Hello Friends, my name is Al-Muthanna Al-Ani.  I am a first-year graduate student pursing a Master’s in Mechanical Systems.  I graduated with my bachelors from UCF in Mechanical Engineering.  Why do more school instead of going off into the real world? Well, I’m one of those people who loves school and learning so I decided to do 3 more years of it.

Over the 5 years I’ve spent in UCF I made a lot of long-lasting connections with students and faculty, took classes in subjects I didn’t know existed, had whacky adventures, made tons of new friends, and learned things about myself I wouldn’t know otherwise.  Now I am conducting research on exosuits, taking classes where infinity is a regularly used word, and watching movies outside on the side of my van with my friends.  One constant in all of this was bringing engineering to schools and giving them the confidence to learn.

I have been with STEM ambassadors for 4 years.  I showed tons of kids the huge world of engineering, math and science from planes to beams to robots.  A driving motivation of why I am continuing my degree is to become that expert who can walk into a room and answer any (or at least most) questions.  Recently I was in a classroom and a student asked, “can I make a lightsaber”, at the time I couldn’t say much so I answered “maybe in the future we can”.  Soon I want to learn enough to go back to that classroom and say “we probably can’t, but if we could, this is how it would look”.  I am excited to return as an ambassador for the 2022-23 year and hope to meet you all soon.