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Jamieleigh Wilkins


My name is Jamie Wilkins and I am Mechanical Engineering major here at UCF. I am currently a sophomore and have taken on a Finance Minor during the course of this year. I am from Tampa, Florida and graduated from East Bay High School in Gibsonton, Florida. I decided to go for the STEM Ambassador Program because I like engineering and wouldn’t trade it for the world. I want people to know that if you love your major you’re on the right track. Just because people say it’s hard or has no job market doesn’t mean you shouldn’t major in it. I want people to see that and go for major/ jobs they want. I do have trouble in my classes so when I get stressed out I like to sit down and great cartoons like Looney Toons or Tom and Jerry. I also like exploring new places because I am naturally curious person. Because of my major I have to take a lot of math so during my late high school/early college years I began to like Calculus because it explores a whole other detail of how things can be figured out versus algebra. Calculus is like the space of math and it’s hard to understand but pretty to look at. Dr. Ali Gordon is my favorite professor at UCF. I worked under his supervision in the Mechanics and Materials Lab, during my freshman year of college because I was in the LEARN program, which allowed me to participate in undergraduate research. Dr. Gordon helped me see how cool engineering is; he really helped me understand where I want my research career to land and what I want to study. I can’t wait to take his classes on Fatigue, which happens to be my favorite test variable when it comes to metal alloys. My advice to all STEM majors is that you can fail a subject and accept it or you can fail a subject to understand it. These subjects matter in our majors and the only way were going to understand it is if we fail a few times to get the right answer.