#201 Building Post High School Resilience and Career Confidence: Ethan Zellner’s Journey Transcript

THIS IS AN AUTOMATED TRANSCRIPT… PLEASE FORGIVE THE TYPOS & GRAMMAR! xo-Lisa.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 1:36
Ethan Zellner, it’s been, it’s been a while, and yeah, yeah. How exciting to do this. I love catching up with students, and I just wanted to say, welcome to the podcast. This is a special episode to hear about a student journey, and you were in launch Career Clarity. What four years ago? Wow. So you’re right now a sophomore at Bradley University in civil engineering, correct? Yes, yeah. Are you having a good year?

Ethan Zellner 2:08
It’s a it’s a busy year. It’s a lot. You know, being an engineering student is a lot at Bradley University, just engineering in general, especially when you’re in clubs, managing internships, managing a social life which is important at college. Yes, you know, taking 20 credit hours along with, you know, all these other things you have to find balance in college is a good time to do it.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 2:32
I like the idea that you’re saying like you’re not just sitting in the library all the time. You are still finding ways to have that social life. But we hear all the time engineering is grueling, it’s tough, and it sounds like it is tough, but you are still trying to maintain that balance.

Ethan Zellner 2:50
Yeah, I think having the social life is what gets you through being a engineer. Because all of our, I mean, all of our classes are ridiculously hard, you know, like fluid dynamics, stuff that I’ve never seen before that’s conceptually hard, you know, just going with your friends and playing flag football at 9pm at night. It’s just something I can like, Okay, I have this quiz, and then I can go play fly football. Like, that’s just something how my brain works to say, well, I guess I’m looking forward

Lisa Marker-Robbins 3:17
to I have a question. You said you’re taking 20 hours. So this is your third semester in college. Yeah, taking 20 hours. Do you have to take 20 hours to kind of to keep up, or would you be able to take a lighter load? What did you do freshman year? So

Ethan Zellner 3:33
I take freshman year, I took 17, and then I took 16. However, I had some difficulties with calculus at my school, though, it set me back a little bit, and so I’ve been taking online I took online classes over the summer help catch up. I’ve just kept taking online calculus to kind of not even get back to where I was, but get ahead. Yeah, because I was told I can even graduate a semester early if I wanted to, which is up for debate, because I want to enjoy my four years of college.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 4:04
Oh my gosh. My daughter, Sydney, she graduated in April of 24 and she could have graduated a semester early, and she was like, I want to stay like, this, is it the real world’s coming. And she’s in the real world now. And sometimes she’s like, I’m so tired, or adulting is hard. So if you if your family can afford to, and we’re, you know, those that can are very fortunate to be able to do so, I say, go ahead and stay in and make the most of it. So and I love your honesty about, like we always hear, math is really hard, which actually, let’s go back to the reason we’re sitting here today. You and I have kept in touch on LinkedIn since you started launch. Our launch Career Clarity course four years ago, and you didn’t have a profile back then, and that’s part of what we do in the classes, is get on there. And one of the things that delights me about you, Ethan, is you have continued. I. Have watched you, over four years, continue to build your network. I checked today you have 389 connections you had 04 years ago. So you’re building a network. I watch you have experiences and share about them and build your network and so and you’re active because you saw a post I did. I went to a conference last month, and I said, you know, I really want to talk more about the role of math in students getting clear on like, Career Clarity, right? Because what I see is a group of students who are good at math in high school, and sometimes they overestimate their mouth prowess, and they pursue tough degrees like computer science and engineering, STEM fields, mathematics, and I hear from professors like they get here and they can’t keep up. And we know that math and computer science and engineering are the most switched out of majors, and it’s really because of cognitive load more than anything else, right? So when I posted about I want to talk more about this, you piped up and said, Why did I have had an interesting math experience in college? So let’s talk about what that is because you’re like people need to hear this because it’s created a complexity that you’ve had to navigate, right? Yes.

