the rough guide to designing your future : career guide : audi design foundation(5.04mb)

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Designing Your

Future

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CreditsWritten: Wendy Grossman

Additional contributions & editing: Richard Craig Design and layout: Peter Buckley

Proofreading: Margaret Doyle Production: Katherine Owers

Publishing Information

This first edition published 2007 by Rough Guides Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL 345 Hudson St, 4th Floor, New York 10014, USA

Email: [email protected]

Distributed by the Penguin Group:

Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL Penguin Putnam, Inc., 375 Hudson Street, NY 10014, USA

Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 1E4

Penguin Group (New Zealand), Cnr Rosedale and Airborne Roads, Albany, Auckland, New Zealand

Printed in Italy by LegoPrint S.p.A. Typeset in Avenir, Minion and Myriad to an original design

by Peter Buckley and Duncan Clark

The publishers and authors have done their best to ensure the accuracy and currency of all information in The Rough Guide to Designing Your Future; however, they can accept no responsibility for any loss or inconvenience sustained by any reader as a result of its

information or advice.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher except for the quotation of brief passages in reviews.

© Rough Guides 2007 Illustrated work profiles and quote boxes excepting p.4, p.10 © ETB

Foreword © Sir James Dyson

96 pages

Designing Your Future

with the assistance of

Promoting the vital contribution of scientists,engineers and technologists

www.etechb.co.uk

The Audi Design Foundation encourages and supports young designers

www.audidesignfoundation.org

www.thalesgroup.com/UK

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Contents

Introduction 1

What’s on Offer 13

Job Opportunities 24

The Learning Matrix 53

Spoilt for Choice? 74

Ways in 81

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Foreword Difficult decisions are not the preserve of adults. At school you are faced with tricky choices too – some of which may impact on the rest of your lives. Art or woodwork? Humanities or science? These were the kind of haphazard decisions I made at school. I opted for art (uninspired by the wonky matchbox holders we were to make in woodwork) and humanities (because I couldn’t see the point of all those formulae in science). Of course, I have spent the rest of my life not only attempting to turn the woolly-headed artist into a scientist, but also cursing the wrongheadedness of a system that forces students into such choices.

This is the reason why I am a fan of Design and Technology. It doesn’t separate out design from technology; but instead recognises that art and science, the practical and the theoretical, can all work together to bring about creative products.

Unfortunately, my own school days were long before the advent of D&T, so for me it took a forward-thinking course at the Royal College of Art to open my eyes to the possibility of design. I entered as an interior design student but came out as an industrial design engineer. The scale and scope of engineering and architecture captured my imagination, and I was drawn to the idea of making things work better. This, for me, is what good design is all about. Whether you are designing textiles to cope with hostile environments, a new medical instrument for the latest keyhole surgery techniques or a leaflet to explain the use

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of emergency evacuation procedures, it’s all about making things work better.

And how do you make things work better? Well, this is the fun bit. Design involves experimenting and trying things out. When I designed the Dyson vacuum cleaner, frustration and instinct made me think that there must be a better system than using clogging paper bags. Yet, this inkling of an idea was not enough. It took many years and thousands of prototypes to get my idea of using cyclones to suck up dust to actually work. Summarised in that way it sounds like hard work (and indeed it was), but it was also very enjoyable. In how many other careers do you get to use your hands and your brains and make things that people actually need?

Careers in design are creative, demanding and fun. These jobs lead to a bright, exciting, profit-able future. We hope this book shows you how you can design your future.

Sir James Dyson

01IntroductionEver get tired of hearing the question “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

S ome 70-year-olds still struggle with this question, but you’re expected to start thinking about an answer at 14. If you have a driving passion for

something, you might already know the answer. If that’s you, congratulations. If, instead, you’re like most people, then you don’t know for sure what you want to do. Which is where this book comes in. Its aim is to help you make choices that will ultimately reward you with a satisfying way of making a living.

You may not have considered a career in science, engi-neering, technology or design. Perhaps you think the subject matter is too hard or would limit what you can do. The truth is the opposite: a good background in any of these subjects can open doors in any sector and lead you to interesting and unexpected work.

Your decisions are more complicated than those of past 1

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generations. First, the world you will work in is chang-ing rapidly because of the Internet and digital revolution, which has always been a part of your life, but barely existed when you were born. Second, the nature of employment itself is changing. Your career will include multiple employ-ers and jobs, and you will always need to keep learning new skills. So don’t write off technical subjects – the fewer choices you close off now, the more options you will have later. And there are big and very diverse opportunities in a host of SET and D&T areas (see p.24) that you are most likely unaware of … which is where this book comes in.

SET, STEM and D&T?

When you start looking into engineering and related disciplines, you will find these subjects variously referred to as SET (Science, Engineering, and Technology), STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Maths), and D&T (Design and Technology). Because this book is geared more towards the engineering and D&T side of things rather than pure science, we will use SET and D&T.

First ImpressionsAren’t all scientific and technological professionals like the boffins I see on TV?Movie and TV scientists and engineers are typically obsessed, unattractive, unkempt, socially inept characters who never have any fun. Even in the mainstream press

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you’ll find engineers disparaged as “boffins” or lambasted for the problems of the Millennium Bridge. Well, guess why? The arts graduates who make up most of the media are the same people who made fun of the smart kids who liked science when they were at school. Scientists now realise (like many other groups in society) that they have to work very hard if they are to receive fair representation by a commercially driven media. Media bias is real but it doesn’t mean it is right.

People make fun of what they don’t understand. Couple that lack with the pressure of short deadlines and the fashion for defining “balanced” coverage as an argument between opposing views, and you get lazy journalism that relies on stereotypes that reflect prejudice rather than an honest picture of what the scientific professions are like.

Teleportation

Star Trek’s “Beam me up, Scotty” is fantasy, but scientists are researching information teleportation to underpin quantum net-working, which could transmit data far faster than today’s commu-nications networks. A team in Denmark used light to transmit the quantum state of a group of atoms to another group twenty inches away.

In real life, most scientists and engineers do not match the stereotype. What is typical instead is a passion for under-standing how things work and using that understanding to improve the world around them. These are the people who invented text messaging and YouTube, who built

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the London Eye (see opposite), who create energy-saving light bulbs and recycling technologies, explain apparently impossible phenomena such as firewalking, and research new materials to improve athletics shoes.

Which would you rather be? The person who writes or reads about the things that other people do, or the person who does the things that other people write about?

The Indirect RouteProfile: Peter Cochrane, business angel, consultant, and former head of research for British Telecom (www.cochrane.org.uk)

“I grew up in a mining village in a house with three books in it: a Bible, a dictionary and an atlas. I failed my exams, left school at 15, was turned down for my dream job as a radio shop assistant, and wound up at BT digging holes for cables. At 19, I started night school and got help with mathematics, which had held me back all along. Suddenly, I had City & Guilds, HNC, and a couple of A-levels. At 22, I took five years off to go to university and get my degree while my wife worked night and day to support us. When I went back to BT, I was assigned to research switching systems. I finished an MSc and a PhD, and did some teaching and consultancy on the side, becoming head of research in 1990. I’m never really happy unless my ideas are shock-ing someone.”

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I’m not Einstein. Will I be able to handle the study?Some careers – such as astrophysics or brain surgery – do require long years of academic study, but apprenticeships, on-the-job training, and National Vocational Qualifications offer opportunities to enter science and engineering profes-sions at different levels. All of these provide practical expe-rience that you will need even if you complete academic degrees. If classroom learning feels like more than you can handle right now, consider an Apprenticeship (see p.87 for more), which will cut to the chase a lot quicker. If you feel like it you can always return to study later.

You may also be smarter than you think and simply need help to get over a particular subject – often mathematics – that’s holding you back (see box opposite).

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Employers go for their own kind: nerdy boys. Ethnic minorities and women like me won’t stand a chance in job interviews, will we?Your chances are getting better all the time. According to the Royal Society, though the vast majority of those employed in SET-related jobs in 2002–03 were white males, the 1990s saw a significant increase in non-white ethnic minority participation. Employers are going to consider-able lengths to attract a diverse workforce, especially since the passage of the Race Relations Amendment Act of 2002. Indeed, recent research has shown that if your origins are Chinese, Indian or African your chances of working in SET are higher than for comparable English white students. If you are from other non-white communities, more employ-ers than ever are running diversity programmes that may

You Are Not Alone

Many organisations offer help, particularly for women both in terms of approaching a career and mentoring once in a profession. Candid discussion of pros and cons (including sexism) for women studying SET-related subjects before employment can be found on the NUS women’s campaign website (www.nusonline.co.uk /campaigns/womenscampaign/Archive). The UK Resource Centre for Women in SET has a role model database and also lists the many other organisations that offer similar profiles at www.setwomenresource.org.uk/en/role_models/other_role_models). Read their stories and be both inspired and forewarned. Plenty of others have blazed a trail and are now working in senior managerial roles. Check these out and also Women Into Science, Engineering and Construction (www.wisecampaign.org.uk).

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help you to be a trailblazer. Discrimination is impractical: industry needs as many skilled, talented workers as it can get. The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry warned in October 2006 that the country faces a manpower crisis because of the drop in numbers of graduates with good science degrees. Increased diversity in SET and design benefits everyone.

For all these reasons, you should not give up on a subject that interests you just because you think you may encounter prejudice. Nor should you underestimate yourself: you may lack confidence rather than ability, so ask for help. Finally, look out for the many mentoring schemes that exist – there may already be someone who has made the journey you are considering and they may be willing to help you over any difficulties you are experiencing.

Why don’t I go for a career in the media or finance instead? It won’t require any training and will be a lot more interesting.There is no such thing as a high-paying, fun, high-profile job that requires no training, knowledge or skill. (Even Big Brother contestants have to acquire media-handling skills when outside.) Just think of the enormous competi-tion for entry-level media and finance jobs. The upshot of that stampede is that pay can be poor, the hours are long and many jobs are not the glamorous experience you may imagine. Most scientific professions offer a lot more scope for creativity and innovation than, say, a media job selling

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advertising space or an entry-level finance job scanning and registering invoices. SET training will open doors for you in any sector, including media and finance, where SET training can improve your career prospects. And if money is still a prime consideration, you should note that accord-ing to the Engineering and Technology Board (ETB), www .etechb.co.uk, 25 percent of SET graduates are working in finance and business where pay is often the highest of all and where maths and technical know-how are richly prized.

I have a job that is great fun, very varied, fascinating and even

well-paid – more people should do it!

Nicky, engineer, Thales e-Security

Jobs in SET and design are not just about working with machinery in a facto-ry – only 26 percent of SET graduates work in manu-facturing. What could be more exciting than design-ing new products that millions of people will use or that will save lives? Think of all the things you use every day that were designed and created by scientists, engineers and/or technologists: the Internet, iPods, cars, telephones, wash-

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ing machines, medications, light bulbs, bridges, shampoo. Scientists and engineers gave us space travel, try to avert global warming, and study the origins of life. Without them, there would be no finance or media sectors.

Does taking science, technology, engineering or design courses at school and university mean I have to work in these sectors? Certainly not. People with backgrounds in these subjects go into all kinds of fields. Succeeding at any of these subjects shows that you have the ability to learn, study and use your imagination – assets that apply in every sector. Dropping these subjects, however, can close options you may later wish you had. The Internet may seem to you like it’s always been there, but to the world at large it’s new technology that is changing everything.

