• Question: What are the most important subjects needed to be an engineer?

    Asked by Amar to Matthew, Neil, Paula, Pete, Philippa on 12 Mar 2015. This question was also asked by Xx_LawdBendtner#3Fan_xX, cal_wba_coyb.
    • Photo: Matthew Gall

      Matthew Gall answered on 12 Mar 2015:

      Hey Amar, great question! I suppose at least in my field, technology, maths and science are pretty important!

    • Photo: Neil Taylor

      Neil Taylor answered on 16 Mar 2015:

      Hi Amar!

      I guess it depends what type of engineer you’d like to be! Industry needs engineers with skills in:-

      mechanical engineering (e.g. for moving parts in cars, or designing pumps)
      electrical engineering (e.g. for electronics, power lines)
      aerodynamics (e.g. for testing a car’s wind resistance in an air tunnel, aeroplanes)
      civil engineering (e.g. bridges, roads)
      biomedical engineering (e.g. developing prosthetic limbs)

      …among others! Some jobs require simply that you have an engineering qualification, others require a particular discipline.

      However, two subjects common to every discipline are Maths and Physics – so I’d select them as the two that are the most important

      One thing to note, though: in the workplace you will typically have to communicate your work/ideas to your colleagues and/or people from other companies. This means that English is really useful too alongside your more sciencey-type subjects!

      Hope this helps!

    • Photo: Philippa Jefferis

      Philippa Jefferis answered on 16 Mar 2015:

      For me maths and physics were the important subjects. However my knowledge of economics has also proved very useful in ensuring I am able to understand how engineering fits into a wider context.

    • Photo: Pete Symons

      Pete Symons answered on 17 Mar 2015:

      Hi Amar,

      At school you need the STEM subjects really, but later on when (and if) you look at engineering as a possible career then this really dependent on the area of engineering you go into, there are so many branches of engineering that you could choose between a lot of subjects. In my job, as well as the usual STEM subjects, a business degree would really help as well!

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