Ethan Zellner 6:19
So to talk about my college experience first, I have taken calculus one three times, so I failed it the first two times. Our professors at Bradley University are very unique. Being a small school, we cut our math funding a couple years ago, so we’re kind of seeing the resultant of professors not being able to research as much. So we not necessarily get lower tier professors who these professors are still very good people, but my high school had amazing teachers. Mason High School in Cincinnati, Ohio has, yeah, there’s amazing math teachers, yeah, who had amazing math teachers every year who like, cared about you in a way that college professors and so my first semester, I took calc one Bradley with 17 other credit hours, and I was in for very rude awakening. I remember my first quiz, my first exam, I got single digit percentage. It was something like, were you so shocked? Percent I was I was like, I thought I understand this. And everyone else in the class of the same experience too. These in high school, we never had to study for math. It always was just something that came naturally to us. We always understood one plus one is equal to two. And then we get to college, and we’re learning these things, and they move so fast. And then you get to the exam, you’re like, I got this. I don’t even need to study. And you look at the exam, and then your exams just in Russian, and you have no idea what’s happening.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 7:44
You know, it’s interesting. My post originally came out of I went to this session at the National Association for college admissions counseling national conference in Columbus back in September, and there was a session about the role that calculus plays in admissions. And I said, I think the bigger topic, I mean, that’s a very important topic, but I am like, I think a bigger topic is like, how is this relating to major completion, major and career choice, right? And so you fall into that camp of like, I’ve got this, like, a little overconfident, I guess, right. Yeah, that I was Yeah. So what have you done? I love your honesty about like, hey, the struggle is real, but you didn’t change your career plans because you hit a bump in the road. So what have you done to navigate that? Well,

Ethan Zellner 8:33
first of all, I want to say that taking calculum three times just means I’m three times better at calculum than everyone else I love too. So there’s that. What I’ve done is just, I haven’t given up. I knew there’d be challenges with engineering. It’s our degree. Just conceptually, go with you know, there, there are people in this world who will tell you you can’t do it, you’re not smart enough. And for me, that just means, well, I have to try harder. Then, yeah, it’s my favorite thing in the world, is to prove people wrong.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 9:00
Actually, I know this about you, yeah. So I

Ethan Zellner 9:04
just kept going. I just kept grinding. You know, I put in hours, I studied. And then over the summer, decided, all right, as as well with taking an internship, let’s see if I can take calc one again. Get it over with, get it done. And so I took it along with another summer class, while managing a full work like work schedule. And I passed it, and now we’re in Calc Two. We’re in I just passed Calc Two yesterday.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 9:28
Oh, yeah, okay, everybody, yes, yeah, you will not taking Calc Two. You won’t be three times better at Calc Two than everybody. Oh,

Ethan Zellner 9:37
I know. I mean, I can take it again if I want, but I don’t really want to. I don’t do that. No. So I’ve been taking calculus online, okay, through a university in New Hampshire that offers eight week courses. Okay, so I have been spending 15 hours a week doing calculus because, you know, the classes are sped up, yeah, but the. Assignments make this to me now, just in a way that they format it, compared to a Bradley format, that the way that they come across and they form problems, and the resources they give and they say, here’s a problem, but then right here, if you’re stuck, here’s a video link that goes through the entire problem with different numbers. Yeah. Okay, so that’s, I mean, I have a nine. I finished with a 94 in Calc Two, which is arguably the hardest calc class in college. So just that turn around set, you know, proves to me. Well, I, you know, I can do this. Yeah, my, my three times of calc one means nothing anymore. And you know what

Lisa Marker-Robbins 10:39
I love about this? I know you’re going to be a fantastic engineer because of how you’ve problem solved this problem, right? You weren’t. You didn’t feel that your needs, and I’m sure there’s other students at Bradley who their math needs are being met at the school, but the way you learn was not being met by your university. So you went out and you found a different way to tackle a problem. You know this idea of math and engineering back on episode 27 I just looked it up, if anybody saw me like typing back on episode 27 of the podcast in July of 2022 I had a Dean from University of Toledo on to talk about the differences between engineering and engineering technology majors and careers, right? So there is a difference. We’re not going to get into it today. We don’t have time, but people can go back and listen to episode 27 I’ll put it in the the link to it in the show notes, or you just go to flourish coaching, CO, com, forward, slash 027, and that will get you to where you need to be. But they actually have deconstructed calc one, and they sprinkle it in throughout their curriculum so that students aren’t having happened to them, What happened to you? And they’re not the only university doing it. But I think this is a good lesson when you’re looking particularly in these really tough STEM fields that you press into. How is math being taught like? Is it the traditional way is? Do they to have a different spin on it? Do I need to look like it for a different program? But I love that you solve this problem for yourself. And congrats on passing Calc Two.

