This Saturday, iCAN returned to UMass once again to host the third edition of our academic event, the iCons Survival Guide.
This popular event is designed to provide current iCons undergraduates with the tips, tricks and knowledge they need to successfully navigate the challenging iCons program.
This year’s event featured three presentations from distinguished alumni, and one from a current student. Joseph McGaunn (class of 2020) gave an excellent primer on the iCons 1 course, focusing on the ways in which the course is designed to help students develop a positive problem-solving attitude and a solid base of investigational skills.
Next up was Angela Essa, whose presentation tackled how best to approach iCons 2, an infamously rigorous course.
iCons 3, the most hands-on of the group iCons courses, was addressed by a pair of alumni presentations. Dimitri Livitz spoke about the renewable energy version of the class, and Matt Richard handled the biomedicine version. It was great to have two presenters for iCons 3 this year, since the course really differs a lot between the two iCons tracks.
The evening was rounded out with a panel discussion of iCons 4, the class in which students prepare their theses. This experience can vary so much between individuals that we thought it was better for undergrads to hear from a wider range of voices, and be able to ask any questions they might have about the intimidating process of developing a thesis.
After the official event was over, the alumni joined the students for a hearty dinner at Hamp. Thanks to everyone involved for helping put on such a great event!