To Be, or Not to Be (An Engineer)

     Here at Bayswater, we are gearing up for our annual giant used book sale event and as a result, we have been handling even more used books than we normally do in the course of a week.  That means, of course, more interesting discoveries to be made!

     This week we found the test scores for a male student who took the National Engineering Aptitude Search Test (NEAS) as a 12^th grader in 1968.  At the time, this test was organized by the Junior Engineering Technical Society, a non-profit organization that sought to promote engineering careers to high school students.  The test was taken using the old punch card system, requiring that student answers be marked by punching holes in the card to allow for what we now recognize as an early form of computerized data entry.  As you can see, the scores were reported on one single piece of cardstock no larger than a check.  Back then, misplace your test score report and there was no checking online to print out another.  Do you remember those days? 

     

     The student who took this test (and then left it in a book almost 50 years ago) displayed a very high aptitude for engineering.  In fact, the student scored higher than 90% of all other students in the nation who took this engineering aptitude test in 1968!  Clearly, this student had the makings of a top-notch future engineer. 

     Upon researching entrance requirements to engineering schools during 1968, we found that scores such as these would have helped this student to gain entrance into many top colleges and universities.  The question is…did he ever go to any such schools?  Did he, in fact, become an engineer, or did he decide to pursue another avenue, instead? Why would he leave such a stellar score report in a random book?  Did he ever show his family?  Ahh, the mysteries that pour forth from our used book floor.  We could easily get carried away with questions, here.

     Our thanks to those of you who have stopped by to see the now “famous” (as we have been told that it now is) used book floor in our store.  We even had a customer head upstairs yesterday excitedly proclaiming her high hopes that she, too, will discover the next gem hidden in the once loved pages that have now found a home on Bayswater’s second floor.  You never know…