Ethan Zellner 12:25
Thank you. I start calc three in a week. Oh

Lisa Marker-Robbins 12:27
my gosh. So are you also going to do calc three at the other university?

Ethan Zellner 12:31
Okay, great. I’m taking all my math classes there.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 12:36
Okay, so you will be finished with that by the end of this semester, calc three. Yes,

Ethan Zellner 12:43
I will have one more class I need to take for math, but I will be done with her next semester with all the math need.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 12:50
So is that the highlight of your semester so far, or do you have a different highlight to share? My

Ethan Zellner 12:55
highlight of the semester is I’ve already landed an internship for summer of 2026

Lisa Marker-Robbins 13:02
Okay, so first of all, well, tell us where it

Ethan Zellner 13:05
is. It is at a company called Mauer Stutz in Peoria, Illinois. Okay, they are, they are Illinois based, and they are a civil engineering firm that they do a lot of different things. However, I will be mostly focusing on the transportation aspect and helping them design things.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 13:21
I love it. I mean, so that makes me go all the way back to when you were in high school and you came into our launch Career Clarity course, and you’re like, got to figure out what I want to do before I choose a college, which I always say for the college bound reverse engineer, start a career, go back to major, and then go to to the college piece. I remember even your college search you were looking in applying to different places. So let’s talk about that process. Because I remember back then, and I can’t remember if you did this or not. I had suggested as one of your real world experiences that we teach about module four, that maybe you reached out to somebody in the Department of Transportation. Did you do that? I can’t remember. Like, how did you figure out that civil engineering was indeed what you wanted to do?

Ethan Zellner 14:07
It wasn’t exactly that. But ironically, at the same time, my high school was offering a job shadow at a civil engineering firm, and so I went to the job shadow, and then also through the course, I got put in contact with a couple of other engineering people who I was able to just talk to and even through school, my biology teacher, who was a recent college graduate, new civil engineers, and said, Hey, I have two friends who work at one, works at ODOT. One, works at a private firm. If you want to see differences, I can set up meetings with you, with them. So I’ve talked to them, and, you know, I took that career test, and it all led me back to here, and I think I always knew what I wanted to do. It’s just I wasn’t confident enough to say, Oh, I have to go through this hard major. You. Know I don’t. I don’t want to second guess myself. I mean, I haven’t looked back enjoying everything that I’ve done so far.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 15:09
I remember like you, let me just I want to brag on you again for a minute, because you showed up for all of our group coaching calls, our online coaching calls, where we have the group come in and you’re and I always say the college bound journey is a family journey. Your mom would come on and she would also ask questions, like, you take advantage of all of the opportunities to connect with other people and and I do remember when the light bulb went off, you’re like, I got my confirmation. So really what you did? Because here’s what I see a lot of schools doing, a school might through a free platform, they already have give some sort of personality assessment that’s already for free, and a different tool that the school has. What’s missing is this link of validation, and that’s what you came in to do, right? Like, does the Berkman, which is a really great personality test, does it give a job list that says I should be an engineer? Yeah, you’re like, oh, okay, more confirmation. Now, let me go get real world validation through. You did a job shadow, you did multiple informational interviews. You put yourself out there on LinkedIn. You had a prize for continually putting yourself out there a lot, which I love that. So congratulations on that. Thank you. So then you got so I remember you were clear by the time, I think six or seven, eight months into our course, you’re like, Yep, I’ve got my confirmation. This is what I’m going for. And then you had time to do your college visits and stuff, right?