Don’t be put off by stereotypes. If you study engineering you will be able to work in many sectors … . I’ve been involved with projects ranging from robotics to healthcare to construction and environment. Whatever

sector you choose you will be working with and for people.

Penny, university lecturer, Dept of Engineering Science, Oxford University

In your working life you are likely not only to change jobs several times but to change the kind of work you do because the sector you’re working in has changed. The more varied

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your early education and the more flexible you are, the more choices you will have in facing these challenges.

Emirates Stadium

Opened in July 2006, the Emirates Stadium in London, the home of Arsenal Football Club, is a remarkable feet of engineering. This £390 million, 60,000-seat stadium presented the engineers behind its construction with many unique challenges. Most notable was the challenge of fitting the four-tier elliptical seating bowl into the triangular site while staying within the planners’ 46-metre height limit. The design, which took five years to create, also includes features intended to lessen the stadium’s environmental impact.Among those involved was the 35-year-old structural engineer Paul Westbury, who became a partner of Buro Happold at only 30..

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What kinds of jobs come under these headings?The range is enormous. There are science, technology, engineering and design jobs in almost every sector, not just the traditional and obvious ones such as aerospace, automotive, information and communications technology, construction, electronics, healthcare, transport and phar-maceuticals. And this can lead to some pretty interesting assignments that might relate to other interests such as sport.

Engineers and technicians run the cameras and sound-recording equipment for television, design and build large machinery for agriculture, and design the technology that keeps patients alive in intensive care. And that list doesn’t include less obvious sectors like business and finance, law, government agencies, charities, or activist non-govern-mental organisations, where knowledge of these subjects can lead you into specialisations where you’ll be much in demand – 24 percent of the top executives at FTSE 100 companies completed SET qualifications at university. Exercising your creativity by studying design could even help you come up with ideas on which to found your own business.

And next?Dip in and out of this book and see if anything catches your eye. What’s on Offer (p.13) takes you through some of the things in SET and D&T roles that appeal to those who work in them. More detail on specific D&T and SET

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sectors is given in Job Opportunities (p.24), whereas how educational choices can relate to those job opportunities is outlined in The Learning Matrix (p.53). All of this could leave you feeling Spoilt for Choice? (p.74), which offers a few hints on pursuing unconventional or specialised options, whereas Ways in (p.81) picks up the threads from The Learning Matrix to run through the pros and cons of the various routes into SET and D&T.

The most important “next”, though, is not this book but almost certainly the Internet. We’ve given a few recom-mendations of interesting and useful places to look, but this is only scratching the surface. There’s no excuse not to be informed, so look there and keep looking. Whether you decide D&T or SET is for you or not, make the time to research your future and take any decisions based upon the best information and advice. You owe it to yourself. Most of the best things in life owe something to design. Why shouldn’t yours?

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02What’s on Offer

W hat matters in a job? SET and D&T professions have to compete with all other kinds of employers for the skills of young and old,

and they compare well in many areas. But whereas the attractions of being a successful popstar or actor are well advertised, the benefits of an SET or D&T career don’t get the same kind of publicity. They are worth thinking about, and in any case factors such as working environment, work-life balance, creativity, teamwork and travel should be considered in respect of any career path. How do D&T and SET careers measure up?

Working EnvironmentMany industry and technology sectors are largely the domain of big companies. What does that mean for an

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employee? Long-time employees of the world’s biggest multinationals often report that they’ve had many differ-ent jobs all within one company. This makes it easier to progress up the career ladder than in a small company, where opportunities are fewer and older staff may be entrenched. Big companies can offer better benefits such as private health insurance, paid sick leave, paid holidays and an upward career path. In addition, large companies have the resources to back risky but interesting projects and get successful results into the hands of millions. There were many MP3 players before Apple’s iPod, but good design and excellent marketing made the iPod the one that changed portable music. Small companies have advantages, too. You will have much more direct contact with owners and man-agers. A project that would be one among thousands in a large company may be a small company’s top priority. Small companies are also generally quicker to change direction in response to outside change. Charities and non-governmen-tal organisations are likely to pay less with fewer benefits but give you the satisfaction of helping people or furthering a particular political agenda.

If you dream of one day being self-employed or running your own business, these options are probably best explored later. To succeed, you will generally need experience in your chosen field and some understanding of business. You will also need fresh ideas that will make your offerings unique in the market, and you will need industry contacts, not least because you will also need funding.

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Creativity and TeamworkThe biggest surprise about SET and design careers may be this: they all require good people skills, good communi-cation skills and the ability to work in teams. The media image of the solitary, unsocialised, unkempt genius toiling away late at night at his computer or in her lab, with no social life and no outside interests, is almost wholly wrong. Yes, people in these careers may spend long hours into the night trying to solve problems by themselves. But almost always those solutions will be small pieces of a project that must fit into a larger whole: the hydraulic systems for a car, the vibration dampening in a tennis racquet, the airflow in a building. Even software programmers, who are notori-ously solitary, must devise solutions that work together with those of others; modern software is often written by hundreds of people and is as complex as building a bridge.

Sitting down with other staff to brainstorm how something can be done, and coming up with solutions to

problems which have never been solved before.Alison, transportation consultant, Faber Maunsell, on what a

typical day involves

Something like 5,000 people worked to create Windows XP, for example, about 2,000 of them programmers. The very first work on its predecessor, Windows NT, was done by a small, creative design team of about eight people.

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Apple’s iPod was overseen by a team of only twenty within Apple – but the company also hired many subcontractor companies, each of which fielded teams of perhaps dozens of people to contribute the hardware design and the user interface software.

Being creative in such circumstances demands flexibility, logic, clear thinking, discipline and, as already noted, great communications skills. You must be able to think through a problem logically and come up with a workable solution that fits constraints such as time, budget, size and materials. It’s no good, for example, designing a fuel system for a car that relies on the availability of a perpetual motion machine – these do not exist, and cannot exist according to the laws of physics. Similarly, if the desired price point for a product will be under £1, you’re unlikely to be able to make it out of diamonds and platinum.

It is great being part of a team, working together and

seeing problems solved. A site office is never as serious as

a normal office, it’s always a good laugh!

Lucy, building design coordinator, John Sisk & Son Ltd

Once you have solved those sorts of problems, you must be able to explain your solution to your teammates and to your manager. You must be able to articulate the problem you tried to solve, the approaches

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you tried, the solution you’ve come up with, how it works, why you believe it’s right, and how it will work with the rest of the design. You will also have to be able to deal with criti-cism and be prepared to modify your thinking according to feedback from your teammates. When they, in turn, discuss their work with you, you need to be master of the art of critiquing their work without alienating them.

International TravelIn the 1990s it was commonly believed that the Internet would end travel. Why get on a plane when you can video-conference? Because, it turns out, humans have more trust in people they meet face-to-face. Cheaper long-distance communications have encouraged – and been encouraged by – the trend toward globalisation. And although globali-sation means jobs from the UK are being outsourced to cheaper locations abroad, it also means increased oppor-tunities to travel or work overseas. In general, though not always, the larger the company the more likely it is to have international opportunities, though don’t overlook non-governmental organisations. The more skilled you are – particularly in an SET or design discipline – the more valuable your skills will be internationally. For example, a chartered engineer working in agriculture may become responsible for a particular country or group of countries. A technical specialist in the automotive industry may work on reducing emissions with colleagues from all over the world. A graduate recruit with a company like Atkins, the

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UK’s largest engineering consultancy, might spend his first year working on a major UK project – and his second man-aging projects in Bahrain.

International travel as part of a job based in the UK is simple compared to working abroad temporarily or permanently. If the latter is your interest, the Prospects website (www.prospects.ac.uk) has good advice. There is a lot to gain from working abroad, such as new perspectives from living under a different legal and economic system in

In the Navy…Profile: Richard, marine engineer officer, Royal Navy

“I am directly responsible for ensuring our marine services and propulsion plant are available to the Captain through a switch or a lever. I manage the day-to-day aspects of the Marine Engineering Department, a team of forty technicians, all with diverse backgrounds and experience. It really is a team effort to keep the complex machine that is a modern warship operational at sea.I have seen some of the world’s most amazing places, including Dubai, Cairo, Rio de Janeiro, West Africa, and the Antarctic. I have also taken advantage of the numerous sporting and adventur-ous training activities available, from mountain biking and hiking in Snowdonia to participating in the RN Ski Championships in Europe. I have built up a vast array of experience in a relatively short time, and should I decide to pursue a civilian career the skills I have developed are highly sought after by many employers.”

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a different culture. However, expect difficulties adjusting, and be prepared to be flexible. For both international travel and working overseas, studying a foreign language – any foreign language – will help you when you need to acquire language skills for your destination country.

More specific help is available for those seeking to work abroad than for those seeking international travel; for the latter, you’ll need to read the job descriptions and careers information offered by individual companies, international organisations such as the World Health Organisation or the World Bank, European Union institutions, and UK govern-ment departments. The British Council (www.britishcouncil .org) provides information and assistance finding voca-tional education, work experience and training abroad.

MoneyYour employment prospects are likely to be somewhat brighter than in recent years. The Association of Graduate Recruiters, which conducts twice-yearly surveys of its employer members, mostly large companies and organisa-tions, expected the number of vacancies to rise 14.6 percent overall in 2006 compared to the previous year, making 2006 the third consecutive year of growth. More than half of the employers surveyed expected to hire more graduates in 2006 than in 2005. A lot of this growth is happening in SET.

SET jobs command some of the better starting salaries. The average salary for all types of jobs in 2005 was £17,029. But IT and mechanical engineering, the highest paid of the

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SET disciplines, had a median starting salary of £22,000, considerably below the top earner, investment banking (£35,000), but coming in seventh overall. Civil engineer-ing, science, research and development, and electrical/electronic engineering all had median starting salaries of £21,000. Starting salaries for graduate engineers average around £19,000, above the typical graduate starting salary of £16,500. Graduates in science don’t do quite as well; Prospects UK (www.prospects.ac.uk), the graduate careers website, found that in 2004 computer science graduates averaged £18,046, with mathematics, physics and chemistry graduates all earning £500 to £1,000 less. Nonetheless, a recent study found that graduates in these disciplines earn up to thirty percent more than those with just A-levels and also twice as much more as a History or English graduate.

Reports on pay vary. The Association of Graduate Recruiters says that although engineering salaries have increased over the past few years, they remain well below the £60,000+ that legal and consulting firms pay and even the £35,000 salaries to be found in the oil, professional services and construction sectors. Even so, engineering disciplines account for six out of the top twelve gradu-ate salaries. The Office for National Statistics found that in 2002 the average annual gross earnings of professional engineers were £33,300.

The Engineering and Technology Board (www.etechb .co.uk) found much more positive results for registered engineers in 2005; annual gross earnings averaged £53,000, although registered engineers are typically older and more advanced in their careers. Top chartered engineers can

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earn over £70,000 a year, and the Institute of Chemical Engineers’ salary survey shows that its members’ salaries are second only to doctors and solicitors, with manag-ing directors in chemicals or power earning £100,000 to £150,000. Engineering is a field where increasing skill and experience, as well as qualifications, are valued. If those media jobs still look appealing, consider this: in 2005, according to the National Union of Journalists, a junior reporter’s average salary was £20,780, and given luck, talent and hard work, might eventually rise to £39,800.

