ESS 710: ESS Programs

Laura Vogt:
Hello, and welcome to the Not So Secret Guide to Being a Berkeley Engineer. I’m your host, Laura Vogt, the Associate Director of Marketing and Communications in the College of Engineering. This week I’m excited to introduce you to Marvin Lopez, the Director of Programs and Engineering Student Services, or ESS, as you’ve heard it called. Hi, Marvin. Thank you for being here today. Can you take a moment to introduce yourself and tell us about your role in ESS?

Marvin Lopez:
Absolutely. Thank you, Laura, for having me and for taking the time to chat with me. My name is Marvin Lopez, and I’m Director of Student Programs and Engineering Student Services where we provide, as we like to say, world-class support and knowledge and tools for students to thrive at Cal and beyond. We like to say that we fundamentally provide tools for success, and you can’t spell success without ESS.
What I do at ESS and a little bit about me. I am Director of Programs, so I run a team that provides co-curricular support of learning outside the classroom, and I’ve done this for seven-and-a-half years now in the college, and it’s a joy, a delight, and a privilege to do this. I came from industry, so I’m actually an engineer myself from many, many years ago. The equivalent of the computer science engineering background, though I recently also just completed my Master’s in Education, so I guess I’ve veered away, truly, from technology to education.
But I have spent a lot of time in industry where I ran university programs besides being an engineer, ran university programs and recruiting programs for many, many years where I hired myself a number of students, but also ran the programs to hire students. I’ve been around the block when it comes to the recruiting and then career readiness effort, but also the programs and the co-curricular support that I used to sponsor when I was on the corporate side and now I run directly through my team.
What we do in ESS programs is really provide a suite of programs, a suite of support outside of the classrooms. We provide academic, professional, leadership, and even wellness programs, given the importance of wellness and how critical it is to be well physically and mentally. We provide a suite of programs around those areas for students to thrive, and to have the best experience they can have while they’re at Berkeley.

Laura Vogt:
Congratulations again on getting your Master’s. That’s an awesome feat.

Marvin Lopez:
Thank you. It’s pretty cool, yeah, and I can’t believe I actually did it.

Laura Vogt:
I think it’s awesome that you went back to school and that you’re continuing your education. That is so cool.

Marvin Lopez:
Thank you.

Laura Vogt:
We talked a lot this summer about Engineering Student Services on the advising side, because we were getting students ready to register for that first set of classes.

Marvin Lopez:
Right.

Laura Vogt:
I’m excited to talk about more of what students do outside of the classroom. Why is it so important to build and learn outside the classroom and have these experiential experiences?

Marvin Lopez:
Yeah, so first of all, I’m delighted that you’ve talked to the advising team, as they’re our partners, so the other half of engineering student services on the undergrad side. We work very closely with them and defining the things that we do and supporting all our undergraduates. But, why we exist and why we provide these programs outside the classroom is, because learning does not just happen in the classroom. What companies and organizations that aim to hire and work with our students are looking for more than just technical knowledge. The technical knowledge that you gain in the classroom is only half the story. I would say even, only part of the story.
The other part of the story is the non-technical skills that you gain outside the classrooms through involvement in student organizations, through tutoring, through the programs that we offer, the things like LeaderShape and others. Because, the skills you gain outside the classroom are critical to your development as a complete student, as a complete engineer. Being a professional and being an engineer, it’s not just the technical skills. It’s the technical skills and also the non-technical skills, the interpersonal skills, the ability to connect with others, to collaborate, to think, to be resilient, to think outside the box. All those skills are critical to be a complete engineer and a complete professional that companies will really, really want. If you look at it from a career readiness, a professional development perspective.
But also as a student, and in order to succeed at a place like Berkeley, as you know, Berkeley engineer is rigorous, is not number one for no reason. Part of that reason is the rigor of the classroom, and to overcome the challenges and to get through that rigor, you need to work outside the classroom with peers. You need to come to tutoring. If you’re doing great in a class, do even better and come to tutoring. If you’re struggling a little bit, come to tutoring and do even better. If you’re doing great, become a tutor and help your peers. Study with others and teach each other, and so we encourage and we promote that, and so that students can get through the challenge that is Berkeley. For having those engagement opportunities outside the classroom are critical to the success of students, not only as but as professional.

Laura Vogt:
Thank you. How is programming in ESS tackling the imposter syndrome that we know a lot of our students come in with?