Ethan Zellner 16:39
Yeah. So ironically, my first college visit was a little bit early. It was during the course, but it was rose Holman, which had, you know, every, every engineering under the sun. So it really didn’t matter what engineering I chose, just because you all get the same feel of, well, here are glad for this, this and this, but I pretty much had my mind set by the time I took the AC T and, you know, all sent my scores to all the schools. All sent them for civil engineering, yeah, and I had that was a huge stress relief of now, know what I want to do now? Where do I want to do it? Because that’s arguably just as important as your major.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 17:19
I would agree, you know. And I people who start with where do I want to do it, and then what do I want to do? They could end up on a campus where they don’t, they’re not reputable for that major, or they don’t even have that major, which can be a problem. But when I hear you say, like, it’s just as important not only to know what I want to do, but also to to find that home away from home, which is where I want to do it, right? But that goes back to the fact that you’re like, I’m striking a balance here. I might be taking 20 hours. I might have to take calc one three times, but I’m still going to go do intramural football or whatever with my friends. And that’s where the the importance of where am I going to do it is right, right?

Ethan Zellner 17:59
And my actually, I got in contact with my high school pre calculus teacher because he had my sister and his course, and him and I were he was very helpful towards my college search. He even gave me an early intro to calc one when I was in pre Calc, and he said, Ethan, what do you call a doctor who failed the MCAT seven times a doctor? Because you’ll never know the difference. That’s right. So it ultimately doesn’t matter in the long run, as long as you do it, yeah, in my opinion.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 18:27
Well, okay, so I know that you came back to Cincinnati for the summer after freshman year, and you had an internship, which you’ve already said, I want to I’ve got two questions. First of all, I want to celebrate the fact that everybody hear me. Ethan failed calc one and still landed an internship. And internships after freshman year are rare to find, but you had a legit go connect with them on LinkedIn. You had a legit internship. It was at a civil engineering firm, right? It was okay and downtown, overlooking the Bengal stadium, yep, and don’t throw in either of us any shade about our Bengals, right? So, how did you land that internship? Like, how many internships as a freshman did you do? You remember how many you applied to? Or how do Okay,

Ethan Zellner 19:19
so ironically, I spoke to the introduction to civil engineering course this semester about my experience, of my like, my internship experience, of how I went through it, because I had a very difficult internship experience, of finding one. The running joke is, you want someone who who’s 20 but has 25 years of experience, so it’s it’s it’s harder to get internships when you have no experience. And a lot of companies that I applied to over here because I went to the job fair, you know, I marketed myself. A lot of them a problem with me not being a resident here

Speaker 1 19:53
Illinois, yes, so because I’d

Ethan Zellner 19:57
have to provide for housing, which means they might have to pay me more. More they might have to provide housing. It’s an extra step for them. Okay? So I applied to 25 companies total over the course of five months. I was a candidate for the final four of one company, but they decided to go someone who was older than me and lived here. No shade to them.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 20:16
Yeah, that makes sense, right? That’s a business. I always say we have to meet our business decisions. One more business honor.

Ethan Zellner 20:22
And then I I applied to 24 and then over New Year, I was in Gatlinburg with my closest friends, and I was like, All right, I haven’t gotten anything. I’m reply to one last one, and just, you know, see what happens. If not, I can go work back at Kings Island, and I’ll figure it out from there, but I will. I’m gonna apply to one last one and just pray. And I got an interview a couple of weeks later, and I got in, I got a job offer at the end of that interview, and I took it right away.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 20:49
I love it. So I think, you know, I always say high school internships are out there when you know how to find them. They’re also hard to get, but it’s really hard to get these freshman internships. But one of the key differences is, like, it’s you. I mean, we’re gonna play this, I think, in November, December, but we’re, we are mid October. So mid October you had landed your post sophomore college year internship. And it’s an earlier timeline. You literally, you go back to school and you start applying internships right away. When you’re in college, if you want to get them, if you’re in high school, that internship application season really is like January to March. And so I love that you just kept going. So this year, how many did you apply to? I applied to 14.

