Any Engineers/Engineering Students on here?

[tommo82]

Where are you working, saber?

 

[BullittSV6]

Hey mate, just finished my Elec eng degree last year, and starting my grad job next week. Is it really the case where the hardest part is doing uni, not the actual job itself?

Uni is really just a test of your capacity to learn. If you can learn at uni and pass, you should be able to learn what you need at work.

As a graduate, you start at the bottom. No one cares what degree you've done or what you scored. What counts is experience. I went to Flinders Uni in Adelaide and in 3rd year for the entire second semester I was on my placement. On that 20 week placement I realised that its the experience that counts. Only a fraction of what you learn at uni is ever used and you learn the rest at work.

In the end I'm working at the same place I did my placement. I'm not getting the highest wage, I'm not always in an airconditioned office but I love what I do. I get to design equipment, commission it and make it do whats its designed to do. And I'm learning so much valuable stuff along the way.

So bottom line. Next week don't go in like you own the place. You're at the bottom so you need to work your way up all over again!

 

[MasterOfReality]

Only a fraction of what you learn at uni is ever used and you learn the rest at work.

Depending on what path you take, you do use a fair bit. Probably more from 3rd and 4th year subjects. For instance, I wish I paid a lot more attention in my Mining Rock Mechanics subjects at uni, it would have saved me a fair bit of relearning later on.

So bottom line. Next week don't go in like you own the place. You're at the bottom so you need to work your way up all over again!

Hehe, aint that the truth. I have just reached the stage where my job title has changed to senior engineer, and I have seen plenty of grads come in thinking they are king ****, only to fall splendidly on their faces within 6 months. Working in the mining industry sorts everyone out quick smart, especially smartass grads as all the mining engineering grads usually have to spend a year on crew. But as you said, keep your head down and your mouth shut for the first few years and it will be fine.

 

[jules]

Hey mate, just finished my Elec eng degree last year, and starting my grad job next week. Is it really the case where the hardest part is doing uni, not the actual job itself?

uni is hard because you have to do the work yourself, at your own pace. there is no one looking over your shoulder.

i've got an eng. degree and an MBA, but trust me the eng. degree is much harder.

arts-based degrees, within reason, you can write any old fluffy stuff mostly and your point of view will be accepted to varying degrees and marked accordingly. but in engineering, unless you can sit down and sweat out how to do differential equations and the various other stuff you need to learn, you will fail. there is no BS-ing your way through that stuff - you can either do it or you can't and it takes hard work to learn it.

 

[saber]

Where are you working, saber?

Hey mate, I'm working at a company called Maunsell.

So bottom line. Next week don't go in like you own the place. You're at the bottom so you need to work your way up all over again!

Cheers mate for the advice, got no problems starting from the bottom and working my way up, have had to do it a couple of times in various part time jobs over the years.

Hehe, aint that the truth. I have just reached the stage where my job title has changed to senior engineer, and I have seen plenty of grads come in thinking they are king ****, only to fall splendidly on their faces within 6 months.

Lol, exactly what I don't wanna be doing. The old mans works in the construction industry and said the exact same thing.

Thanks for the advice, seems I need to keep my head down, arse up, mouth shut and go from there.

arts-based degrees, within reason, you can write any old fluffy stuff mostly and your point of view will be accepted to varying degrees and marked accordingly. but in engineering, unless you can sit down and sweat out how to do differential equations and the various other stuff you need to learn, you will fail. there is no BS-ing your way through that stuff - you can either do it or you can't and it takes hard work to learn it.

Amen to that brother!!

 

[peanut buttercups]

im halfway through my civil eng. degree. working for a construction joint in melbourne.

 

[Flat_White]

Anyone know of any PT jobs that uni students can get relative to engineering?

And no, im not interested in selling my life away to a cadetship.

 

[dufus]

Anyone know of any PT jobs that uni students can get relative to engineering?

And no, im not interested in selling my life away to a cadetship.

Huh, wait untill you have done more than 3 weeks of engineering before you decide you can work part time and juggle your work load. Dont think summer school is full time anyway?

 

[The_Plague]

It's enough to see me get an In charge engineers ticket. That will see me able to atleast pick up en electrical engineers job easy and go in charge to if i want too. Dosnt get much higher than that. Next step is mine manager.:yeah:

how do you figure the next step is mine manager?, I would say maintenance manager, electrical engineering bears little resemblance to mine management per se.
For that (DPI mine manager) you will need some of the following:
A DIPLOMA of Surface Coal Mine Management OR a Diploma of Extractive Industries
OR
A Mine Engineering Degree / Graduate Diploma / Masters etc, something to do with mineral engineering directly from uni, civil wont cut it.
OR
None of the above but you must occupy a position above overseer for 2 years in a MINING discipline, a maintenance superintendent role wont cut the mustard.

After that you will need to take the DPI exam for a certificate of competency as a mine manager (manager of mine engineering), if your background is electrical then it will be interesting.
I am guessing you have looked at the application rules that state you will need PRACTICAL experience in open cut mining / underground mining, 3 years for no degree, 1 year with degree.
After passing the written examination, you will then be required to attend an ORAL examination, I just had one for my DPI Cert of Competence as an Open Cut Examiner, to call it hard and pressure cooker is an understatement.

Best of luck with it mate, BTW, don't be tempted to stretch the truth with the DPI, on the forms or in any other manner, read the CMHSA 2002 and CMHSR 2006 and you'll get what I mean :yeah: (you'd also be hard pressed to find a Mine Manager who will lie on these app forms anyway, as they can lose their ticket)
Obtaining a seat in the exam through deception of your experience or qualifications will get you in deep ****, not overly deep but rap across knuckles and maybe a disqualification from sitting for a while.
If you then pass said exams and obtain ticket but are later found to have lied about ANY element of your experience / qualifications, meaning you were ineligible to sit, the DPI will render the qualifications void (certificates of competency are numbered, a lost one costs money to replace) and may charge you under the CMHSA 2002 with an offense against the Act, highest penalty, prison (not likely), mid range penalty, monetary fine and tickets voided (potentially) or at the very least, tickets voided, you blacklisted and banned from obtaining them at any point (HIGHLY LIKELY).
All this is better than forging a ticket though, that just gets you in a world of hurt, there is even a section in the CMHSA about that, it attracts penalty units for you (think $$$$$$$$$$$) and the mine that allowed you to perform as a "competent person in a function required by the regulation" gets a bigger amount of penalty units.

EDIT: If you don't know what the CMHSR and CMHSA are yet, don't stress, but you'll be studying them for about 4 hours per day leading into the exams, along with OHSA 2000, OHSR 2001, EA 2003, ER 2005.

 

[BullittSV6]

Anyone know of any PT jobs that uni students can get relative to engineering?

And no, im not interested in selling my life away to a cadetship.

Huh, wait untill you have done more than 3 weeks of engineering before you decide you can work part time and juggle your work load. Dont think summer school is full time anyway?

Exactly what dufus said. I only did part time work in my final year because I had two full days off in second semester cos I overloaded my first semester. In hindsight I should have used those days to work on my honours project but I don't regret it.

I think I did about 12 weeks but I worked on tools development which was basically Visual Basic programming with excel. Basically I made calculation programs for the full time engineers to use and verify. I didn't do much project work but it was good to be in that support role.

But for your first two years it will be very difficult to get an engineering related part time job. I know that some unis require you to do about 12 full weeks of work in your spare time ie summer, so you may want to check that