Marvin Lopez:
Yeah, that’s a great question, Lauren, and something that, well first of all, in case for those of you that may not know what the imposter syndrome is, is feeling like you basically don’t belong in where you’re at. Feeling that you just, that somehow you made it here and wherever you may be by mistake, that somebody hired you accidentally, somebody admitted you accidentally, and that you’re not as smart as the people around you, and particularly not as smart as you thought you were. That is absolutely not true. Every one of our students that is here is here for a reason. They were admitted and they belong here, because they were admitted to Berkeley. But despite that, when you are, and particularly if you’re a student of color, if you’re a woman, if you’re one of a few, whatever that may be, and you don’t see yourself in others, you might feel like an imposter.
You might feel like you don’t belong and wonder, how did I get here? That’s a common feeling, and I can tell you that when I arrived on campus seven years ago, I felt like an imposter. I thought, what am I doing here? There’s no one looked like me here. I’m a corporate-y guy, I’m not an education guy. It was a new environment, so I felt like an imposter. Over time I realized that, no, I do belong here and know what I’m doing. It is not uncommon, it happens to most of us, to the best of us. There are two ways really to talk, to deal with this. But fundamentally it’s about speaking out, and it is about realizing that no you, and look into the things that brought you here, the successes that brought you here, and realize that no, you have all earned it. You all belong here.
Two, is reach out to your peers, because I guarantee you that the thoughts you’re having about feeling out of place, feeling like you don’t belong, somebody else is having those very same thoughts at the very same time. But, you don’t know that unless you speak out. Part of what we provide in engineering and services in the program side is a place to do that, is the center for access to engineering excellence, to come and build community with your peers. It’s the workshops to engage with others. It’s the support that we provide ourselves. The peer advisors, as you know, our advising team provides peer advisors, you can talk to them about how you’re feeling. You can talk to your advisor about how you’re feeling, you can talk to us about how you’re feeling, but most of all talk to your peers about what you’re feeling, because I guarantee you that if you’re feeling a certain way, your peers are feeling a certain way.
Then you realize that you’re not alone, that it’s not uncommon. If it really becomes truly corrosive and truly a fundamental concern, there’s a CAPS team, our psychological services team, and they’re more than happy to talk to you about that. We also work with the CAPS team to provide workshops on things like the imposter syndrome and wellness. There’s formal knowledge that you can gain through them, but ultimately it’s about speaking out and engaging with your peers, engaging with your community and connecting and building a network where you realize that you’re not the only one, that the others are feeling the same way, and you in fact do belong here, and you are here for a reason, and in time you overcome that. But it’s a process. It’s a journey. One that is not as pleasant as you’d like it, but that many of us do go through, and also do get past it. That’s what I would say about the imposter syndrome.

Laura Vogt:
Awesome. You want to tell us a little bit more about your team and the programs?

Marvin Lopez:
Yes, so we have an amazing team of world-class, committed, passionate professionals and student affairs that runs the suite of programs that we have. Starting with Tiffany Reardon, who is our Associate Director of Excellence, Engineering Excellence programs that she runs. Things like Prep and T-prep. These are the programs that you might’ve heard of and some of you have heard or probably have been in. The pre-engineering program and the transfer pre-engineering program, which are start, and they used to be, were the only program, the entire extent of the program was the summer, but now they start in the summer and then they go on the rest of the year. These are programs primarily aimed at first generation students, students who have maybe historically not been part of the college, and to get them a head start on their time at Berkeley.
They come, they’re actually here right now, they’re spending three weeks here at Cal. It’s a residential program. They get to spend three weeks at Berkeley, freshmen and transfer students who work with their own cohort, above all, building community. Building community that will celebrate them, that will support them, sustain them for the next three, four, x number of years. Also, they get to spend some time getting a glimpse of the classes. They get professional development with me and they also spend time at Jacobs building a prototype to societal problem. It’s really cool. Then, that’s just in the summer, and then during the year they spend time in various seminars with Tiffany and with others continuing the conversations and deepening those relationships in that community to sustain them for the long term.
Tiffany runs all that, among other things, within my program’s team. Luis Castillo runs the Center for Access to Engineering Excellence, which is always a mouthful and wish we could call it something else, but we call it the CAE or just Center, that is currently being relocated because the construction in Bechtel, or the new building that’s coming, the engineering student center is coming, as you know, in a couple years. For the time being, the Center for Access to Engineering Excellence is relocated to 325 Davis. There we is where we normally will provide tutoring.
We have free tutoring from nine to nine every day, except Friday’s where it’s nine to five, and it’s literally free tutoring. If you need tutoring in any class, we have 50 some classes that we offer free tutoring in. If you need tutoring, come see us. If you don’t need tutoring, come see us. If you need a snack, come see us. If you like coffee, come see us. If you just want to hang out with somebody and meet people, come see us. If you don’t have any clue what you want to do in life, come see us. In other words, come see us no matter what. We provide a welcoming, inclusive community for students to find to be safe and be happy at. Louis manages all of that with an amazing team of students that runs the entire operation.