Work and LifeThe work-life balance is a key area for concern across all sectors going into the twenty-first century. There is a common perception that many SET and design careers demand long hours – a concern to anyone interested in balancing work and family life. The truth is, long hours are a UK fixture in many sectors. Media jobs are particularly unforgiving. If you buy a newspaper on Boxing Day, some-one worked on Christmas to get the day’s news onto those pages. In both media and show business you are the person who provides the entertainment other people enjoy during their leisure and holiday time; your own holidays must be when others are working. And because there is so much competition for media jobs, the situation is less likely to improve than in other sectors.

The issue is still a live one for SET and D&T sectors. Women in particular tend to foresee this type of conflict,

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chapter 2since decades of feminism can’t change the biological fact that they will be the ones who give birth. Many career women still report that they do the lion’s share of family management and household jobs. But the work-life balance affects everyone, and government programmes increas-ingly recognise this. In a 2003 study of chartered surveyors, for example, 68 percent of men said that childcare respon-sibility had some impact on their working lives.

Flexible working hours are great – come and go as I please (within limits) and get extra days holiday if I work

too much! Recreational activities provided on site … . I never imagined my job being so fulfilling or

satisfying. It pays well too, but job satisfaction is definitely the best thing!

John, detector systems engineer, CCLRC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory

The hours in IT are particularly long. Almost every suc-cessful product’s back story illustrates just how little sleep its developers got. The culture around IT start-ups espe-cially assumes nothing matters but shipping the product. Some other SET areas are notoriously demanding. The construction industry, for example, is known for its cul-ture of long hours. The early years of a medical career are famously marked by terrible pay and less sleep. However, unlike IT, the hours in medicine tend to improve as your career progresses.

In general, though, employers are tending to recognise that employees are more productive and less frequently absent if working practices are more flexible. It can cost

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an average of £4,300 to recruit and train a new employee; with that kind of investment, especially if the employee has hard-to-replace skills, it is cheaper to retain employees by giving them more choice in working arrangements. Schemes are also being developed in universities where in the past careers in research have suffered from breaks for childcare. Also, The Year In Industry (www.yini.org.uk) now organises a scheme for women returners.

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03Job OpportunitiesAerospace and DefenceEver since Samuel Franklin Cody made the world’s first officially recognised powered flight in 1908 at Farnborough, the UK has had a thriving aerospace industry, which now employs over 120,000 people and generates over £4 bil-lion in revenue. Those figures are without the significant numbers of aerospace and defence jobs in the military. Jobs in this sector include designing and integrating aircraft systems, maintaining flight readiness of both commercial and military aircraft, and designing computer-aided flight-tracking systems and pilots’ equipment.

Besides key employers such as the military, BAE Systems, Thales, Rolls-Royce, Boeing and Airbus, you also find small companies such as Surrey Satellite Technology Limited, which designs and deploys low-cost, lightweight satellites

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that, among other things, are helping track global disasters and environmental change. In addition, the EU is currently funding the massive Galileo project, which between 2007 and 2010 will deploy some thirty satellites to compete with the US’s Global Positioning System and open up an entirely new market for location systems.

We can’t just become a country of service industry employees; somebody has to make something!!

Ciaran, drawing office team leader, BAE Systems

British space science is funded through the Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council, in collaboration with the European Space Agency, and includes teams working on missions to the moon, Mars, Saturn and Venus, as well as

Space: Galileo global navigation system

NASA has competition. Martin Unwin, 38, is helping reinvent the satellite industry by designing and launching low-cost, lightweight satellites he calls “PCs in space”. A senior engineer at Surrey Satellite Technology Limited, Unwin completed a BSc from Lancaster University in 1989 in physical electronic engineering and a PhD at Surrey Space Center.

SSTL created the test satellite for the Galileo Joint Undertaking, a thirty-satellite, !2.3 billion European competitor to the US’s Global Positioning System, to be launched in 2008. Galileo is expected to usher in a new generation of applications for global navigation sat-ellite systems such as tracking deforestation and improved atmos-pheric modelling. In his current research, Unwin uses GPS signals’ reflections off ocean, ice and land to study their surfaces.

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research into exoplanets – planets that circle suns outside our galaxy. You can enter this sector, like many others, either via apprenticeships or via an academic degree.

www.just4Aviation.net www.aviationjobsearch.com These two sites are amongst

several industry-specific recruitment sites. Follow the menus at www .scenta.co.uk to find a wide range of profiles emphasising the value of professional registration and mentoring.

Flight PathProfile: Craig, aero-dynamicist, Eurofighter Typhoon, BAE Systems

“I’ve had a zest for aviation ever since childhood, and developed a knack for flight mechanics science at university. Links at university with the Royal Aeronautical Society and with BAE Systems prepared me for an active and rewarding relationship with both organisations. BAE’s graduate entry route into engineering is a two-year Graduate Development Framework, and this programme reinforced my inter-personal and professional skills. Off the job, learning to fly in south-ern California provided me with a sound understanding of practical flying issues, and gave me a fantastic time, too. I’d advise anyone considering my sort of career to do the same: gain flying experience wherever you can so that you can physically interpret what might otherwise just look like plain maths – and so you can enjoy it, too. Now I support wind tunnel trials to obtain aerodynamic stability and control model data for new stores configurations. I also assist with the flight-test validation of aerodynamic stability and control models.”

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job opportunities www.sbac.co.uk The Society of British Aerospace Companies is

a corporate-feeling industry site pointing to intriguing new areas of development such as sustainable aviation.

www.rafcareers.com The Royal Air Force Careers website gives a broad view of what RAF life is like, from topics like socialising (sport is well catered for) through to job profiles for such areas as air cartographer or weapon technician.

www.bnsc.gov.uk The British National Space Centre has an excellent website which manages to convey the fascination of those working in the field. Follow the links through for students and you’ll find a good overview of prospects, including how to become an astronaut and some good role profiles, such as the woman whose work involves “sitting by a PC making occasional whooping or blubbing sounds” tuning into the mysteries of the universe.

Agriculture Hate the idea of a desk job? Think working would be OK as long as you could spend every day outdoors? Agriculture means a lot more than farming; this sector is made up of seventeen different industries, including horticulture, landscaping, fisheries management, environmental con-servation, floristry, animal technology and even veterinary nursing. Working in agriculture, you could farm fish or manage a working forest, selecting which trees need to be thinned and breaking out the chainsaws. You could also work with animals: the agricultural livestock industry includes the production of beef, sheep, dairy, pigs, poultry and eggs. Land-based engineers work with the many types of machinery used in these many sectors.

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The thirty years between the 1960s and the 1990s saw a huge change in agriculture, as the traditional small, mixed-production family farms were bought up by large compa-nies that converted them to specialise in just one or two specific areas of production. All areas of agriculture became more intensive and more efficient. In the last decade, how-ever, the organic farming movement and concerns over practices such as battery poultry production have begun to cause the pendulum to swing back.

Land-based and environmental careers suit people who can combine technical knowledge with practical skills, although, contrary to what you might expect, you can also enter the industry after earning a degree. Apprenticeships in many areas of agriculture are run by Lantra, the Sector Skills Council for the Environmental and Land-based Sector. It isn’t easy to name key employers; many, if not most, agriculture businesses are very small, with fewer than ten staff. Information targeted at those looking for career help is offered at ajobin.com.

www.lantra.co.uk For each area of agriculture Lantra has an occupational and functional map; these can give you a good picture of a sector, including the kinds of jobs available and some idea of what kinds of employers you’ll find.

www.ajobin.com The first one-stop shop for agricultural job information is breezy and uncluttered. Its short accounts of jobs from areas as diverse as fencing or production horticulture frequently stress the potential to be your own boss.

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Automotive Despite a general dearth of UK-based owners, this country still produces two million vehicles every year, and seven of the world’s top eight manufacturers have bases here. The UK remains at the forefront of technical development and is a global leader in component manufacturing. Approximately forty percent of American and Japanese investment in Europe’s automotive sector comes to the UK.

The sector is worth £46 billion a year and employs 800,000 people; it has more employment opportunities than either aerospace or oil and gas. Globally, the automo-tive industry is the world’s largest manufacturing industry; its worth is conservatively estimated at £500 billion a year.

Key employers in this sector include more than just the well-known manufacturer names such as Audi, DaimlerChrysler, Honda and Ford and large dealer chains such as Ryland. Less well-known names include Torotrak, which designs and develops infinitely variable transmission systems; and the repair and maintenance chain Marshalls. You can enter via either an apprenticeship or a degree, which will include a year’s work in the industry; there are also graduate apprenticeships designed to bridge the gap between degree and first job. A number of apprenticeship programmes leading to NVQ Levels 1 to 5 are administered by Carter & Carter Group’s Emtec division (www.carter-and -carter.com). As of July 2006 women make up only one to two percent of apprentices in the motor industry, but ini-tiatives to improve that are afoot. Becoming a motorsport

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technician is possible at any of a number of colleges across the UK; you need four GCSEs at grade C or above. If you’re planning to study engineering, try The Year In Industry scheme (www.yini.org.uk), which provides paid gap-year placements and is active in this sector.

www.remittraining.co.uk The best place to find more about training, placement and recruitment.

www.the-mia.com The Motorsport Industry Association is the best source for information about training to be a motorsport technician.

On the road…Profile: Naomi, automotive engineer, Arup

“I get to crash cars for a living. It’s incredi-bly exciting, and I know that I’m prevent-ing people from being injured and killed in the real world. More formally, I work in the vehicle design group at Arup as an automotive engineer. I design, analyse and test the crash structures of cars. I am also involved in investigating road traffic accidents, and I am developing an inter-est in biomechanics.I did the Year in Industry scheme in my gap year. It’s really important to understand what an engineer does before going to university – and it’s fun. While I was there, the Potter’s Bar rail crash occurred, and I was involved in the investigation. I felt privileged to be able to work on the project and provide the survivors and the families of those who died with answers to what happened. My goal is to achieve chartered status, which requires a Masters in Mechanical Engineering.”

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Construction The British construction industry is ranked in the top ten worldwide, employs over two million people, and provides a tenth of this country’s gross domestic product. Few industries have as much direct impact on the world we live in: the construction industry builds our homes and creates our skylines and public spaces. Jobs in this industry include assessing the environmental impact of projects, designing and planning, research and maintenance. Employment opportunities exist at every skill or educational level, from craft workers to civil engineers with advanced degrees.

There is a massive office building in Pretoria that cantilevers over a

cliff as you approach Pretoria from the south. I asked my mother: “Who

built that?” She replied that it was a civil engineer, and I decided to

become one.Claude, civil engineer, Birse Rail, on

what attracted him to his job

Many of the thousands of young people who enter the industry every year start as apprentices and become tech-nicians, who are needed in every construction project to support the work of engineers, architects and surveyors. Career progress is always possible; you could enter as a craftsperson and wind up a chartered engineer. A good degree from a good university can help you enormously;

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but work experience is as important or even more so. Summer jobs during your university years can lead to a permanent job offer when you graduate.

Key employers show the industry’s range. The building and design company Buro Happold, the company that built the new Arsenal Emirates Stadium that opened in London in July 2006, also redeveloped Ascot race course. Among the company’s other projects around the world are schools, museum galleries, airport lounges and housing develop-ments. The structural design consultant Bianchi Morley has designed 23 stadiums and arenas around the world, including the retractable roof that will be installed over Wimbledon’s Centre Court for the 2008 Championships. The service company Street Crane Xpress provides equip-ment and bespoke solutions for all kinds of materials handling systems; it will, for example, build the actual Wimbledon roof, and it designed lifting equipment for Sheffield’s Energy Recovery Facility. Alpine is a leading supplier of products and services for the building compo-nent industry whose products have been used in more than seven million homes. The company continues to invest millions in developing computer programs not only to help engineers design structural building components but to control automated machinery such as saws and component cutters. (Also see, “What is an Engineer?” p.37)

www.bconstructive.co.uk/careers/ is the best place to start, with a very well-organised site that covers all the questions you are likely to have about education and job specifics.

