Seniors Andrew Bocker, Morgan Bergstrom, and Spencer Pozder took Wednesday Feb. 25 off to go on a job shadow at the Samuel Engineering Firm in Denver. This opportunity was presented to them as a part of the Engineering IV class they are in.

“For the job shadow we went to an actual, real life engineering firm. Instead of just sitting in the classroom all day and imagining what it’s like to be an engineer, we got to see what it was and what kind of stuff we would be getting into,” Bocker said.

The students talked to several people who worked at the firm and were able to learn about different jobs in the engineering field.

“I expected engineering to be a lot of designing parts and putting things together, but they focused more on refineries so they did building plans, piping, and electrical stuff, which I didn’t know was a part of engineering,” Bocker said.

Bocker said one of the coolest things about the firm was that about 60 percent of the people who worked there graduated from the Colorado School of Mines, which is the school he hopes to attend.

“At the School of Mines, almost all of it [the main majors] is petroleum engineering and that’s what everyone says to get into. However, actually seeing where they end up, I was thinking that is definitely not what I want to do,” Bocker said. “I am going to go to [the School of Mines], but take a different path for engineering.”