Gear up

  1. Empathy has played a huge role in my own life. I grew up in a family that cared for and even adopted foster children. Even though it 
  was hard sharing everything at times, putting myself in their shoes always made me more grateful and much more caring towards them. I 
  think it is really important to help those in need in any way that I am able to. 
  
  2. To be able to design something that will provide for someone's needs is really hard to do if you don't look at the problem from their 
  prospective. By doing this, its often possible to eliminate many sources of error, identify a suitable solution, and even go above and 
  beyond their expectations. Computer science is not just about the machines and code, but rather what we can acheive with those tools. 
  
  3. Empathy is especially important when working on a team. The reason teams are so useful is that there are people with different 
  prospectives, unique skills, and different personalities all coming together to acheive specific goals. The downside is that because of
  these differences, conflicts may arise within the group. When working in a group, we should strive to embrace each other's differences 
  be prepared to empathize, communicate, and compromise.
  
  4. I took a debate class in college which required us to work in groups of three. we had three projects together. One of my teammates 
  did a lot of work on the first and third projects, but was very ill while the second project was in progress. At first I was slightly 
  peeved due to the extra workload, but later put myself in his shoes, and just did the work in hopes that if I ever needed help he would
  do the same. 
  
  5. I have the hardest time empathizing with someone when they get themself into a bad but easily avoided situation. I need to be more 
  aware of the fact that we are all humans, make mistakes, and have to rely on others when we get ourselves into tough situations.