YOU’D BE SURPRISEDWHERE YOU FIND US…

You may not have heard of Thales, but we’re actually integral to much

of the electronics technology that makes a difference

to the world around you. We’re leaders in many sectors and we offer a wide range of graduate opportunities.

Why not visit our website and contact our Graduate Recruitment team to find

out more.

www.thalesgroup.com/uk

The world is safer with Thales

Designing_your_future_inserts.in1 1 16/1/07 12:10:23 pm

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www.cibse.org Follow the careers menu to find a convincing answer (affirmative of course) to the question, “Why become a building services engineer?”

www.best-ltd.co.uk This is the place to look for apprenticeships in the areas of plumbing, air-conditioning and heating industries.

www.abe.org.uk This education site offers little on careers but gives pointers on NVQs and its specialised building engineers degree.

ElectronicsStill interested in that media job? Electronics offers a dif-ferent way of working in the media other than getting in front of the camera or radio microphone: sound and audio technicians. Technical operators record and mix sound on location and in the studio and operate cameras or light studio sets. The BBC’s research organisation is responsible for many technical achievements in the electronics field. However, when most people think of electronics they think of engineers; this sector overlaps somewhat with commu-nications and telecoms and a great deal with IT. Electronics engineers design, assemble and test integrated circuits that are used in products from computers and televisions to controls for heating systems. There is hardly an industry you can’t work in with an electronics background. However, there are many other types of electronics besides comput-ers; electronic and electrical engineers design and test

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systems used in scientific research into particle physics and astronomy, work in the automotive industry, and maintain many types of control systems.

Electrical engineering technicians support engineers’ work. Many key employers in electronics are the obvious US-based multinational IT companies and their UK or Irish subsidiaries: IBM, Microsoft, Google, Apple, Hewlett-Packard, Dell. These companies employ hundreds of thou-

An engineer’s life…Profile: William, project engineer, EDF Energy

“As soon as I completed the two-year graduate engineering scheme, I was placed in a position of responsibility managing the electrical infrastructure at one of London’s airports. I am currently managing major refurbishment of the airport’s high-voltage and low-voltage infrastructure over the next couple of years. Not easy when you’re trying to keep the run-way lights on! I also manage the client interface and all operations and maintenance activities. The most satisfying aspect of this job is the responsibility … and lots of it.EDF Energy is recognised as a “learning business”, and it’s very focused on developing its people. The graduate development scheme (www.edfenergygraduates.com) provided excellent introductory management training, coupled with technical train-ing. Before I joined EDF Energy, I studied electrical and electronic engineering at Queen’s University, Belfast, specialising in power engineering.If you’re interested in my career, get your hands dirty. Be flexible.And don’t be afraid to ask stupid questions.”

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sands of people with scientific and technical backgrounds from pure mathematics to psychology and design. This list barely scratches the surface of electronics companies. There are more American big names: General Electric, Motorola, Intel, AMD and Texas Instruments. There are Asian giants: Samsung, Fujitsu, Sony, Toshiba, Hitachi, Matsushita. There are the European manufacturers: Nokia, Ericsson, Siemens and Philips. Britain’s own biggest name in electronics, Marconi, sold some of its businesses to Ericsson in January 2006, but the communications support services part of the company remains under the new name of Telent.

Traditionally, kids experimented with building circuits and often discovered their interest in electronics through amateur (ham) radio. These days, concern over safety means that hands-on activities are less common. But elec-tronics and electrical engineers and technicians in all fields still need strong technical skills and a logical and methodi-cal approach to work. Graduates may have an easier time, but work experience is valued, and you may be able to enter the profession with only A-levels as an apprentice and gain

Neural Networks

Many of today’s technologies are designed to emulate biological systems. Neural networks attempt to create artificial intelligence by copying the human brain’s way of processing information so that many highly interconnected nodes work together to solve prob-lems. Also like the human brain, neural networks are intended to learn from previous experience.

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sponsorship for degree study. www.iee.org/EduCareers/Schools, which is part of the

Institution of Engineering and Technology’s site, provides some basic background on career paths in this sector as well as a lot of very useful links.

www.careers-scotland.org.uk provides more detail on the kinds of skills and background you need in electronic engineering as well as apprenticeships. Scotland, particularly Fife, north of Edinburgh (where the company Agilent is based) and the area around Greenock, is strong in this sector.

www.prospects.ac.uk also provides a close-up view of an electronics career, including starting salaries (£17,570 to £27,000 for graduates, whereas www.connexions-direct.com/jobs4u has more profiles and useful links.

Energy and Utilities The formerly stable and by reputation rather dull energy industry is in the middle of its biggest shake-up since its creation in the nineteenth century, driven by two different trends. First: governments worldwide are deregulating the industry, opening the way for new competition. Second: concern for the environment is forcing the industry to devel-op new technologies to assure its future. Encompassing the supply of electricity, natural gas and water to domestic and industrial customers, this sector’s biggest employers include such famous names as Thames Water, Centrica (formerly British Gas), EDF Energy (formerly Seeboard), United Utilities, British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL) and Bifta.

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These employers all need skilled engineers and technicians, as well as scientists. The utilities sector also includes water utilities and waste management.

Energy companies generate, transmit and distribute electricity and gas, and workers in these areas maintain

What Is an Engineer?

The rather outdated popular perception of an engineer is of someone covered in grease working on heavy machinery. A few mechanical engineers do work like that, but in fact, an engineer is anyone who applies the principles of science and mathematics to create economical solutions to technical problems.

Therefore the term “engineer” applies to a bewildering variety of science-based disciplines. Engineers work in fields as diverse as aerospace and agriculture, health and safety and nuclear power. Civil engineers build bridges, water supply systems and roads. Agricultural engineers develop ways to conserve soil and design machinery. Electrical and electronic engineers test and design computer hardware, lighting systems and the electrical systems in automobiles. Chemical engineers are even more varied, doing everything from designing new food products and developing new plastics to working in biotechnology to create tomorrow’s new medical treatments.

There is a professional body for each of these areas which offers the opportunity to become registered or chartered. This qualification is highly prized, both by employers and by the engineers themselves, who regard it as significant recognition by their peers. A good place to start is www.scenta.co.uk, which profiles many sectors in the context of articles on SET topics of general interest. For any spe-cialist area, chances are there is a dedicated institute or chartered body, many of whom are listed as strategic partners of Scenta’s par-ent body, the Engineering and Technology Board (www.etechb.co.uk).

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and test equipment, diagnose and resolve faults, and need a practical aptitude for mechanical processes. In order to understand the principles of transmission and distribution, workers in these fields need a basic knowledge of physics and maths. You will need to be computer literate and have good numerical ability. All these jobs require the ability to learn and apply technical information.

Engineering is never boring, and it has given me a very varied and interesting career with plenty of

opportunities for growth through travel and learning.Nicola, integrity engineer, E. ON UK

In general, most people employed in this industry will have gained the qualifications they need through an apprentice-ship, vocational qualification or a degree at the beginning of their careers, especially if those careers are in engineer-ing. Many employers do, however, provide structured training to help employees become chartered engineers or technicians or attain other professional qualifications.

www.euskills.co.uk Career information is available from the Energy and Utility Skills website, which, although functional, is suprisingly lacklustre.

www.british-energy.com is one of many company sites alongside the likes of www.centrica.com and www.bnfl.co.uk (if you want to go nuclear) that generally cut straight to the chase with details of current job offers and necessary qualifications.

Food and Drink

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Food processing rarely figures on the top-ten lists of the biggest changes of the last century, but it should. It’s one of the biggest industries in the UK, employing over 650,000 people and turning over £64 billion a year. Food and drink are increasingly a form of entertainment, and the industry constantly creates new products that appeal to both the desire for familiar comfort foods and the desire for new and exotic tastes, derived in part from the boom in ethnic cuisine. Think potato crisps flavoured with black beans and spring onions; or ginger and chilli Ribena; or slightly car-bonated milk that tastes like bubblegum. All of these have been developed, tested and marketed in the last few years.

If you eat or drink, you’ll know the names of most of the major employers in this industry: Coca Cola, Cadbury Schweppes, Nestle, Kraft, General Mills, Tate and Lyle, Gerber and Unilever, as well as all the breweries. Smaller niche companies spring up all the time to produce spe-cialty items from energy bars to traditional ethnic foods; they face the same problems of designing products that have sufficient shelf life and can be manufactured consist-ently to the right quality standard. All the major companies

Functional Foods

Why shouldn’t ice cream be as healthy as broccoli? Doesn’t it make sense to make junk food more nutritious? Food scientists are increasing the nutritional value of foods by adding calcium to orange juice or Omega-3 fatty acids to snack bars. Biopharming turns ordinary foods such as bananas into drug or vaccine delivery vehicles.

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employ graduates with degrees in chemical engineering, chemistry, food science and food technology; most offer work placements and training. To become a food scientist or technologist, you are best advised to start with a good grounding in science subjects, though this can come from GCSEs, A-levels, NVQs or access courses. The Institute of Food Science and Technology (www.foodtechcareers.org) provides information on universities and other institutions that provide courses of study at all levels.

Apprenticeships are available in several areas: bakery, food and drink manufacturing, and meat and poultry

On the Road…Profile: Rachel, development engineer, Cadbury Schweppes

“I couldn’t do a job where I sat at a desk all day. I like the excitement of trying new things and being given the free-dom to explore my ideas. At Cadbury Schweppes, my job is developing proc-esses to make and pack new confection-ery products and optimise existing proc-esses. It’s a lot of fun and is varied. The most satisfying part is I make and taste new chocolates.I am a registered chemical engineer with a Master’s degree and a Doctorate. My degree gave me a good grounding in logical thinking and basic scientific and engineering principles, which gave me an excellent platform to choose from a wide variety of careers.I’ve always been provided with training in technical aspects when I’ve needed it, but the most important thing is knowing how to influence people. Anything you do in teams and with other people helps you understand how to deal with them.“

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processing. From 2009, a new diploma in manufacturing, aimed at people between the ages of 14 and 19, will be launched in English schools to combine vocational on-the-job training with traditional academic study.

www.improveltd.co.uk Comprehensive career resources come from the Sector Skills Council for Food and Drink, Improve, whose site offers career advice from Dunkan the animated gingerbread man and all the necessary information about courses, funding and apprenticeships.

www.foodtechcareers.org comes from the professional body Institute of Food Science and Technology. It is aimed at schools and does the job of overviewing courses and careers neatly and concisely.

Healthcare Most people think of the healthcare sector as one requiring years of study and more years of horribly paid, exhausting clinical training leading to jobs that don’t pay all that well. To some extent this is true. But you do not have to be a doc-tor or nurse to work in the healthcare industry; some jobs do not even require advanced degrees. Almost every area of hospital care, for example, is supported by technicians, who maintain, set up and repair equipment in intensive care units and assist in making up medicines in pharma-cies, for example. If you are attracted by the satisfaction of helping and caring for people, this sector might be for you. Certainly, experienced personnel are unlikely to lack jobs in your lifetime: the UK’s ageing population is likely to need

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a lot of care. Many healthcare jobs do require advanced degrees, from radiographers who conduct and examine X-rays, ultrasound scans and MRIs to pharmacists, veteri-nary surgeons and clinical engineers, who investigate the mechanics of the human body and design equipment used in patient care.

