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Life Around Dallas

Summer fun in Dallas

By Kathleen Batman

This past weekend a group of friends and I decided last minute to get tickets and go see Brad Paisley perform at the Gexa Energy Pavilion. It was so much fun! We got in the car a few hours before the concert and drove the quick trip. Before the concert started we tailgated in the parking lot and met lots of new people! It was a lot of fun to listen to country music and sing along with people we didn’t even know! When we finally got to the concert we were sitting on the lawn enjoying Lee Brice and Chris Young perform before Brad Paisley came on and one of the event staff people came over to us and gave us tickets into the section right in front of the stage! We were so lucky! Brad Paisley’s performance was so fun! I had such a great time at Gexa that my friends and I are looking into other concerts there in the coming months! I can’t wait to go to another concert there! There’s always something going on in Dallas so I have no doubt that I will be at another concert in no time!

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Careers

Innovative Engineering

By Liz Dubret

945155_585786564786431_1142228990_nThis summer I participated in an Immersion Design Experience (IDE) through the SMU Innovation Gym. I spent ten days and ten nights with seven other SMU students creating a wireless sensor network. We partnered with bcWorkshop, a local non-profit, to help them find a better way to measure living standards within a community. At the end of the experience, our team had eaten six boxes of double stuffed Oreos, soldered for over 24 hours straight, and designed a working prototype collecting noise levels within a community. We even designed and implemented the algorithms to filter the noise and tell which areas of the neighborhood were the loudest and what was causing the noise! It was a great experience and I really enjoyed learning a real-world application to all of my classes.

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General

Road Trip to Austin

By John Morrow

Texas summers provide plenty of opportunities for students to travel throughout the state. This past weekend, a group of friends and I took a road trip down to Austin. We kicked off Saturday morning with breakfast at Texas Honey Ham (I highly recommend the breakfast tacos). After stuffing our faces, we hopped into our cars and made our way Morrowto San Marcos, TX; a popular starting point for floating the river. With plenty of sunscreen (or so we thought) and water, we grabbed our inner tubes and began our “three” hour float of the San Marcos river.

There were so many people on the river that it seemed liked all of Texas decided to float with us! Needless to say, our three hour float quickly became a five hour affair. A combination of college students, locals, and an eccentric group of Yo-Pros sporting suits (on a river!) presented some of the best people watching Texas can provide. Halfway through the float, we noticed a Mustang hat down the river! After a few minutes of frantic paddling, we caught up and introduced ourselves. Turns out they were fellow students and we even have a class together in the fall.

You never know where the Mustang family is going to find you!

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SMU Abroad

SMU Abroad: Working in London

Screen Shot 2013-08-08 at 8.28.28 AMBy Adam Melson

I just touched down in Texas after a breathtaking two months studying abroad in London, England. Through SMU’s abroad office, thirty students and myself, lived studied and interned for a range of business institutions in the United Kingdom. Looking back on those two months I can undoubtedly say they were the best two months of my life. After classes, friends and I would spend our afternoons touring the Tower of London, enjoying High Tea, or watching English soccer at Wembley Stadium. The weekends free gave us time to travel across Europe. My favorite trip from London was to Dublin, Ireland for a weekend, and other students went to destinations such as Barcelona or Paris!

During the internship time, I got to experience my first Accounting internship and actually played a crucial role in the company. We all worked Monday through Friday and gained the feel for life after graduation which was exciting! The times I had in London actually got me excited to go back to school in August and gave me a chance to look past American culture in order to enjoy what European culture had to offer.

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General

Intern Life at AT&T

imageBy Liz Dubret

This summer I had the best job interning at AT&T. I got the best of both worlds, because I got to work at the headquarters in Downtown Dallas and at the innovation center, the Foundry, in Plano. The two different environments were really cool to experience. One is your typical corporate America business center that is comprised of four buildings and an entire plaza. But the other is not your typical work space. We ride scooters around the office, take phone calls on couches, and stay physically fit by walking while working at the treadmill desk. I got to work on two really interesting projects and even participated in a product launch. The program also planned fun activities for us to do as an intern class: movie night, Rangers games, sand volleyball, etc. It was a great way to bond with the people I spent every day working with. All in all, it was a great summer working and having fun.

