• Question: What was the university course for engineering like? Which aspects did you most enjoy/ find the most challenging?

    Asked by hannahgrimes to Alex, Chris, Harriet, Jed, Ken on 14 Mar 2012.
    • Photo: Alexander Zacheshigriva

      Alexander Zacheshigriva answered on 14 Mar 2012:

      The course was quite broad; there are a few directions that you can choose from. And typically you can switch between one and another in the first few years. For starters there are disciplines: Mechanical, Electrical, Civil and Chemical. Than each has sub-division. For example: Mechanical engineering with management, mechanical engineering with renewables, etc.

      The course has a mixture of labs, tutorials and lectures. The labs are of two kind, once where you build things and do experiments (similar to physics experiments in schools) and computer labs, where you use engineering software.
      There are typically 4-6 courses each semester, 1 of them tends to be management of a type (economics, accounting, marketing, etc) and the rest are technical courses. The first few years have a lot of maths. The assessment is mixture of coursework and exams.
      I think as far as the amount of formal teaching hours (i.e. lectures, tutorials and labs) engineering is among the busiest degrees in uni (second to Medicine and Vet). However I don’t think it is right to say that one degree is harder than another. I guess it depends what you are good at. In engineering you have to write few wordy reports or essays. But you do get to do a lot of public speaking when presenting your coursework.

      Some of the labs where we strip and build engines were good fun.

      Most challenging.. Well, there are different types of challenging, things that are hard but enjoyable to master and things that are purely annoying. So the first type is probably mathematics, materials and thermodynamics. I had to spend most time studying these subjects, however they are my favourite now.

      The annoying bits are just some of the lectures that were badly taught. It’s not that the subject is bad, just the teaching wasn’t always great.
      The good thing in uni is that if you don’t like how the subject is taught you can get a book from the library, miss the lectures and do self-study instead. That was my way around a few courses that I didn’t enjoy.

    • Photo: Ken Gibbs

      Ken Gibbs answered on 14 Mar 2012:

      Hi there, Hannah: There were so many different subjects including maths, physics, chemistry, surveying, engineering drawing, practical workshops learning how to use lathes, shaping machines and the like, and so on. Later on, we had courses in electrical, mechanical and civil engineering, later still progressing to specialities such as structures, roads, harbours, railways, fluid mechanics and so on. If you didn’t pass all the subjects in any year, you had to repeat the whole year, so the challenge was to ensure that you didn’t concentrate only on the subjects you enjoyed.

      What did I enjoy most ? I think it was the field trips we occasionally did which showed me more about what I could end up doing rather than any of the theoretical work we did in the lecture halls. Ah yes, and the singing of slightly rude songs that the engineers would sing on the way to (and back from) field visits.

    • Photo: Jed Ramsay

      Jed Ramsay answered on 14 Mar 2012:

      I did a course in River & Coastal Engineering so it was all about what I do in my job everyday. This made it really interesting to me.

      I learnt how to design anything you want to build on the river and also learnt about the issues around flooding and how complex it is to try to solve this – even in the UK where we have quite a bit of money to spend of flooding.

      The most challenging part was trying to study whilst I was working at the same time – as I did the course part time over 3 years. It was hard work, but I was glad I stuck at it.

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