The product that I contribute towards helps people. It improves people’s health and in some cases, saves sight. I get to do what I enjoy

and know that it benefits people.Faryal, software engineer, Optos

The biggest healthcare employer – and the biggest in Europe overall – is without doubt the National Health Service. About seventy percent of the NHS’s 1.3 million staff directly treat or care for patients: doctors, nurses, nutritionists, speech and physical therapists, radiographers. The rest work in management, health informatics and sup-port services. Most of these jobs require at least a general understanding of science, and all require some ability to work with computers and also in teams with other people. For example, a job in sterile services, which involves fol-lowing strict procedures to decontaminate reusable devices and repackaging and labelling them for their next use, requires GCSE or equivalent passes in maths, English and a science subject and on-the-job training. Such technicians generally work 37 hours a week, with pay starting at around

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job opportunities £10,375 a year. For comparison, a nutritionist entering the profession with either a four-year first degree or a two-year postgraduate degree in dietetics or nutrition might start on between £17,745 and £19,155, which could then, with some years of experience, rise to £21,825–£28,540.

Other employers in this sector include private health insurers such as BUPA nursing homes, school infirmaries, nurseries and hospitals. Don’t forget the charitable sector, which includes both large and small organisations seeking to offer help to those who need it, sometimes on an indi-vidual level. Origin Care (www.origincare.com), for example, is constantly seeking assistants to assist spinally injured people in managing their working and personal lives; it offers a complete training course in all the necessary skills, including first aid.

www.nhscareers.nhs.uk is the NHS careers website detailing more than 300 different careers in the NHS, in particular 34 under the heading of “Healthcare Science”.

www.connexions-direct.com/jobs4u www.careers-scotland.org.uk

Both these sites have built up some useful profiles in this sector.

www.ipem.ac.uk is the home of the Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine. Advice on training and job roles is offered.

Industrial DesignShould robots have faces? Should a hot water tap change colour to show the water’s temperature? Why do stoves have to have little graphic user manuals to show which

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knob goes with which burner? Industrial designers answer these kinds of questions, and sometimes getting those answers right makes the difference between a successful product and one that winds up in the Museum of Failed Products. Sometimes they make the difference between life and death, as in designing aircraft cockpits, the controls in passenger cars, medical systems used in patient care, or cooling systems for nuclear power plants.

Design, more than other subjects covered here, draws on a wide range of disciplines. Design and technology, psychology, physiology, engineering, biology, chemistry, physics, maths, marketing, architecture – any and all of those subjects can be helpful in a design career. Overall, there are 29 topics identified by the Design Council (www .design-council.org.uk), the UK’s national strategic body for design. Designers work in every sector and on everything from retail spaces, materials, and packaging to cars and computer software, typography and fashion. Ergonomics is the science of designing machines and furniture that are physically comfortable; human-computer interaction (or, sometimes, human factors or usability) focuses on the problems of creating computer interfaces that humans can understand with a minimum of training. Those trained in design can – but don’t necessarily have to – move into crea-tive industries such as advertising and entertainment.

Most successful designers have had at least some further education. Because design is so much a part of every indus-try, the key employers are the large companies in every sector. You will also find freelance design consultants and

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small boutiques that are hired by the larger companies to work on specific projects.

www.yourcreativefuture.org is the Design Council’s offering and whilst giving a few links and an overview of the multiple routes to employment is – like other sites such as www.dba.org.uk (Design Business Association) and www.csd.org.uk (Chartered Society of Designers) – short on careers advice.

www.ied.org.uk hosts a work placement site for the Institute of Engineering Designers amidst a host of other industry links.

Sustainable Technologies Take a look at the news and you’ll see dozens of gloomy headlines about the future of our planet. We are, or will be, running out of fish and cheap oil; carbon dioxide and other emissions are contributing to global warm-ing; climate change will bring about water shortages; the

Ergonomics and Usability

Imagine driving a car if turning the steering wheel left turned the car right. You could do it, but there would be many accidents. Ergonomics is the science – or art – of designing machines and tools so they’re comfortable and intuitive to use. In computing, it is also called human factors, or usability.

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UK produces enough waste every hour to fill the Albert Hall. In response, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) is making it a priority to fund research into sustain-able technologies – that is, technologies that minimise our harmful impact on the planet.

Recycling isn’t enough. Real change will require altering manufacturing, materials and other processes to get rid of polluting emissions and changing everything from crop management to medical science. One example of the kind of profound change experts predict: micro-generation, in which each home generates electricity for its own needs and sells on its surplus. Despite the media’s willingness to blame scientists for everything from BSE to the nuclear bomb, it will be scientists and engineers who will fix many of today’s problems. Finding your way into this kind of career requires a little more ingenuity and research, because you aren’t just looking for someone – anyone – who will employ you. Instead, you are looking for someone you are willing to work for. You may, for example, want to eliminate from your list those companies that do animal testing or make their money by manufacturing chemicals whose by-prod-ucts are toxic waste. But sustainable technologies are going

Fuel cells

Batteries store energy; fuel cells make energy out of external fuel (such as hydrogen) and oxygen with no harmful waste products. Homes equipped with fuel cells would be able to make their own electricity and sell their suplus back to the grid. They are still too expensive for widespread use.

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mainstream. The new Emirates Stadium, for example, was built out of materials deliberately chosen for the lower amount of energy needed to make them, and the building itself is designed to maximise natural light and ventilation.

Key employers in sustainable technologies come in two forms: traditional market leaders who are planning for their futures, and niche companies who do nothing else in the hope of creating a market for themselves. The former group includes Centrica, ScottishPower, General Electric, nPower and Renewable Energy Systems – the latter a subsidiary of the construction company Sir Robert McAlpine. The latter group employs electrical design engineers and managers, project engineers and technicians. A wind farm developer,

for example, generally needs a qualification in a science or engi-neering subject plus experience in the wind energy sector.

www.sgr.org .uk/ethics.html is a great place to start. The Scientists for Global Responsibility site has a good section on ethical careers, with case studies covering a variety of sectors, including the chemical industry.

www.bwea.com is

A futuristic wind farm

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the trade association site for the wind industry, whilst www.r-p-a.org.uk is the same for biofuels and renewable energy. Both have jobs pages, but only a few clues on career paths.

www.sd-commission.org.uk This is the government-funded watchdog aimed at keeping sustainable development embedded in government policy.

www.sustainabledesignnet.org.uk has an invaluable page of links to follow, but little on careers. More systematic listings can be reached via www.designcouncil.org.uk; however, there is still a lot of digging to do unless you know precisely which area interests you.

TransportationTransportation has many subsectors: rail, roads, marine. Engineers work in all these areas, managing traffic flows, studying road safety and parking problems, planning rail and bus schemes, and building and maintaining ships. Transport planners forecast travel patterns and, increas-ingly, draw on engineering disciplines to manage growing travel demand with an eye on the environmental and social effects of the transport infrastructure.

Key employers of highway engineers include local author-ities, the Department of Transport, consultants, contrac-tors, materials suppliers and police forces, all of whom build, repair, maintain or manage roads. The Institute of Highway Engineers has useful advice: aspiring highway engineers should study both English and maths, but can enter the profession via either on-the-job training or a university degree.

Marine careers are varied, as they include not only

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ship building and repair but also offshore oil and gas, the Coastguard and underwater technology. The Institute of Marine Engineering, Science and Technology (www.imarest .org) is a good starting point. Members of the Society for Underwater Technology (www.sut.org.uk) design offshore structures, study the geology of the sea bed, work in pipeline design and manufacture, and design underwater vehicles. Other key employers include cross-channel ferry operators such as P&O and Seafrance, though these jobs tend to be seasonal.

Since the 1990s privatisation of the railways there are many employers. Network Rail (www.networkrailcareers .co.uk) is now a major employer and manages the infra-structure, including signalling, electrical control, train operations, maintenance, building and maintaining bridg-es, and ergonomics and safety. For safety reasons, some jobs require pre-employment medical exams including drugs and alcohol screening.

London Underground’s equivalent is Metronet Rail (www.metronetrail.com), which is in charge of a massive, thirty-year, £17 billion regeneration programme. In the next seven years, Metronet will spend £7 billion on new trains, track, signalling, and station modernisation and refurbishment. Jobs with Metronet may also require drugs and alcohol screening.

The UK also has many rail companies (www.rail.co.uk), including long distance, such as Virgin, ScotRail, Hull Trains and GNER; commuter such as Silverlink, c2c and Docklands Light Rail; and freight, such as English, Welsh and Scottish Railway. Finally, Angel Trains (www.angel

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trains.co.uk) owns over 5,000 vehicles valued over !6 billion, and leases these to many British and European railway companies. Angel offers summer placements to students in mechanical engineering and electrical engineering. Also, don’t forget Eurostar, which has engineering jobs in London and Ashford, Kent. High flyers who are committed both to attending university and to rail as a career should contact the Association of Train Operating Companies (020 7841 8000) about their professional engineering devel-opment scheme.

Travel planners are much in demand to deliver the government’s £181 billion, ten-year transport plan, which includes upgrading the West Coast rail line, new signalling nationwide, Heathrow’s Terminal 5, and the M25’s widen-ing. They must be numerate and need to be able to commu-nicate well in both speech and writing, and may have back-grounds in any of a number of subjects including statistics, environmental sciences, engineering and planning.

www.ihie.org.uk will get you on the right track for road transport careers.

www.transportationopportunities.org.uk is flying the flag for travel planners and really keen to recruit, offering training and summer placements.

And don’t forget…The actor Michael Caine has said that the one piece of career advice his father ever gave him was, “Never take a job where you can be replaced by a robot.” Today’s equiva-

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lent might be, “Never take a job that can be sent offshore.” Herein lies an advantage of SET and design jobs that you may not have thought of: any job that requires physical presence cannot be outsourced to a remote country, no matter how cheap the workforce is. Telesales, software cod-ing, customer service, data entry and even administration can be sent overseas and supported by remote communi-cations technologies. But maintaining bridges and roads, designing and maintaining patient equipment or heavy machinery, recording sound, managing forests, and run-ning TV cameras all require local, skilled workers.

Besides all those options, there are plenty of SET and design jobs in what are known as the “service industries”. These include a number of apparently mismatched sec-tors: banking, insurance, tourism, government, retail and education. Insurance, banking and, increasingly, retail rely heavily on cutting-edge information technology, much of it invented in-house, to stay competitive. Most of govern-ment other than raw data processing cannot be outsourced without questions being asked in Parliament.

Teaching is another entire set of careers worth consid-ering, particularly in SET and design. A recent House of Lords report warned that the British economy will suffer unless the government invests in recruiting more teach-ers in all areas of science. Scientists and engineers do not create themselves spontaneously; they must be taught. The shortage of well-qualified teachers is longstanding, and the report advises better career advice in schools and bet-ter funding for science laboratories. For you, however, the shortage may represent a golden opportunity. Not only are

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there job openings in a career that has many sought-after characteristics such as decent pay, compatibility with fam-ily life, and an important contribution to society, but there may be additional funding available in the form of bursaries and signing bonuses (a “golden hello”). The Training and Development Agency for Schools (www.tda.gov.uk) offers as much as £5,000 to new mathematics and science teachers and administers a training bursary of £9,000 for teachers training in those subjects, a bonus over the funding they are able to offer other sectors. Visit web.data.org.uk/data /publications and download the “D&T Connections” PDF, which has a good section on becoming a teacher.