Ethan Zellner 21:37
Okay, however, I spoke to all of them at the job fair, and I didn’t necessarily apply to all them. Some of them reached out to me, which is something that’s extremely different. Just the, you know, the freshman, the sophomore leap is something that is crazy, and I didn’t expect, because when you’re a freshman, you’re trying to, you know, you’re trying to sell yourself. You’re trying to say you should come, come hire me. Even though I’m younger, I’m more developed. I can be developed. I have a bunch of energy. I can do all these things that these people can’t. And then this year, it was more these companies are trying to sell themselves to me. Now I so now I have the choice of going wherever I want to go, because last year I took, I took the first opportunity that came across my door right this year, I got to choose, where did I want to go? How much do I want to get paid? Even less, not important, because it’s more about the experience. Yeah, I had an experience of just a practice of pitted companies against each other and said, this one’s offering me 25 can you match it? And

Lisa Marker-Robbins 22:37
they did. So okay, so you’re making $25 an intern, engineering intern, summer after sophomore year. That’s fantastic. That’s great.

Ethan Zellner 22:48
Yes. And with the experiences, I got an offer two days after the job fair. The our job fair was mid September, and an offer two days after that, from a company up in Chicago, okay, or I guess Lombard Illinois, since Illinoisans are very they don’t like when you call the suburbs Chicago,

Lisa Marker-Robbins 23:07
but, oh, okay, did not know. Yes, you learned this. Yes,

Ethan Zellner 23:11
I’ve gotten, I’ve gotten yelled at a couple of times for that. So I got an offer up there, and they’re an amazing company with amazing people. But then I just, you know, I kept interviewing because not only was it, I wanted more opportunities, I think it’s good practice to just keep talking.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 23:25
Okay, that’s a great piece of advice. Like, I hope everybody hears that like, you didn’t just keep interviewing because you were looking for a different job. You’re like, this is great practice for the real thing, right? That’s another real world experience, like you’re going to be better for that. I have a question this year with this difference of like they were courting me or pursuing me, right, almost like trying to date me. And so what do you think? Can you point to anything in particular on your resume that you think made you desirable in the eyes of these engineering firms.

Ethan Zellner 24:04
It’s ironic you say that, because actually, on Tuesday, at an interview with a company, even after I accepted a job offer, and they knew it, they said they still wanted an interview. It was a small company named wh, k, s, and the president of that company said, I loved your resume. I want to talk to you about future opportunities, not even after, not for this summer, but for the summer after that, or even post grad. Amazing. I’ve spent hours on my resume. It looks pretty. There’s a lot of information on there that’s useful. It’s worded nicely. I’ve used it, you know, for so many things, and it changes every year, because, you know, as you get more experiences, the you know, the Kings islands of the world totally falls out

Lisa Marker-Robbins 24:49
eventually, I think maybe even Kings Island won’t be on your resume after this year,

Ethan Zellner 24:53
correct? But I have two resumes, which is something you don’t want to do. However, I was told. In my case, it is perfect, because I had my general resume with just every experience, all my qualifications, all of the fun things like that. And then my second page, WSP actually gave me a template of engineering, of an engineering sheet, or an engineering resume, as they called it. So on my engineering resume, it was all the types of projects I worked on, what my contribution was, the total number of projects, what states I worked on then in. So it was almost like you got to see two different sides. You got to see all right, here’s this guy as a whole now, here’s him making this company money.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 25:39
Well, it’s almost like people who are going into the performing arts, right? You’ve got the general and then it’s like, here’s the roles that I’ve played, or song or, you know, I know nothing about musical theater, so don’t send me emails correcting me. It’s okay, but it’s like, what are here? Are my performances, right? Or here’s what I’ve directed, so that that is so generous of them to give you that. So let’s talk about this projects that you’ve worked on so you’ve had one of the things I really admire about how you’ve been handling all this since you were in the course four years ago and got clear is you’ve never stopped gathering those real world experiences and continuing to validate, right? I’ve seen other kids like they got validation quick, but they didn’t keep validating. I always say career development. I did career advising with you for, you know, eight months or whatever, right? But then career development is lifelong. Career advising, career coaching, happens at a point in time, career development is lifelong. I’m 56 I’m still developing in my career, right? So you’re tenacious with going after these other experiences in addition to these real work experiences. So even your Kings Island stuff, you know you loved working there. You worked long, grueling hours, you would get promoted. I remember us talking about it that’s an amusement park for our listeners outside of the Cincinnati area, and you loved it, so that taught you a lot of good work skills. Now you’ve had an internship. What other real world experiences are you doing? Anything on on campus, anything else in addition to the the actual jobs,