Laura Vogt:
One of the things I like about the center is that it’s a good place if you just need to study, because then there’s people around you that are studying the same thing.

Marvin Lopez:
That’s right.

Laura Vogt:
If you run into a problem or you need, so you don’t have to go there just like knowing that you need tutoring, you could just be there to be around people doing the same thing you’re doing.

Marvin Lopez:
Absolutely. Yes. Thank you, and one of the cool things about the new setup we have is that it’s not a big open space with one big open room we have. If you come and see us, you’ll see that there’s four separate little offices and spaces there, and so we’re thinking that those will be themed. It’ll be like the math room and the physics room. It’s kind of cool that now if you’re interested in working with somebody for your physics class, you can come to the physics room, or math, you can come to the math room. As always, we make the most of what we have, and so for the time being we’ll be in Davis, and then of course look forward to be in the big room and the big building come two years from now.
Then we have Marcia, Marcia [inaudible 00:11:56], who runs what we call the Berkeley Mentorship Program. This is a suite of programs that we have with the understanding that mentorship is critical to our success, to all of us professionals, both young and experienced. With that premise and that understanding, we actually have support from one of our donors, a former alum who has made sure that we have the resources to create a complete, holistic mentor program. We have a number of what we call families of mentor programs that, of students mentoring each other. We have second and third year students mentoring incoming students.
We have a mentor program for prep students, for transfer students, for women, for LGBT, or we have a family for if you don’t care for a particular affinity, if you just want to mentor independent of any sort of identity, we have a family for you too. You simply apply to be either a mentor or a mentee and you get to mentor your peers, and we teach you how, we guide you through the process, and actually get a stipend if you’re a mentor. Because we realize it’s a job, it’s a commitment you’re making, and so there’s a stipend to go with it. We’re seeing that students that take it, that get involved in things like mentorship do better, are more engaged, that are less likely to experience the imposter syndrome. Come see us and join the mentor program. Then finally, we have-

Laura Vogt:
The applications are open for that until the end of August.

Marvin Lopez:
That is correct. Thank you. Then we have an open position, but that’s focused on transfer students, so that position is open at the moment, and that is focused specifically on transfer students. Something that we are particularly passionate about and not just in the college, but in my team, is ensuring that transfer students have the support to thrive here for the five semesters that they’re here. Transfer students face a particularly challenging experience, in that they’re only here for four semesters, maybe five. They have to do all that freshmen also have to do, but in four semesters. They have to know, they have figure out how to navigate the academic world, research, and careers, and find where the classrooms are and everything within really, really quickly. We have this position that specifically focuses on transfer students and manages things like the Transfer Ambassador Program that is transfer students supporting transfer students.
We have an engineering transfer center over at It’s Hard to Die, where students transfer students can come and hang out and be with each other, commiserate, build community, have snacks, and a transfer mentor program that is done in conjunction with Marcia’s team for transfer students, mentor transfer students. All about transfer students, because we know that transfer students bring an amazing experience to the campus, but also face some interesting challenges, and so we want to make sure that they thrive for the time that they’re here.
That is my team, and then of course, Crystal, who runs our front desk in ESS. She’s part of my team but supports all of us in ESS, and if you come to our new Engineering Student Services Advising Office at 308 McLaughlin, you’ll find her there. That is the team, so we’re, I’d say I’m delighted that we’re a small team that really, as the proverbial cliche says, we punch up on my weight, because we do a lot for a small team, but we don’t do it alone. We work closely with our advising team, with our departments, with the development office. We have a huge network of partners that we work closely with to make all this happen, and we love doing it.

Laura Vogt:
What’s the best way for students to learn more about programs and to find out about the events and workshops that happen throughout the year?

Marvin Lopez:
Above all, number one is the newsletter. As I think you know the newsletter very well, because you put it out at Fries every week, and I tell the students, if it’s not in the newsletter, it does not exist. Please, read the newsletter every week, every Monday afternoon the newsletter goes out, and everything we offer is in the newsletter, so workshops, events, services are all in the newsletter. It’s also on our website, so coesandbox.berkeley.edu/, I believe it’s ESS, and various locations throughout the website, it’s all there. Our calendar of events, our tutoring schedule, and our locations, it’s all there. Take a look at that. Our social media channels have conversations about what we do, so it’s all out there. In particular, I think the newsletter is the number one place where you can find all that we do. Again, if it’s not in the newsletter, it does not exist, so read it. Read it, read it, read it.

