Students from Parkland High School and Orefield Middle School recently attended a private screening of the movie “Dream Big: Engineering Our World” in ArtsQuest Center at SteelStacks, Bethlehem.

The movie produced by MacGillivray Freeman Films, in partnership with the American Society of Civil Engineers, was presented by the Bechtel Corporation.

After the movie and a question-and-answer session with a panel of engineers, Tanya Mehta, Abby Graham, Prathysha Kothare and Stephanie Dean from Orefield spoke with The Press.

“I think engineers play a big role in helping our society solve problems,” Mehta said. “In addition, engineering inspires other students and adults to help our environment for the greater good.”

Mehta said the movie was inspiring.

“It changed my perception about engineers,” she said. “I learned much [more] aspects of engineers and how they influence society.”

Mehta said the movie has inspired her to consider a career in biomedical engineering.

Graham said the essential role of engineers is to perfect society mechanically and to help people live their everyday lives.

“The movie helped me understand how engineers can really help people,” Graham said.

“It increased my interest in engineering, but I was already considering a career in it.”

Graham said the movie really brought engineering to a whole new level.

“It was interesting and it lengthened my knowledge of how I can help our world as an engineer,” Graham said.

Kothare said engineers are invaluable in the evolving world.

“Their level of thinking, imagination and ingenuity has the potential to change the world and have a global impact,” Kothare said.

She said the movie absolutely did change her perception about engineering profession.

“I truly understand how engineering applies to every aspects of life and the variety of occupations available in the field,” Kothare said.

Kothare said before the movie she had already been thinking of pursing a field in S.T.E.M. (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) and the movie enhanced her perception of engineers.

“I thought it [movie] was very inspiring and enlightening,” she said.

“It was perfectly depicted for a young adult and adolescent audience.”

Dean said engineers help people by designing things.

“Almost everything from cell phones to roads are designed by engineers,” she said.

She said the movie helped her realize just how broad engineering is and thought it was very interesting and quite inspiring, but she would have liked it if the principles beyond the projects were explained in more detail.

“I was already seriously considering engineering as a career, but the movie encouraged me,” Dean said.

Engineers Stephen Ressler, P.E., Ph.D. and Michael W. Derr, an associate with Geo-Technology, Quakertown, spoke with The Press about why it was important to show the movie to students.

“We really had two agendas here,” Ressler said. “For the younger middle school students we wanted to raise awareness of engineering and get them excited about the possibilities of pursing an engineering career.

“For the older students, who are already enrolled in a rigorous high school level engineering program, we wanted to provide real-world perspectives about what it really means to study engineering and to work in the engineering workplace.”

Derr said, in his opinion, there is limited outreach during Engineers Week.

“We wanted to highlight the start of Engineers Week and provide outreach during the week. I believe we achieved that goal and then some,” Derr said.

“Our partnership with ArtsQuest has probably started a yearly event during Engineers Week and/or summer camps.”

“It was personally gratifying that we reached over 1,000 students and that the students were really excited about engineering upon seeing the film,

“We hope they take this excitement forward into choosing a science and technology field like engineering.”