Claire Parker.

SINCE MY LAST ARTICLE I have completed my first semester of Chemical and Material Engineering and am positive I made the right decision. Since specialising and having a larger focus on papers that interest me my grades have also improved and ended up with me achieving my best marks so far. I believe this is a representation that I am enjoying my papers since I am much happier to put more effort into each paper.

This semester I am starting to better understand how the two sides of my degree come together. This is because the papers focus on processing through energy and design with the materials focus on mechanics of materials used in these processes. For example, pressures acting inside a pressure vessel. It draws on a lot of static mechanics knowledge gained in part one and shows how the material covered last year can be applied to multiple specialisations.

This semester we have a paper called Managing Design and Communication which is taken by all part two engineers. The focus is on soft skills that will aid you when i n i ndustry. It covers topics such as teamwork, word/ excel skills and communication. It also focuses on ethics and sustainability which are both i mportant issues that will i nf luence every decision made i n the f uture and are topics which can sometimes be overlooked when there is so much emphasis on content.

I am also i n the process of applying for i nternship roles for over the summer period. It has been i nteresting to see what different roles are available for Chemical and Material engineers and where my f uture career could lead.