Civil engineering apprentice Review

Highly skilled work as a hydraulic modeller with no support to little support from senior engineers

Through work i have learnt how nearly everything about hydraulic modelling using InfoWorks ICM and CS software. How to communication with clients and professionals. basic understanding of pricing for bids. understanding and knowledge of running a scheme. university though lots have been learnt its relatively impractical

Pay was hard to live on, work and university was overwhelming and stressful. Its hard to say what you enjoyed when everything was a need.

Poor organisation on the university part first 3 years felt like we were second class compared to other students. university never published work in a timely manor leading to more stress chasing them. university policy is 21 day results back however rarely happened. felt like we were an easy pay check

Lots of support from my employer however like I say inequality was high as I frequently was required to teach individuals (graduate engineers) whom were paid more and provided with higher grade. started with 14,000 year, sometimes due to the way tax was paid out the last couple of months the payment was less that £1000 travel into work wasn't subsidised so i spent about 50% of my wage on that, this lead to extreme stress.

uni policy was to submit work to lecture who is required to check and send back comments however on a number of occasions this wasn't done. lectures also were hard pushed to reply to an email, call or message leading to a sum of many hours just trying to open lines of communication

I don't believe i have gained any knowledge from the degree that i can or will implement into my work however there were some environmental and study modules which may allow me to create conversation in the workplace. For some learning at university is the only way the can understand the topic however engineering is slightly different, its more of a way of thinking, no quick calculation or book can tell you that might need a support, we need to survey that or the pipe is too shallow, it all comes down to common sense and experience. yes later larger calculations are needed but the calculations taught in a degree are so primitive its impractical. Really we should have been taught how to find information such as curtain rules and regulations or even what the language in those documents mean.

Nope, no time, no money, too much stress

Yes

At the end of the day I made it here today and though it was really tough it was still better that going full time, with huge debts, no practical experience and I got paid

Unless you really know what a role entails don't be afraid to apply to join other departments. For me a relative introvert being a hydraulic modeller is great as i take on entire projects where a CAD technician will do parts of one project ect