Besides all these possibilities, be creative in your think-ing. Other SET subjects have similar resources on their sites. Also check out www.tda.gov.uk – it’s the government’s general teaching careers site.

Lastly, there is hardly a sector that doesn’t use designers, scientists and engineers. Good luck!

04

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04The Learning MatrixAll change…

F rom Key Stage 3 onwards school transforms from a place where you are told what to study to another kind of place. Suddenly you have a lot of things to

decide, from whether to study, what to study, how and where. It can seem something of an abrupt change of gear, even a pain. You will be introduced to coursework and managing your own time. What you like plays a big part but there are other things at work here too. What follows aims to give a few pointers about what you are doing now in SET and D&T and how that might develop in terms of immediate jobs, long-term careers, further study and vocational training.

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D&T GCSEs A lot of people feel that D&T is not abstract science but something they connect with personally. If you are lucky you will be one of those who “connect”. The reason is sim-ple: everybody can have a view on whether a music player or a piece of clothing works well or looks cool. By contrast, not everybody gets to explore the intricacies of nuclear fission, because to do that you need to have completed spe-cific studies in physics and chemistry. D&T teaches you to ask why? Why has it been designed in that way? Why has it been made using those materials? Coursework also means time for in-depth projects and review and evaluation.

D&T is not just about abstract discussions of how things work. It’s about hands-on application. In most D&T courses – particularly the coursework, which unlike any other subject will make up sixty percent of the course – you are going to be designing and making things and assessing them, learning practically how a large part of the world works. Beyond that, D&T courses also ultimately offer you clues about earning money, job opportunities and working with other people. Understanding why requires getting a bit more specific.

Don’t be surprised if your school doesn’t have all of the following course options – and don’t worry about it. If there’s a course you’re keen on that they don’t offer, you can always pursue that specialism later. Anything you do in D&T is likely to support your ambition because all the courses below interrelate. All of them give you practice and

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help you develop valuable skills for working life that you won’t find studying the Elizabethans. Better still, if you’re not sure how far you want to go in any particular aspect of D&T that you’ve enjoyed in the past, all courses will keep your options open at this stage.

Graphic Products Good Things about Graphic Products: Learning to

analyse, evaluate, design graphic products and create your own from briefs. Computer Aided Design (CAD) experience .

Graphic Arts: Typography

When Dutch graphics student Natascha Frensch was studying at the Department of Communication Art and Design at the Royal College of Art, she started wondering why the letters in standard textbook typefaces were so hard to distinguish from each other. Frensch had a personal interest: like two million Britons, 375,000 of them schoolchildren, she is dyslexic.

Frensch spent three years designing and testing her own typeface, which she dubbed “Read” (www.readregular .com). The basis of her design: hand-drawn letterforms that incorporate many more small details and changes of shape so as to make individual letters distinctive. With funding from the Audi Design Foundation, Frensch completed three variations, one with special spacing intended for younger children. The font is being adopted for textbooks.

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Next Steps: Spend time on the computer and look at graphics packages – it is a good base for moving onto a Foundation degree. In the end, some might aspire to going freelance or working in a design consultancy, but note: not everyone is cut out for the lifestyle of moving from contract to contract. Compared to engineers and physicists, creative designers are not in such short supply, particularly outside of SET areas.

Systems and Control Good Things about Systems and Control: Getting to

understand underlying processes in engineering and all kinds of automated service professions. (Ever wondered how your mobile phone works?) Discovering how work is organised by employers, not teachers.

What Employers Want: Designers

Increasingly, companies compete on innovations, not products. For example, a customer chooses one hot water tap over another because of its design, not its functionality.

To succeed in design in today’s world, you need to be able to work with networks of people in other departments, professions, organi-sations and even countries. As you progress, you will need to be able to manage clients, domestic and international. You will need to understand materials and manufacturing; the most beautiful and functional design is useless if it can’t be made at the right price. Finally, you will need to keep up with new techniques and digital technologies as they continue to change the process and speed the pace of innovation.

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Next Steps: An AS/A-level in Systems Control Technology is offered by the OCR and AQA boards, and there are many degrees with a predominate focus on systems engineering. Many of these courses stretch to four years and link their teaching to industry projects and partners. Considering work experience or placements should be high up your agenda. If university interests you, look at courses such as Aerospace Systems Engineering or Medical Systems Engineering, but also check out the employers and opportunities in these areas before committing. If you start a degree in one of these and find it’s not your thing, it will be hard to switch tack late in the day.

Intellectual Property

Any industry that relies on new inventions or ideas needs time to develop those ideas into marketable products. Therefore, all these industries depend on intellectual property law to grant them a monopoly on their ideas for long enough to make a profit from the invention before competitors are allowed to copy it.

The four most common types of IP protection are copyright, patents, trademarks and design rights. Copyright protects the expression of ideas – for example, a movie or engineering drawing. Patents protect ideas themselves. The words in a book are copy-righted; but if someone invented the book itself it would be pat-ented. Patents last for twenty years. Design rights protect the look of a product. Trademarks protect product and company names.

There are other types of IP protection. For example, plant breeders’ rights in the new hybrids they create prohibit buyers from propa-gating those plants without permission. The expansion of all types of IP law over the last thirty years has proved controversial, particu-larly the extension of patents to computer software.

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Product Design Good Things about Product Design: Getting a sense

of hands-on processes and how design functions in business. Undertaking your own designs is often the key to business start-ups. Working with CAD, CAM , Rapid Prototyping and ICT work.

Design: Reinventing the Wheelchair

It took David Constantine, co-founder and executive officer of the charity Motivation, fifteen years to design a new wheelchair. The goal: to make chairs that would be high quality, low cost and suit-able for the rough terrain that wheelchair users in developing coun-tries have to navigate. In 2000, he received a £14,000 grant from the Audi Design Foundation to design such a chair. Constantine’s design incorporates a third, smaller front wheel to improve stabil-ity. For cost reasons, the chairs are made in China and delivered flat-packed. They are prescribed, assembled, fitted and maintained locally, and Motivation also offers training courses to organisations working in these countries to ensure that their staff are properly qualified. Motivation aims to distribute 10,000 chairs a year.

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Next Steps: Apprenticeships (see p.87) in construction or engineering with technician-level positions in computer-aided design or engineering are a possibility without a degree. D&T Product design can be followed through to AS and A-level with, say, maths, engineering, industrial design, computing or manufacturing A-levels or a traditional science like physics. Engineering, computer and manufacturing could all be logical career paths but so would be a more graphically orientated route combining with GCSE art. Choice at university is impressive, with footwear, sustainable products, sports and furniture design among many areas on offer.

Resistant Materials Good Things about Resistant Materials: Getting up

to speed on woods, metals and plastics, how they are combined, their properties altered and then used in products. Learning which products can be mass-produced if you have a great idea (or even if you don’t). Making things and completing hands-on projects.

Next Steps: Craft apprenticeships move on from resistant materials to more specific trades and crafts such as carpentry, plumbing and motor vehicle occupations, but there are no GCSE exams at A/AS level in Resistant Materials. Engineering and systems control and technology and product design can be studied at some schools and colleges, but physics or mathematics may be required for specialised undergraduate engineering or technology degrees.

Textiles Good Things about Textiles: Project work and transferable

experience of CAD/CAM design. Core knowledge of fabrics, product design and manufacture useful for any kind of fashion job.

Next Steps: The Edexcel exam board offers an A/AS level in

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Textiles Technology, but the textiles option in an Art & Design GCSE is more likely to be your available option. The AQA board’s GCSE in Product Design (Textiles) is also very popular. Textile design is a big degree area, though if the general retail and marketing end of the spectrum is what takes your interest, you should look under those headings. Fashion never goes out of fashion and there are many who opt for one of the vast array of textile-related fashion courses; in addition, the determined few pursue full-time study in fashion buying or journalism. Textiles and fashion degree options get very specific – from footwear and knitwear to garment technology – and you’ll be qualified in a very specific sector, whether you want to work in a corporate fashion house or create a cottage-size design niche of your own.

Food Technology Good things about Food Technology: Grasping basics

of nutrition, food-types, product development and packaging. Useful as a first primer for the food industry.

Next Steps: GCE A-levels are available in Home Economics and at some institutions in Design and Technology: Food Technology. Combining with business studies and biology would make sense for a career in the food industry at management levels. Those keener to cook should look at catering colleges and other specialist courses. At

Intelligent Polymers

Plastics are made up of polymers, large molecules made up of long, repeating chains. Intelligent polymers are designed to respond to environmental changes such as temperature, electric current or pressure. Fabrics woven with intelligent polymers, for example, could monitor the health of the wearer.

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degree level there is consumer or nutritional science and a range of options from the scientific (Food Microbiology) to the practical (Food Safety & Quality Management) and curious hybrids. Anyone for Food Studies and Criminology?

Interface

Interfaces are the sandwich filling between humans and machines. They are the menus and screen design in computer software, or the controls by which you operate everything from airplanes to wash-ing machines. Interface design is complex, requiring knowledge of human psychology and biology as well as technology.

Be Inspired! Ideas to Take Further

Build and race an electric car (www.greenpower.co.uk). If CO" dragsters are your vehicle of choice try www.f1inschools.co.uk.

Make a football-playing or dancing robot (rcj.open.ac.uk) or take up the international robotic challenge of www.firstlegoleague.org.

Enter competitions: try the Young Engineers for Britain competi-tion (www.youngeng.org). The organisation also runs a network of clubs.

Get a free copy of the inspiring science and technology mag Science Worlds by going to www.scienceworlds.co.uk. Sister website www.technologyhorizons.co.uk for the “Innovation Generation” mixes career advice with articles for older readers. Flipside, a fun magazine for teenagers, takes a lighter approach with pieces on topics like spitting, time travel and weird guitars.

Give work a try – look at national provider of student work expe-rience www.trident-edexcel.co.uk and www.bigwee.com, which enables the parents of 14–19-year-olds to organise placements. Engineers should look to www.thescheme.org.uk.

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Industrial Technology Good Things about

Industrial Technology: Useful as background for manufacturing systems and industry. Good preparation for work experience in an industrial environment. Project work might help as a way to dip a toe into a particular field, e.g. optics or furniture manufacture.

Next Steps: At present there are no GCE AS/A-level offerings in industrial technology but there are A-levels in product design, systems and control technology and engineering. These areas overlap a lot so pursuing any would offer a good route if full-time study were your ambition. But there’s a lot to be said for taking the plunge into the working environment through an apprenticeship, industry schemes and work placement. Alternatively, you could apply for technician-level posts and make your way from there the traditional way! For degrees it really is advisable to specialise, whether big industry or smaller scale product design is your goal.

Microelectromechanical Systems

MEMS integrate mechanical elements, sensors, actuators and elec-tronics onto single chips in the millimetre to micrometre size range. They are used as sensors (tyre pressure and human blood pressure), as gyroscopes and airbag controllers in cars, and in modern projec-tors (where they are tiny mirrors that can change direction).

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D&T-related Museums

The Arts and Crafts Museum (www.artsandcraftsmuseum.org .uk) celebrates the UK’s Arts and Crafts movement in Cheltenham.

The Design Museum (www.designmuseum.org) The London-based design showcase also has an online research archive of con-temporary design.