Ethan Zellner 27:23
yeah, first I’m actually gonna go back to high school, because my experience has started out in high school. They did Mason offers these CAD courses, computer aided design and computer aided manufacturing courses taught by Mr. Elias and Mr. Wiseman, two favorite teachers of all time. So they taught me essentially what engineering is now. Mason started a Project Lead the Way, which is an engineering get more focused setting after I left, unfortunately, so I didn’t get to experience that, but I took courses of like, how design houses in architectural like, you know, what’s the standard wall size. I got to design a actual bridge that our cross country team used. Yeah, so I did a lot of hands on projects where I designed them and built them for the school. And granted the school also didn’t pay for them, but I went out there and built it myself, because I remember still vividly to this day, three years later, you know, standing over the river on building a bridge by myself, looking at my plan sheet, saying, Well, I thought this was going to be here, and it’s not. Where did I mess up? So I had that, you know, early experience of just engineering as a whole. Yeah, now at Bradley, I’ve gotten into American Society of Civil Engineering, which is our, which is a civil engineering group around the nation,

Lisa Marker-Robbins 28:44
professional organization, yes, yes. And we taught in the course, we teach you how to find out which the ones are for the industry. They’re a great way to learn about jobs, by the way. Like, if you think you might be an engineer, go look up what Ethan just told you they’ve got. Do you have a student membership? Do they have a student level membership?

Ethan Zellner 29:03
Yes, yes. So we have a student chapter at Bradley, and through that, we get a student membership, which is free to the to the whole organization. And last year, I was involved as a concrete canoe team member. So we made a canoe out of concrete and we raced it against, think it was 14 other schools in Wisconsin last year where we were judged on the appearance, on the sustainability of our canoe. We had to write a technical paper on it, and we had to present, you know what, what decisions we made last year. Our theme was a banana and our banana split. So we’re not doing any of those themes. Again, that is hilarious. It’s a true story. And this year, I was lucky enough to be one of two captains for the canoe team. So I am currently in the process of designing our canoe where we’re actually, you know, taking concrete cylinders, brushing them and, you know, seeing the strength. And literally, we’re messing with real world. Materials to see, what does this change if we add this microfiber mesh, which is, you know, just a little, tiny mesh to add reinforcement, yeah, what? What’s it do? So we’re actually doing, you know, real science where we’re getting this no one in their right mind should make a canoe out of concrete, no, but, but we’re getting this experience that is unparalleled. And ASCE as a whole is so much like your course, where we especially, what I’ve been trying to do is helping freshmen practice for interviews. I held an entire session where I said, Go meet your resume. I’ll help critique it, and I will talk to you one on one. And okay, here are my skills. How should I, you know, promote myself to a company? Okay,

Lisa Marker-Robbins 30:44
so you’re a member of a professional organization. You are in a quote. I’m still going to call them extracurriculars. I don’t know that we really call them that in college, but it’s you’ve got a high value extracurricular that relates to the career that you want. You’re mentoring younger students. I mean, if that’s not on your resume, mentoring other students, you should put it on your resume. Is it on your resume? I think it is. Okay, good. I believe so. If it’s not, get it on there, because that that’s just those soft skills that employers also want, right? I love,

Ethan Zellner 31:21
especially as an engineering, you know, student, yeah, you see a lot of people who don’t have good vocal skills, or don’t have good social skills, which is, it’s, you know, part of the trade. It is what it is. But what helps me stand out is my mother talks so unbelievably much that I’ve just picked up on, you know, how to talk. Well, I Okay.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 31:42
She’s great. I love your mom, and she probably drove you a little crazy at times. But Jody, we love you and but she it goes back to like this was a family journey for you guys, and she would in our group Q and A cause us ask as many questions or more than when she was going through them with your with you, and then with your sister, I love your mom, but you’re right. That is a byproduct of coming out of your home is you learn how to talk and listen.