Laura Vogt:
One of the things I always like to talk to you about is resilience for the students. What tips do you have for students as they build their resilience?

Marvin Lopez:
Thank you. That’s a great question and a great topic. Resilience is, so what is resilience, first of all? Resilience is when things don’t work out, how do you react to that? Is literally falling down and picking yourself back up. There’s a number of things that come to mind about resilience. First of all is the realization, the acknowledgement that you will fall down, that it’s perfectly okay when things don’t go well. One of the things that when I interview students and when I interview candidates, one of the questions that I like asking is, tell me of a time when things didn’t go well, what happened and what did you do? I am delighted to hear students that acknowledge that, yes, this didn’t go well and here’s what I do. Generally, I don’t believe, and I find it interesting when students say, “So, no, I don’t have anything. Nothing ever went wrong.”
It’s hard to believe that that’s the case, because all of us have things that didn’t go well. Acknowledging that and being okay with it, accepting that is critical. Being resilient is really about picking yourself up when things don’t go well, when you fall down. Critical to that is, again, the community and the network, and your friends and your peers that will also experience the same thing, and will be there to pick you up, and will be there to celebrate you and remind you that while things may not go well all the time, all you just said, you got to pick yourself up and keep going.
For example, academically, you have to realize that no, Berkeley is a rigorous place, and most of us, and well, most of our students were used to getting straight A’s back in high school, and a B occasionally. Now they get here and they realize that everybody is equally capable and equally amazing. Given the way we grade, not everybody can get an A, and so they get an A, they get a B, God forbid they get a C, and they think the world is falling apart. It’s a matter of realizing that what they’re used to is not the norm today. Realizing that is critical. Realizing that, yes, things will be tough and you might get a C, you might get a D for God, oh my God. What do you do? The key is to, again, reach out and engage with your peers. If academically things don’t go well, come to see us in tutoring, reach out to your peers, study together. I’m a big believer that the myth of the self-made person is really that, a myth. No one makes it alone.
In particular, in a place like Berkeley, you can’t get through this place alone. Working with each other, studying together, teaching each other. When things don’t go well, speak out, come see your advisor, come see us in program, come to tutoring. Through that, you get through the challenges that you’ll face academically. Inevitably things won’t go well, and that’s okay. It’s what you learn from it that matters. When I ask the question for students of, tell me a time when things didn’t go well, I don’t want to hear that nothing went wrong. I want to hear that something did go wrong, and here’s what you learned from it, and how you grew from it. Resilience is actually a great place and a great way to grow. But, like I said earlier, it’s not a fun journey. Sometimes it is unpleasant, but it’s that unpleasantness, that dissonance, that challenge that helps you grow as professionals and people.
Then on the professional side, resilience is also critical to understanding that the career journey is not linear. I think students think that you apply for a job, you interview and you land the job you want, done, and nothing ever goes wrong. That is not the case. Along the way, you’ll get rejections, and I can tell you from one student that we had in a workshop some years ago shared with us how he had 41 rejections, and he pasted every single one of the rejections on a screen before he got the one he wanted. After every rejection he kept, picked himself up and applied again, and talked to more people, and talked to more people until he finally landed the one he wanted.
I think being comfortable with the idea that you know will get rejected through the recruiting process and through the landing research and landing internship, you will get rejected. You just keep going and you realize that it’s not personal. That’s the other thing to realize in the career world, it is not personal. They’re not rejecting me, Marvin, the person, they’re rejecting this candidate for whatever reason. There’s no rhyme or reason. For whatever reason you were not selected, and so letting it go and moving on to the next thing is critical, and realizing that what you bring somebody will appreciate and you’ll, by working with others, you’ll get through the process and land something that you want by being resilient and understanding that it takes that courage to keep going, and it all works out. But it’s not pleasant. It can be difficult and it can be hard to accept, but critical to be able to have that courage to continue despite the challenges.

Laura Vogt:
Thank you.

Marvin Lopez:
That’s a long answer to a short question.

Laura Vogt:
No, you’re always so positive and upbeat when you talk about resilience, that’s why I like talking to you about it. Because, it reminds me regularly that, I mean, everybody has to be resilient at some point in their life, so it’s nice to hear that what I’m doing is not wrong.

