For those with children, how do you explain what you do at work to your kids? I tell them that an engineer is like a problem solver who builds and designs things to make our lives better.

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I like to do something similar, problem solving, but there are so many different ways to do it in engineering! I try to relate it to things they are familiar with or things they like doing, like building legos or playing robots. The neat thing about this field is there is such variety in it.

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I tell them I do really large maintenance projects. I fix things that we think will break soon.

I don’t have kids of my own, but anytime a non-engineer asks I say I design powerlines and have a working towards a management role.

I used to take them in the labs to see. "Robots! Lasers!" Now just doing lab management, it's a bit more murky to explain, but as teens now, they kind of get it. "Spreadsheets, kids... endless Excel reports..."

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