Ethan Zellner 32:11
And in my opinion, that’s the you know, just being able to talk and communicate and say, I need help is the first step of being a good engineer, because you can be an engineer with no talking skills, but you’re going to be at the same level your entire career, because you’re not going to move up, right? And companies want companies want people who can communicate with each other, because, you know, projects have issues that happens with every project you know. Sometimes a client decides to change something last minute. Sometimes an architect says, Let’s not do this. You know, things happen, and you have to be able to clearly communicate,

Lisa Marker-Robbins 32:47
collaborate, problem solve, not get angry. Yes, and

Ethan Zellner 32:53
that is something. How I got my internship last year as a freshman was I know I don’t have experience, but I can talk. I’m good with my words. I mean, yeah, I’m not the best at it, but I’m good for an engineer, Ethan,

Lisa Marker-Robbins 33:05
I think, I think you’re fantastic at it. Thank you, and I know you stand out from your peers. Do you have like so obviously, we were doing this together four years ago. We’re continuing to help 15 to 25 year olds find their path. For any, I don’t know, college student, any high school family with a high school or high school student, we got lots of parents that listen, lots of people who work with teens listen to the podcast based on your experiences, which they have been amazing and varied, which is fantastic. What would your parting words of advice be to families? Take this

Ethan Zellner 33:44
course, take Miss Lisa’s course, because it set me on the right track. But I mean, the biggest piece of advice besides taking the course is the student has to want it. In my experience, you know, you have people who will give up after that first calc one people who will give up after that first rejection letter from a company and that first rejection letter from a college, you just have to keep pushing and saying, I want it. I’m going to get it.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 34:09
Yeah, because really, most college students would have landed their internship just like you did here in October already. And I remember we were trying to find a time for you and I to record this. You were like, I just, I have to be responsive to these internship interviews, so I might, Lisa, need to to switch it up. I’m like, totally fine. Ethan, that’s the first priority. But like last year, when you were a freshman, you go into the winter break without one and you didn’t stop you failed calc one. You don’t go like, Why can’t be an engineer? You keep going. And I absolutely love it. Well, you’re inspirational, for sure. Ethan, that’s why I wanted to have you on. We’ve learned about engineering, we’ve learned about choosing colleges. We’ve learned about resumes, how to land in. Internships, extracurriculars that are available, how to problem solve, how to have great soft skills that employers want. This episode ended up being so much more than I imagined it was going to be. Or I think what you even thought of when you said, Hey, Lisa, I could talk about math and how I’ve had to problem solve, like what’s going on at Bradley and my own challenges with math. So. Ethan Zellner, thank you.

Ethan Zellner 35:27
Thank you. I appreciate you having me on and just talking about my experience, you know, helps other people not go through the same boat that I am, because ideally you don’t want to be three times better at calculus. No, but I’ve been also sharing my, you know, experiences with younger civil engineering students here at Bradley. So maybe there’s a civil engineering student that listens to this and says, Well, this guy, I know this guy on a podcast, said to do this.

Lisa Marker-Robbins 35:51
Yeah, I love it. Well, I I’m gonna, if it’s okay, can we put your LinkedIn connection, your LinkedIn profile, in the show notes, yeah, of course. So that would be the best way for people to keep in touch with you, and this has been fantastic. So you guys should know, I say to my students all the time, as soon as you build your LinkedIn profile, or even if you’re not in our course yet, build your LinkedIn profile. Parent students connect with me on LinkedIn. Sometimes people connect with me and I give them like a quick little feedback on something they should tweak. And that’s how I love to keep in touch. So I will continue rooting for you. Ethan I know the future is bright.

Ethan Zellner 36:32
Thank you so much. I appreciate your time.