than just giving us the right answer).
Tell us about your experience in your program. What have you learned that is most valuable?
Geological Engineering follows a more inductive reasoning path than other engineering degrees, in which you abstract small specific details about a site into more general trends that assist you in your decision making. Having a good idea about what your final model needs to look like and contain in order to assist your decision making is critical. This means my degree has given me a much better grasp on the effects of uncertainty on a project and identifying unknown and important variables.
In many projects, it costs a lot of money or is extremely difficult to acquire more information about a project site (imagine how expensive it is to drill boreholes to collect samples from directly underneath Broadway, or from a mountain several hundred kilometers from any road), so you need to prioritize the information you’re collecting to best assist decision making.
It becomes your job as the engineer to piece together all the different small hints you’ve collected to get a view of the larger site characteristics so you can make major calls about the future of whatever project you’re working on.
Sometimes you don’t have information about something, but if it isn’t going to change your conclusions then it’s just adding complexity without substance. My degree has taught me to discern what is and isn’t useful information for decision making.
What advice would you give a student entering your degree program?
There will be a lot of pressure, often self-imposed, for you to be absolutely perfect in everything you do here. You will think that you are a failure when you extend your degree beyond four years, and you need to know that is absolutely not true. UBC is full of wonderful opportunities for involvement and development, and you will become a different, stronger and better engineer for getting involved.
Engineering is about so much more than just getting through the courses, and once you stop beating yourself up to try and do everything at you’ll be happier, healthier, think clearer and learn so much more both within and outside your classes.
There is value in activities outside of a traditional geological engineering degree, like designing a human powered submarine or a floating canoe made out of concrete or eventually being in charge of the entire Engineering Undergraduate Society, and you’ll be a much better engineer and person for getting involved with them.
Where do you find your inspiration?
I found my inspiration from my fellow classmates at UBC.
One of the great things about our school is there are seemingly infinite ways to spend your time on non-class activities.
There are so many people balancing inspirational feats with their course load. All the folks on design teams building autonomous sailboats, actual cars, rocket engines or canoes made out of concrete for some ungodly reason. All the folks building communities through other on-campus groups like Women in Engineering, .caISES, Engineers without Borders, Gears and Queers and many others. Folks involved with their program clubs, or even the EUS, whose passion comes out in the strangest ways during E-Week. All the folks involved with initiatives outside of engineering. All the folks balancing an engineering course load with a part- or full-time job. There are so many people on this campus working so hard, and it was incredibly inspirational to keep myself working as hard as I could to do my absolute best for all of them.
Women in Engineering Engineers without Borders
What are your future plans to make a difference in our world?
Short term, I’m still advocating to Camp 5 and the Corporation of the Seven Wardens to ensure an inclusive and celebratory Iron Ring ceremony for all future UBC Engineering graduates. It’s something I was working on during my final year at UBC, and something that I intend to see through my own Iron Ring ceremony and beyond.
When the pandemic is over, I’d like to work with the Girl Guides of Canada to develop new programming for STEM education. I was a girl guide for 11 years, and I’d love to give back to the community that taught me so much. Engineering is a field that benefits immensely from a diversity of people solving problems, and it’s important to introduce engineering as an opportunity early and often.