Marvin Lopez:
Laura, that’s a great question, a great comments as well, because in my own life, I’ve had lots of challenges in professional and academics. I can be candid with you and our listeners that, when I was in college, I barely got out. It took me a lot longer to get out, my GPA was so-so, I was actually on probation back in my day, and here I am. I got through it by saying, okay, these things went wrong. I didn’t do this, right. What do I do? I reached out to people who had the empathy and the compassion to tell me, and the courage to say, look, either you do this or you’re in big trouble. I listened and I heeded the advice, which is a lot of what we provide is advice. I heeded that advice and I asked her, I wish our students would heed more of our advice that we provide, and I got through that.
I had a great career at one of the companies that I was at for many, many years, and then I got laid off. That was a huge jolt, right? Because you think, oh my God, what did I do? Is it my fault? Again, these things happen for not, usually for nothing that you did personally, just the way it goes. I could have balled up in a corner and become a, turn into a victim, or reach out to my network, reach out to my friends and peers and see what else is out there. If it hadn’t been for that, for being laid off those years ago, I wouldn’t be here today, because that, there’s the proverbial one thing led to another to another, and was able to be here for this when the position opened up seven years ago.
It’s all what you make of it, and realize that things are not linear. Things won’t always go well, but moving through it, and reaching out to others that can help you and get you through is the key. Not avoiding failure, but dealing with it in a positive way. I’m always positive, because I’m a big believer that things do work out.

Laura Vogt:
I like that you’ve pivoted from your technical career into this educational career, so much so that you’ve enjoyed it so much that you even went back and got your master’s to continue your knowledge and your growth in it. What has been your favorite part of working with the students?

Marvin Lopez:
Nothing makes me happier, Lauren, literally nothing makes me happier to see a student through either our programs, or through our engagement with us, or through conversations with me individually, or anything that we do, come into my office and tell me, “Hey, I landed the internship,” or, “I’m going abroad to do whatever,” or, “I got off probation. I am done, done with probation,” or, “I started a startup with my roommate.” Those are the kind of things that just bring me joy, and it brings me joy because it means that students have listened to us. That a lot of, everything that we do, every single thing we offer is not required. You don’t have to come see us. It gives me great joy when I see students heed our advice, and come to see us, and listen to what we have to say, and put the advice into practice.
When we tell them, this is how you do the elevator pitch, this is how you do your resume, this is how you get through this class, this is how many classes you should take or not take, and they listen to that, and they grow through that process, and they achieve the things they came here to achieve. That brings me great joy, and so when I see them grow, I think is what brings me the most joy. When I see them achieve the things they came here to achieve, achieve things despite the challenges they face, whether it’s academic, professional, wellness and personal, and others, when they overcome and they achieve, that’s what brings me great joy. I think all of us in ESS shared the exact same thinking, which is why it’s such a cool place to be.

Laura Vogt:
Awesome. Just to round us out, is there anything that we didn’t talk about today that you wanted to, or that we did talk about that you want to highlight one more time?

Marvin Lopez:
I think the thing I want to leave our listeners with is, everything we offer, the workshops, the events, the activities, all the things that we do are not required. But we know that that students that do take advantage of these things do better. I don’t mean just do better in terms of their GPA. That’s not my thing. Do better in terms of their experience and how they feel about their Berkeley. The more engaged you are in all these things, the more you go to leadership, and come to tutoring, and when we have breakfast at the CAE, come to that, and when we have workshops as we have coming up in professional film, come to that. The more you build that network and that community through what we do, the better you feel, the better you do, not just academically, but as an individual.
Take advantage of the things we have, they’re free. Everything, every single thing we have is literally free, but we can’t make you do it, so please do it. Come see us, and if there’s something that we don’t have that you would like to see, come see us. As I tell the students that do work with us, ask, you may get, don’t ask, you don’t get. If you ask, we’ll probably get it. We’ll probably be able to do it. But if you don’t tell us, then we can’t. As you can see, I love doing it, but I need to know what you need. Come see us and we’d love to talk to more students.

Laura Vogt:
Well, thank you so much, Marvin, for being here today. It’s really great to learn about all these possibilities that you have that are outside the classroom and to help students grow and really thrive.

Marvin Lopez:
It’s my pleasure. Thanks, Laura.

Laura Vogt:
Thank you for everyone, for tuning to the Not So Secret Guide to Being a Berkeley Engineer. I look forward to podcasting with you next week. Bye.