 

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SMU Abroad

SMU Abroad: Embracing London

Blog 1 photoBy Carissa Laughlin

This summer has been absolutely incredible! All thanks to SMU Abroad combined with the Cox School of Business, I have had the opportunity to live, study, and work abroad this summer in London, England. The first four weeks, I spent taking a class about British culture, government, politics, sports, and anything else you can imagine. It was a huge eye opener about not only the differences, but also the similarities between England and America. The second four weeks consisted of an internship at Modus Publicity, a fashion public relations firm in the heart of London. I had an irreplaceable experience where I not only developed my business and leadership skills, but had the chance to meet other interns from around the world. My friends at Modus were from South Africa, Germany, Holland, and Scotland, in addition to England. It was amazing to get to hear about their life experiences, and very funny to receive stereotypical American questions. In addition to school and work, I had the opportunity to travel a bit. I traveled to Dublin and Paris in addition to more local trips to Brighton and Oxford. It was very sad to come home, but I am overwhelmingly excited to start my third year at SMU. I cannot believe how the first two years have flown by, but am even more excited to see what is ahead!

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SMU Abroad

SMU Abroad: Murray at Wimbledon

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Ky Kelsey Buttrell

I just recently returned to the beautiful U.S.A. from my trip with the SMU-in-London program! On this trip, I visited Scotland, Paris, Whales, Salisbury, and more! I took two college classes that expanded my knowledge and experience immensely while also becoming a world traveler! One of the best experiences, while I was there was going to Wimbledon! I have been a tennis nut since I was born, and my dream came true when I got to see a match from centre court! While I was there I saw four matches, which included the winning Andy Murray! An experience of a lifetime to say the least! I am so grateful for the memories and experiences that this abroad program gave me! Forever grateful! Now, I am just working and getting everything ready for next semester! Can’t wait to see you guys on campus! Best of Luck, and Pony UP!

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Life Around Dallas

Things to do in The Big D

By Claire Piepenburg

The Big D is always full of fun things to do, and even though the temperature outside is heating up, Dallasites aren’t slowing down. Here are a few cool things happening this summer:

Bruno Mars/Ellie Goulding at the American Airlines Center

This pop powerhouse duo will be performing this summer at the AAC. In addition, Beyonce, Justin Bieber, and Selena Gomez are coming to American Airlines in the coming weeks,  John Mayer and Mac Miller will both be performing at Gexa Energy Pavillion this summer and Emile Sande will be bringing down the house at the House of Blues. Not to mention countless other live music venues that host a variety of musical talent each night like Trees, the Prophet Bar and Club Dada.

Social Science- ‘Relationships’ at the Perot Museum of Nature and Science

This event is one in a four part series that invites young adults to the new Perot Museum after hours to explore different scientific topics, enjoy performances and shows, and check out new inventions and research.  For the ‘Relationships’ event, guests are invited to discover the relationships behind various scientific topics, like robots and humans or stars and culture. Performances by the Dallas Opera Young Artists, a guest speaker from the Dallas Opera, a Glow Dance show by Orizon Performance Team, and interactive demonstrations and challenges are followed up by an outdoor screening of the original Tron film in 35mm. (Did somebody say ‘date night’?!)

Taste of Dallas at Fair Park

With over 200,000 guests expected at this three-day event, the Taste of Dallas is the largest tasting event in DFW. Celebrating their 26th year, TOD will bring out Dallas’ top chefs from the most popular restaurants. The event will feature shopping, live music, kid-friendly attractions and of course – lots of food!

Rangers vs. Yankees at the Ballpark in Arlington

The Rangers will be playing all summer, but this series will be a ‘can’t miss’! Taking place in late July, the Yankees head south to battle it out in the Lone Star State. Check out a Wednesday game, when the Ballpark hosts their famous $1 hot dog night or a FANtastic Friday Fireworks show, when general admission tickets are just $10 and the Ballpark lights up the sky with tons of fireworks after the game!

This post barely scratches the surface of all the things there are to do in Dallas in the next few weeks. There are entire websites dedicated to cataloging and calendaring all the events, festivals, performances, shows, games and tastings happening in the Big D. Check out the ‘entertainment’ section of www.dallasnews.com or www.dallasobserver.com for even more info about stuff scheduled for this summer. There’s never time to be bored in Dallas!