GELcamp by Emiko P. '25
project management… in the woods?
A few days ago I got back from what I can only describe as a four-day fever dream. Here’s a diary of everything that went down during GELcamp…
Day One
Hello! I am currently typing this in 14 degree weather, snuggled up in a remote New Hampshire cabin with 40-ish people from MIT and Wellesley. Today was our first day of GELcamp (more formally known as Camp Cody, and even more formally known as 6.9140: Project Engineering Management), an intense four-day course for students in the Gordon-MIT Engineering Leadership (GEL) program.
For those of you that don’t know, GEL is a program that teaches MIT and Wellesley engineering students a leadership curriculum through weekly lectures and weekly hands-on labs over the course of an entire year. I was a GEL1 my junior year, and I am now continuing the program as a GEL2 during my senior year, where I help mentor and coordinate the GEL1s. Check out their website to learn more!
Our journey to GELcamp started with a two-hour bus-ride from campus to New Hampshire, where we arrived at the snowy front gate of Camp Cody. I wasn’t expecting much, so I was surprised to be greeted by a cozy summer camp with dozens of little green cabins and a ginormous iced-over lake.
After tossing our bags in the cabin and claiming our bunks, we headed straight to our first class. There are a total of eight lectures taught in this project management course (each being 1.5 hours long), and the first two were called: 1) Strategy, Charters, & Targets and 2) History of Project Management, Intro to Scheduling, Critical Path Method. I’ve been more and more interested in leadership and maybe even running my own company one day, so the main thing I want to get out of this course is concrete project management tools and strategies that I can implement in the future. Only two lectures in, and I was already given a few tangible ideas.
Dinner was held in the main cabin with a roaring fire, and I felt like I had been transported back to summer camp at Camp Lakewood in 5th grade. But instead of being like 10 years old, I was a 21-year-old supposedly full-fledged adult, and instead of being forced to eat spaghetti with no utensils, there was a taco and churros buffet that surprisingly hit the spot.
We then transitioned to our group project that we will be working on these next four days. I was assigned to the Blue Team, and our project was to design and build a solar farm to help offset MIT’s carbon emissions! Half the time we worked on the project charter, and the other half we were watching various Blue Man group videos.01 for team bonding purposes, of course
And that was the first day!! It’s lights out in two minutes, so I’ll see you tomorrow :)
Day Two
Hi, there! It’s Day Two of GELcamp and I feel like I’ve lived two whole days today. We got up bright and early at 7 am for breakfast, and we had class from 8 am until noon. We covered three different lectures: 1) Project Elements: Scope, Activities, 2) Project Organizations, Teams, Allocations, and 3) Project Architecture: Dependence, Breakdown Structures. We learned a lot, but by the end of the fourth hour of lectures, we definitely needed a change of scenery – so that’s what happened!
After grabbing lunch, there was a four hour break, and about 20 of us headed off to the local ski resort to ski, snowboard, and snowshoe! I went skiing, and our little crew ranged from a legit professional speed-skier to legit first-timers. One of the first-timers was Joel S. ’25. Not only is Joel learning about 18 different project management tools over the course of four days, but he also went down a black diamond on his very first day of skiing! Talk about drinking from the firehouse. After one wipeout where he practically slid down the entire mountain face, skis and poles left behind in the dust, I asked him how he was feeling. I got the most enthusiastic “I am great!” I’ve ever heard. I think this ski trip will probably be one of my favorite moments of GELcamp.
I was pretty pooped from our ski day, but it was back to the grind. We had one more lecture called Design of Projects; Canonical Patterns, as well as a class-wide case study and discussion. We then did some more team work on our solar farm project, and then it was night night!
Day Three
Day three! Today was super busy so I’m writing this before bed! It is 1 in the morning! I am so sleep deprived! This is going to be a short rundown of the day. Two lectures02 1) <i>Project Complexity, Risk, and Human Response</i> and 2) <i>Project Control and Adaptation</i> in the morning. Now 8/8 lectures finished. Then panel with industry mentors from Google, System Design and Management masters program, etc. Then went to the ski resort again but this time went snow tubing. Set a record for most people (20!!!!) going down the chute at once. Then dinner and build challenge with our small team. Tried to build a bridge. Stressful. Failed. Tragic. Then grinded on group project for final presentation tomorrow. Feeling good about our project but mostly just tired. It is now 1:05 am. Goodnight!
Day Four
Good afternoon! It’s the fourth and final day of GELcamp. I am writing this just after we gave our final presentation in front of the cohort. I thought it went pretty well, but we sadly didn’t receive all the funding we requested for our solar farm. #L. We did, however, receive feedback on how to revise our proposal for the future (basically our timeline for project completion was a bit too ambitious and we needed to add some slack). Also, side note, it was -2 degrees this morning and my nostrils literally froze on the walk to class, so that was a new sensation. At least I was entertained on that walk by Remi, Eva, and Steph (see pics below)!
We packed up our cabin right after lunch, then hopped on the two-hour bus back to MIT. And with that, GELcamp aka Camp Cody aka 6.9140: Project Engineering Management was complete!
GELcamp complete!
I think the two most important things I gained from this experience were:
1) Fun memories with my GEL cohort. I have to admit – GELcamp has definitely made me closer with my cohort, and I’m honestly glad I went on this trip (even though I cannot say with 100% honesty that it wasn’t hard and at times pretty exhausting). When I first started GEL, I only knew maybe 10% of my classmates, but now after going to this camp and spending the last two years within the learning community, I can now confidently say I have made core memories with at least 80% of the people in my cohort. Also, skiing and snow tubing were SO FUN!
2) Tangible project management tools that I will be comfortable using for my own projects. My personal favorites that I learned were: work breakdown structures, project network graphs, and risk matrices. Also, my favorite in-class exercise was when we had to optimize an example project’s cost and timeline by changing different resource parameters, like the number of people working on different parts of the project.
I swear this wasn’t on purpose, but the timing of this blog is pretty perfect because the 2025 GEL applications for both GEL1 and GEL2 have just opened up for MIT sophomores and juniors. Check that out here! Also, there is a new half semester class called 6.9140 that is being offered this spring, and it is the first ever project management course offered to undergrads at MIT and will teach all the project management skills we just learned at GELcamp.
And with that – thanks for tagging along with me to GELcamp!
- for team bonding purposes, of course back to text ↑
- 1) Project Complexity, Risk, and Human Response and 2) Project Control and Adaptation back to text ↑