The Lighthouse (www.thelighthouse.co.uk) is Scotland’s Centre for Architecture, Design and the City.

The Centre for Alternative Technology (www.cat.org.uk) is con-cerned with all things green. Based in southern Snowdonia, Wales.

The Museum of Domestic Design & Architecture (www.moda .mdx.ac.uk) In the very north of London at Middlesex University, this focuses on the history of the home in early twentieth century.

The Science Museum (www.sciencemuseum.org.uk) The big one! This world-renowned technology and science museum also has a strong design component amidst scientific history and con-temporary exhibitions.

Thinktank (www.thinktank.ac) Birmingham’s Science Museum sees Industrial heritage competing with hands-on activities and current exhibitions on topics like robots or silver work.

Victoria and Albert Museum (www.vam.ac.uk) Costume, Textiles, Decorative and Applied Art and Design are just of a few of the col-lections here. Conveniently close to the Science Museum.For even more, check out www.24hourmuseum.org.uk, which details nearly 3,000 museums and galleries in the UK.

Electronic Products Good Things about Electronic Products Acquire the

basics of electronics: handy for all engineering sectors and industrial design work. Will complement physics and engineering interests as well as being useful for technician roles or further education.

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Next Steps: Electronics is offered by some exam boards at GCE A/AS level and is a more specific route to follow than Engineering GCE, but unless you are looking at the university sector, BTEC and vocational qualifications are in greater supply for practical learning in electronics and lead more swiftly to jobs. If you have the patience, there are lots of degree offerings in electrical engineering and related subjects, though after so many years of theory your choice should take into account the extent to which it offers industry links leading to employment opportunities.

You can have an idea, get it down on paper, take it to the workshop and have the finished article

in your hands by the next day.Rachel, engineer-

ing consultant, PA Consulting Group, on

a typical day

Applied GCSEsThose undertaking vocational GCSEs in subjects such as Art & Design, ICT, Applied Science, Engineering or Manufacturing often have a clearer idea of the type of job they are looking for. With current industry and govern-ment emphasis on bridging academic excellence with craft

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and skills expertise, there are a wider variety of options in theory than ever before for linking up learning and on-the-job experience.

Science GCSEsDouble and single award sciences present science topics in a more integrated and broader basis than single science GCSEs whilst touching upon elements of each. Depending on your school and interests, they can form the spring-board for a vocational learning path or developing physics, chemistry or biology routes for further qualifications.

Where the option exists, Applied Science can be taken at GCE levels which continues with a “real-world” focus and lead, more naturally to vocationally orientated options after school.

Best SET and Design Websites

www.baddesigns.com can be a bit relentless, like someone cornering you at a party, but it will provoke you into thinking how designs work.

www.design-technology.info Alien–green graphics crammed full of handy summaries on D&T topics.

www.design-council.org.uk Lots of links and info on the sector.www.howstuffworks.com does what it says on the tin. Explains

industrial products and scientific processes with a minimum of fuss.www.ieee-virtual-museum.org All things electronic. www.scenta.co.uk Gadgets, gossip, music, sport and the latest

scientific research get a topical gloss alongside careers information on SET and “much more besides”.

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After GCSEsWith so many possibilities to choose from, picking the path that’s best for you can seem like a daunting prospect. Before you make any decisions, talk to as many people as

How to choose…Purpose of study Most relevant

qualification

To secure a skills-based qualification demonstrating ability to do a certain job at a high level

NVQ 3 and 4 Key Skills

To gain an academic quali-fication that would lead to university but related to a specific area of work

Applied A-levels

To develop practical skills in art and design to enable study at a higher education level

Diploma in Foundation Studies (Art & Design)

To study and get academic qualification to secure uni-versity entry not necessar-ily related to any particular vocation

GCE A-levels and AS lev-els, Scottish Highers (also Advanced extensions awards for high academic achievers)

To follow a sector-based work-orientated route with study at varying levels that can at different stages lead straight to a job or to further vocational study

BTEC firsts, Nationals and HNDs Specialised Diplomas (from September 2008)

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you can – parents, carers, teachers, career advisers, friends – to air your ideas, gather new information and get fresh perspectives. Assuming you want to continue learning once you’ve reached 16, lots of options are open to you. Staying on at your school sixth form means that you’ll remain in a familiar environment with teachers and fellow students whom you already know. If, on the other hand, you need a change of scene or want to make new friends, it’s perfectly possible to join a new school at sixth form. Check out what the school offers: you can take a variety of AS subjects in your first year before you decide what subjects to take at A-level in your second year. Many schools also offer GNVQs. Alternatively, you may feel that it’s time to move on from school. Sixth-form colleges form a kind of bridge between school and higher education. Students have more independence – as well as more responsibility – than at school. And because colleges tend to be larger than school sixth forms, they usually provide a wider range of options, with AS and A-levels, AVCE programmes, and GNVQ Intermediate and Foundation courses.

What’s on offer at any specific Further Education (FE) College depends on what else is available locally. If most of the local schools have sixth forms, or if there are sixth form colleges nearby, an FE college may concentrate on vocational or work-related courses – many of which can lead to university entry. In areas where the FE college is the main, or only, option, it will offer everything you could get in sixth form or sixth-form college. FE colleges have many part-time and adult students, and may have more than one site.

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Courses and Qualifications More options than ever are available at the end of Key Stage 4 and earlier. Realistically though, where you live and the focus of schools and colleges in your area will narrow the choice down, and word of mouth from advisers, teach-ers and friends should shrink it further. It’s worth asking around. Where there is choice it is vital not only to figure out what you might like to do but also in what environment and how you would like to pursue your goals. Carefully selecting qualifications is therefore a must. (See chart on p.66 for the main advantages of each type.)

Science AS Levels and A2 LevelsAdvanced Subsidiary (AS) levels and A2 levels, available in over seventy academic and vocational subjects, are usually started in Year 12 (age 16/17). Most students take three sub-jects in the first year, then specialise in their second year;

Quantum Cryptography

Cryptography uses mathematical properties (such as factoring prime numbers) to encode computer data so that it can’t be read by those without the right key. Quantum cryptography instead is based on physics and uses measurements based on quantum mechanics to generate keys that will remain uncrackable as com-puter power increases.

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the learning matrix if you complete that second year, known as an A2, success-fully, you earn a full A-level. However, you might decide during your AS year that gaining NVQs in certain subjects would be more useful than going on to A2. Similarly, if a subject you enjoyed at GCSE loses its appeal with further study, you can leave it behind after year 12 rather than struggling on.

SET and Design Options D&T A-levels: what are they good for? GCE

examinations are available from some exam boards in Product Design, Systems and Control, Textiles and Electronic Products. See GCSE section above for where the subjects can lead. www.data .org.uk has a downloadable PDF on further careers in D&T. You can also register with www.insidecareers.co.uk and download their very detailed and helpful engineering and technology careers survey produced in conjunction with the Engineering and Technology Board (ETB).

Biology A-level: what is it good for? Non-graduate jobs for where biology will be an asset include laboratory work, healthcare jobs (including nursing) and dentistry. For graduate roles it could open doors to a career in sales representing pharmaceutical companies, life science research in health authorities or industry and even the civil service. More specialist roles could include marine biologist, environmental officer, zoologists or as a biochemist. www .iob.org, the Insitute of Biology website, offers a few clues on options for careers but www.biology4all.com is much the better resource and is particularly strong on university options and information.

Chemistry A-level: what is it good for? Relatively few jobs with a chemistry focus are open to non-graduates, though obtaining some experience as a laboratory assistant might be

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chapter 4feasible. As an A-level it is well respected and combines well with other sciences but is probably not the ideal choice if you are looking to make up the numbers before going out into the workplace. For those with university aspirations, chemistry could be essential and lead to roles ranging from patent agent (acting on behalf of companies or inventors) to a colour technologist concerned with the dyeing of textiles. Go to www.rsc.org/Education/SchoolStudents/careers.asp, which delivers a range of excellent links on job opportunities, choosing careers and even taking a gap year.

Physics A-level: what is it good for? An applied science subject is probably a better option than a straight physics AS or A-level if you are looking to employment rather than university, though employers will certainly value skills from the subject such as logical thinking, problem solving and numeracy. For most engineering-related degrees physics is crucial. Some of the best advice on physics-related careers is on the website www.learningphysics.iop.org, which has many useful links to more specialist area websites, from acoustics to meterology.

VCE A-levels: what are they good for? These vocational work-related qualifications develop knowledge and skills you need for all sorts of jobs and are offered in the following SET subjects: applied art and design, applied ICT, applied science and engineering. They can be combined with GCSEs or ordinary A-levels. Their strengths lie in a focus on practice not theory, coursework and closer applicability to specific career options. In other respects they could be said to better prepare you for working life than a traditional GCE with stronger links to industry and potential for work placements, moving on to an apprenticeship or graduate sponsorship. They also may help you confirm a specific vocational interest or allow you to tick it off the list for good. See Job opportunities section (p.000) or the D&T sections (see p.000) for follow-ups.

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And Don’t Forget Maths! Numeracy never ceases to count. Always check out degree or employer requirements and don’t give up on the subject without a long hard think. You can catch up later, but it may prove even harder if an SET job requires maths skills.

National Vocational QualificationsNVQs test how competent you are at carrying out real jobs. Gained while you’re working, they can be taken at five levels and are divided into units, each covering different aspects of the job. There are no formal entry requirements, apart from relevant work experience. NVQ areas include building, engineering, health, land-based vocations, trans-port and resource provision and extraction. You should normally expect to achieve a particular NVQ through on-the-job observation; an assessor will test your knowledge, understanding and performance, and if you demonstrate the necessary competence will sign off on the units you need to complete the qualification.

See www.qca.org.uk/14-19/qualifications for an explanation of NVQs. For specifics ask careers advisers and local educa-tion and training providers.

Edexcel BTEC QualificationsA BTEC – the initials stand for Business and Technology Education Council – is an occupational qualification that can be taken by anyone over 18. First Certificates (part-time) and Diplomas (full-time) take one year, while National Certificates (part-time) and Diplomas (full-time) take two years. Higher National Certificates and Diplomas

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(HNCs and HNDs) are available in subjects like business studies, engineering and IT.

You can contact edexcel for details via www.edexcel.org .uk, but probably best to ask around locally for the ins and outs.

Key skillsKey skills, which are taken alongside other qualifications, are open to anyone studying full-time at school, college or in work-based learning. Besides being geared towards the needs of employers, they can count towards entry to a degree course. The three main key skills qualifications are Communication, Application of Numbers and Information Technology (IT). The wider key skills are usually studied as part of other awards and qualifications.

For full details, see www.keyskillssupport.net.

Entry to Employment (e2e)If you’re aged between 16 and 18 and really not sure what direction to take, an Entry to Employment (e2e) scheme can help. These look at your needs and your goals – wheth-er you want a job, need training, want to develop your skills or go to college – and help you move forward.

Each scheme is individual, geared around your specific needs, and there’s no strict timescale. Organised one-to-one or in small groups, it might entail work experience or training and can help you develop skills in anything from numeracy to IT. e2e participants are paid a training allow-

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ance. More on e2e should be available via the government sites www.dfes.gov.uk and www.connexions-direct.com.

DegreesThe merits of a degree are discussed elsewhere (see p.82), and assuming it is an option you wish to keep open it is worth looking ahead to see how you might specialise with that goal in mind. Equally, if you want to keep your options even more open, opt for a general course. Here are a few pointers.

