This is one question I have been asking myself a lot over the last few months. This has been kicked off by several family and friends kids reaching that stage when they look post school to see what they do next and are asking my opinion on doing an engineering degree.
Both my husband and myself come from families with disproportionate numbers of engineers. 12 in total across the two families. I am pretty sure that is not normal! And even more unusually most did/doing technical jobs. So my initial reaction would be to encourage people to go and do engineering. But which one to choose?
I should have done mechanical engineering – without a doubt. I have always loved cars, taking things to bits, building things. However in the early 90s in Scotland – Silicon Glen was booming and being a female engineer was difficult enough never mind going into what was seen as “heavy industry” at that time. So I went into Electronics. By the time I had left university in ’93 the job situation had already started to turn – this was then followed over the next few years by a mass exodus of companies like IBM and Motorola. My first experience of the lack of job security in the electronics industry. But here I am 23 years later still in the industry. It has morphed beyond believe from that time – big names have vanished, others shaken and new names have risen to domination.
But if I had to choose again would I choose electronics looking forward to what he future holds? Probably not.
I think if I was to choose now I would go back to my initial thoughts – mechanical. So much of our lives now are about harnessing energy from different sources. And so many of these eggs are still to be cracked. The ongoing work on harnessing the waves, wind, sun – the mechanical aspects of transforming these energy types into power is key to the sustainability goals globally. Also the transformation of kinetic energy in the motion of cars into storing and powering vehicles has progressed a long way but still has to make that final leap from reliance on fossil fuels or external charging.
Really interested in other peoples opinions.
If you had to choose a degree now what one would you do?
Or would you do one at all!