Bakersfield College’s Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) program sponsored a lecture from Discovery Channel maverick engineer Deanne Bell on March 23 in the Fireside Room.
The event had an audience of more than 30 and many students were interested in knowing how Bell had come so far in her life. Angelina Mata, 19, said she was excited to know more about her.
“She seems very interesting, and she has come out on TV and that is always exciting, seeing someone from TV in person,” Mata said. “If I see her show, I’ll say ‘Hey, I know her.'”
Bell earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Washington University in St. Louis in 2002. As an opto-mechanical design engineer in the aerospace industry, she designed a FLIR (Forward Looking Infrared) system and a LADAR optical navigation system with Raytheon. She hosted PBS’s “Design Squad” before becoming a scientist on Discovery’s “Smash Lab,” according to her online biography.
She presented her life journey of becoming an engineer through a PowerPoint to the audience.
“I was born to be a nerd,” she said. “When I first learned how to read, I would read electrical engineer journals and try to pronounce all the words in them.”
In college, she didn’t know exactly what to do. She knew she liked math and science, and liked taking things apart and putting them back together. She saw many possibilities while studying engineering.
“I had and have these passions, some whacky ideas sometimes, but that is what makes me different,” she said.
Once she was out of college and in the working industry, she had the opportunity to build and see things she had never seen in the classroom.
“In college you learn the theory of what you’re studying, and when you get out into the industry, it’s a total different atmosphere, a better one because you get to actually work hands on with what you love, even if that means you have to try and try again until it works,” said Bell.
Bell gave examples of seven friends of hers who have careers in engineering but took their passion into work, one doing robotic furniture, for example. “They all do different jobs, jobs that they love, stuff that is interesting to them, and they have fun while doing it,” she said.
“My dad taught me to imagine the impossible, and I got the feeling of wanting to host a TV show and my first show was on PBS, called ‘Design Squad.’ I worked with high school students and we would give them designs to build and it taught them the process of engineering,” said Bell.
Discovery Channel’s “Smash Lab” show she hosts is a program focused on “destruction instruction” to perform experiments on existing technology for a better world.
“I passed up the first offer of being the host of ‘Smash Lab’ on the Discovery Channel, because at that time I wasn’t in the country, but a month later I received a phone call, letting me know they had had auditions, but they wanted me and so I took the job,” said Bell.
Being a woman in the engineering industry was not a challenge for Bell. “I was the only woman in my classes in college, and at first I felt like I had to be better than the guys but I soon got over it and felt that I just needed to do what I love and not care about what others thought,” said Bell.
Bell gave college career recommendations to students who were at the presentation and said it was important for them to follow their intuition and dreams.
“The best thing of working after you’re done with your schooling is knowing you can work together in teams and learning from other people. A job is a team work, and it’s the coolest thing,” said Bell.