đź“– Quick UWaterloo Dictionary for Non-Waterloo Peeps (Click to expand)
- 1A / 1B: UWaterloo’s way of counting semesters. “1A” means Year 1, Semester 1. “1B” means Year 1, Semester 2.
- Don: Basically a Resident Advisor (RA) in the dorms.
- WEN North: Wellesley Court North, one of the residence buildings on campus.
- WaterlooWorks: The school’s official job portal for co-op students. Infamous for crashing right before the application deadline.
- Continuous Cycle: The survival phase of WaterlooWorks. If you don’t get a job in the first main round, you enter this chaotic everyday-apply-and-interview phase.
- PD (Professional Development): Mandatory online courses you have to take while working your full-time co-op job.
1A term
Course Load
I took the following courses in my first term at UWaterloo:
| Course Code | Course Name | What it actually is |
|---|---|---|
| ARTS 190 | First-Year Topics in Arts Disciplines | A mandatory arts elective. Lots of reading and writing essays. |
| ECE 105 | Classical Mechanics | High school physics on steroids. Dropping objects, calculating tension, and pure stress. |
| ECE 150 | Fundamentals of Programming | Intro to C++. Learning how to code from scratch (or reviewing if you already know it). |
| ECE 190 | Engineering Profession and Practice | Learning engineering ethics and how not to get sued. Very dry. |
| ECE 198 | Project Studio | Hands-on project course. Building actual physical things using microcontrollers. |
| MATH 115 | Linear Algebra for Engineering | Matrices, vectors, and wondering why we need so many dimensions. |
| MATH 117 | Calculus 1 for Engineering | Limits, derivatives, and pain. High school calculus but way harder. |
I honestly didn’t enjoy the term. Not that the courses were super hard, but there was a big bump in workload in comparison to secondary school.
My favorite courses this term were ECE 150 and ECE 198:
- ECE 150 was basically learning things I already knew fundamentally.
- ECE 198 was learning how to make actual products and things that can work in the real world.
Quite obviously, my least favorite courses were MATH 117 and ARTS 190.
And I will not explain why. 🤫
Residence and Food
I was placed in WEN north, right next to my don’s room.
Thankfully, I had a kitchen in my residence room, so I was able to cook my own meals. However, since it was mandatory to buy a meal plan, I used the cafeteria for breakfast, snacks, and late supper.
- My go-to menu: Booster Juice and pasta (sometimes burgers and pizza when I was up late).
- Room condition: The room was not bad, and the heating was super nice. However, there was no AC whatsoever, so I had to shower multiple times a day.
- The Shower Struggle: The washrooms and showers were shared, so sometimes I had to literally run to my friend’s room when I needed a quick shower.
Gears
In my 1A term, I used an iPad Pro 11-inch (M1) for my note-taking, alongside my old MacBook Pro 13-inch (2018, 4-port base model).
However, during my finals week, my laptop just decided to stop working. I had to emergency-buy a new MacBook Pro 16-inch (M1 Pro) base model. It was the only available option at the moment, and I had no choice. (Still a great machine though.)
CO-OP 1
Co-operative Work Term 1
WaterlooWorks
WaterlooWorks was a disaster for me. There was no practical guide that I could follow at the time, and only one partial guide was available.
Also, I didn’t notice there were application limits on how many positions I could apply to.
- The First Round: I only applied to Big Tech companies and completely ran out of my apply caps.
- The Server Crash: As the deadline approached, the server became slower. At some point, it just decided to fail on me.
It was a total disaster on my first run, but I actually learned a lot from it. Thankfully, on the continuous cycle, I was able to get an interview and got the job.
Actual Work
For my first co-op, I worked at Stackpole International with the job title of Software Developer Co-op Student.
I was hoping for a remote position, as it was quite far to commute from Waterloo to Hamilton for someone with no car (and it was during COVID). But it was an in-person position, and there was no room for negotiation.
My Role & Tech Stack: My job included working with an early-stage specialized AI with a reinforcement decision tree that could detect defects during production on local edge devices like the Jetson Nano.
It was an interactive job, and I got to experience a real software position and see the actual possibilities of AI. Worth the commute.
PD 19
Tactics for Workplace Success
It basically treats you like a high schooler and teaches you how to write an email, not sleep at work, and interview a mentor at work.
Honestly, the work is simple and not hard at all; it’s just purely annoying.
1B term
Course Load
I took the following courses in my second term at UWaterloo:
| Course Code | Course Name | What it actually is |
|---|---|---|
| ECE 106 | Electricity and Magnetism | The sequel to ECE 105. Invisible fields, Maxwell’s equations, and pure suffering. |
| ECE 108 | Discrete Mathematics and Logic 1 | Proofs, sets, and logic. Basically math without numbers. |
| ECE 124 | Digital Circuits and Systems | Designing logic circuits, K-maps, and playing with FPGA boards. |
| ECE 140 | Linear Circuits | Analyzing electrical circuits with resistors, capacitors, and op-amps. |
| ECE 192 | Engineering Economics and Impact on Society | Learning about interest rates, taxes, and how money works in the real world. |
| MATH 119 | Calculus 2 for Engineering | Integrals, Taylor series, and 3D shapes. Hard, but doable with a good prof. |
Before writing about 1B, there is one thing I want to share: I really wish there was an option for us to choose what Electrical Engineering courses we should take. Sometimes you just have to take things that don’t fit you.
The Biggest Hurdle: ECE 140
My worst course was ECE 140. I honestly struggled to grasp most of the course material. Unfortunately, I couldn’t align well with the course structure, and finding the right support from the teaching staff when I was stuck proved to be extremely difficult.
I ended up failing ECE 140 this term. It sucked, but it was a massive learning experience about my own limits and how I need to approach studying differently.
The Highlights: ECE 124 & MATH 119
On the other side, ECE 124 and MATH 119 were my absolute favorite courses this term.
- ECE 124: This taught me how digital logic works and how it is implemented in the real world. ECE 124 was the GOAT.
- MATH 119: The course was hard, but the instructor was the GOAT.
Overall, my first 12 months were full of unexpected failures and random disasters, but I survived, got a solid first co-op, and figured out what I actually like doing.