Go to www.ucas.com and use the search function to see what degrees are available where. Then compare the results with the more specialised searches of www.science -engineering.net, which also covers degrees available abroad. Next see how promising options rate in the stats at education.guardian.co.uk and the Good University Guide on the Times website, www.timesonline.co.uk. For a mixture of independent student comment, urban myth and gossip there is www.unofficial-guides.com, which gives you uncen-sored views. If you want to look even further ahead to research degrees (PhDs) in cutting-edge topics and taught postgraduate degrees (usually MScs), the various profes-sional engineering or science sites such as the Institute of Mechanical Engineers www.imeche.org.uk or the Institute of Physics (www.iop.org) offer clues on where research is going in their area and what’s on offer. By and large, though, graduate study is something best considered later.

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05Spoilt for Choice? How about…

I f you think SET and design sounds hard, academic and boring, you haven’t really looked at the variety of choices. There is no sector that does not need engineers

and designers, and therefore there is no sector you cannot work in with an engineering or design background. The exact entry requirements for any given field vary, but in general the more science subjects (plus mathematics and design and technology) you study at GCSE level, the more choices you will have. This is especially true if you haven’t picked an area to specialise in. You may not need to: a good designer can move between industries, and a materials engineer who studies how things break might apply that knowledge across the board. If you are passionate about the future of the environment, what could be a more practical contribution than working on

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technology such as alternative energy sources and organic foods? SET and design can also keep you from spending your life in an office pushing paper and electrons from one person to another. Engineers and designers work underwater, in forests, on the land, in the air, and even in space. In this case, the sky really isn’t the limit. Here are a couple of ideas.

ErgonomicsA number of universities around the country offer MSc degree courses in ergonomics, also known as human fac-tors or human sciences, but you can also study for a BSc at Loughborough University (www.lboro.ac.uk). Ergonomists study human physiology, anatomy and psychology in order to understand how better to design products, services, systems and environments. The increasing emphasis on health and safety means that students can go on to work for organisations of any size, from boutique consultancies and government departments to large companies in sectors from IT to health care.

Entry requirements vary, but Loughborough University says good preparation is A-level study in a combination drawn from biology, psychology, geography, mathematics or design and technology. The programme accepts mature applicants and those with other types of qualifications (such as BTEC).

The degree programme includes a lot of hands-on work attempting to solve real-world problems, and students are encouraged to take four years to complete it so they can

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Job Profile Sites

Almost any careers website that has at least a few personal profiles showing the results of the same choices you are facing. You will usually find helpful examples at the sites belonging either to uni-versities or the professional bodies in your field.

www.prospects.ac.uk – Each of the job descriptions offered on the UK’s official graduate careers site has a case study, a list of entry requirements and a list of typical employers.

www.connexions-direct.com – Splendid coverage for every major sector is hidden in the “Working In” section of the “Download Publications” heading within the “Careers Resources” heading.

www.scenta.co.uk – The Engineering & Technology Board’s main careers and news site is stuffed with profiles of individuals working in a wide variety of sectors. It is linked to www.scienceworlds.co.uk and www.technologyhorizons.com, both of which include role models under each job sector.

www.ajobin.com – The careers information site for the environ-mental and land-based sector has multiple case studies from each of its main job areas, from floristry to veterinary nursing.

www.atkinsglobal.com – The UK’s largest engineering consul-tancy publishes a recruitment newsletter that includes profiles of the careers of graduates working at the company.

www.encgc.org – The Engineering Council UK includes mid-career case studies in its “Get Registered” section.

www.imarest.org/careers/profiles/default.asp – The Institution of Marine Engineers has a selection of job profiles showing off the variety in its sector, from the Royal Naval officer who became equerry to Prince Philip to the seafaring marine engineer.

www.careers-scotland.org.uk can be recommended for its pro-files even if you aren’t planning to move up north.

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spend a year in an industrial placement that the university helps to arrange. In past years, students have done place-ments with BAE Systems, IBM, Ford, health trusts and the Ergonomics Society.

Forensic ScienceThere are about 5,000 forensic scientists (www.fss.org.uk) in the UK. Some of them do the sort of work familiar from TV crime shows, though with a lot more complexity. The basic idea is that they use the power of scientific analysis to resolve legal disputes. Graduates with degrees in forensic science may investigate crime scenes or move into research positions, but also work in public health laboratories, ana-lytical consultancies, trading standards organisations, and in quality control in the chemical, manufacturing and phar-maceutical industries. They are also responsible for analys-ing samples such as hair, body fluids, glass, paint and drugs in the laboratory, and also do DNA profiling and other technical analyses. In some cases, their work is the key to solving crimes that would otherwise remain mysteries.

Forensic scientists work for police laboratories, for the Forensic Science service, or for independent contractors. They may also work in horse racing, fire services or for government organisations such as the Home Office, the Forensic Explosives Laboratory or Customs and Excise. Entry requirements for degree programmes in this field vary, but typically require at least one A-level in a science subject, usually biology or chemistry. Courses typically include laboratory work, including working in small teams,

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and research projects, and may even give you practice in appearing as an expert witness in a mock court. You are also likely to need a strong stomach: crime investigations are less pretty in real life than they are on television.

Renewable EnergyScotland, where it’s dark in winter for all but six hours a day, may seem like a strange place to study solar power, but the University of Dundee (www.dundee.ac.uk) offers a new degree in renewable energy, the study of generating power in useful forms from natural sources from sun, water, and wind (they do have a lot of that). Technologies that can suc-cessfully draw on these sources is needed to replace exhaust-ible fuel sources such as oil and natural gas with sustainable ones. Scotland’s renewable energy sector is already produc-ing about 16 percent of Scotland’s renewable energy needs, and the Scottish Executive (www.scottishrenewables.com) estimates that the country has the resources to produce as much as 75 percent of all UK electricity from renewable sources. The degree includes lectures, tutorials, and prac-tical laboratory work and is intended to lead to a career as a researcher or manager. The programme includes a computing, and modules in maths, thermodynamics, vari-ous types of engineering, geometrician, and other technical subjects. Entry requirements include maths and a science or engineering subject at Higher or A-level. The university will consider alternative qualifications similar to those it accepts for physics.

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And Then…SET and design careers require creative thinking; apply yours to your career search. For example: you love sport but aren’t athletic. Why not become a materials engineer and contribute by designing and developing better materials for sporting equipment such as shoes, racquets, and skis? Or: you can’t handle the years of academic study to become a doctor but still want to help. Consider biomedical engi-neering: develop artificial organs or improve patient care. Finally, you can become an entrepreneur, and start your own business based on your ideas. If that’s your goal, learn as much as you can about business and management, as well as the sector you’ll be working in.

General Resources, ie the WebThe Web is a fantastic resource to help you work out wheth-er a particular career might be right for you. Nonetheless, remember that most careers websites accentuate the posi-tive. It is hard to find negative information about any career. The most anyone can say is what was person-ally right for them. So the first rule is: read carefully when you’re considering whether a particular field might appeal to you. Be honest with yourself about your own interests and capabilities. That said, there’s a lot to read. Besides the general resources (see p.37), every engineering area has an institute that registers professionals, and each of these offers career advice. Most science disciplines – especially computer-related subjects including design – are well rep-

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resented on the Web, and with a little effort you can become acquainted with the kind of work people do in that field, what the latest developments are, and what your career prospects might be.

The second rule is simple: the Web is not enough. For those who still prefer paper, The Careers Directory: The One-Stop Guide to Professional Careers (ed. Ken Reynolds and John Mainstone, 2006) gives a decent overview. However, with online research so convenient it is easy to forget other resources. Start with your family and your friends’ families. Can you find someone who works in the field you have in mind or a related one? What can they tell you about their daily work? Can they take you to work for a day or show you what they’re working on? What would they do differ-ently based on what they know now? Other people’s mis-takes are the cheapest possible way you can learn.

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06Ways inWhich Route?

I t’s the classic debate. Which matters most: getting a degree or getting some experience? The answer is simple, if not helpful: it depends. For some professions,

clearly there is no, or almost no, choice. If you want to be a pharmacist, doctor, mining engineer, surgeon, aeronautical engineer or a researcher looking for new antibiotics you will need a university degree. Structural engineers or computer games developers, by contrast, won’t necessarily have degrees, though they probably will. To become a computer games developer, whether as programmer, designer or graphics artist, the most significant requirement is an absolute passion for games. You will most likely have started as a games tester playing the same game for months on end looking for bugs and flaws and reporting them to the development team, and progressed from there. Even so, many parts of games development require first-rate skills in areas such as programming and artificial intelligence, and these are most easily and completely acquired with a university degree.

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There are, however, still many careers where work expe-rience and hands-on practical training are the main event: lighting technicians, surveying technicians, and many agriculture and land-based jobs. A plant scientist studying the genetics of potatoes has a university degree; a florist has vocational qualifications that come from a combination of classroom work and practical experience; a crop farmer might have either of these, but could also have completed an apprenticeship and learned on the job.

University DegreesThe benefits of completing a university degree can be considerable even if you can succeed in your chosen career without one. For one thing, surveys show that generally the higher your qualifications, the more you earn. They don’t always make a distinction between university degrees and equivalent qualifications, however. A university degree therefore means that your pay rises more quickly, around 43 percent more on latest estimates, at least partially offset-ting the extra debt you’re likely to have.

Government policies in recent years have driven a general increase in the percentage of the population that has degrees. This means that those without degrees may face increased competition from those who do, and also that employers may increasingly demand degree study for careers that formerly didn’t require it. So far, that doesn’t seem to be happening. A 2004 survey of 1995 graduates found that so far the expansion of higher education has not

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led to decreased opportunities for graduates.Graduates do a wider range of jobs than they did in the

past, but most respondents to the survey said they were in appropriate employment for someone with their skills and qualifications and were using the skills they developed dur-ing their university courses. Employers continue to pay a premium to degree-holders, but graduate earnings vary by sector and region, as well as gender and age. Women aver-age lower pay than men at all levels.

I went to the University of Surrey,

one of the top ranked universities in the

UK for employment. The reason they are

successful is because they offer a sandwich course, that is a year out in the middle of your degree where

you spend time in a professional

environment learning how to do the job you are training for. This

experience is invaluable not only in gaining employment but in enhancing your understanding of how things

work.Robin, civil engineer, Gifford, on studying

on a sandwich course

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The benefits of a university education are not, however, limited to pay and prospects. There are many social and cultural benefits associated with attending an institution where you mix with hundreds or even thousands of peo-ple your age from a wide variety of backgrounds. Lifelong friendships are formed at university with people you might otherwise never have met, and you have a chance to experi-ment both intellectually and socially in ways that will not be open to you once you are in full-time employment. A university course is an experience as well as an education, and it is very rare for people who have done it to look back with regret and say they wish they had entered the work-force sooner. It is, however, common for those who did not go to university to wish, later in life, that they had.

Of course not everyone can afford to go to university; not everyone can win a place on the course of their dreams. Do not despair if this is you. Many, perhaps even most SET and design careers, have alternative routes to qualifications that are functionally equivalent to a university degree or even more advanced degrees. A university course seeks to teach you how to learn as much as a specific subject; many peo-ple complete university degrees with no very clear idea of what they want to do afterwards. Work experience is often deemed necessary by employers uneasy at taking graduates with no training outside the classroom.

A university degree shows that you have learned critical and analytical skills and that you have reached a certain level of educational achievement. Vocational courses instead teach the practical skills you will need for a specific job; they are more limited in scope and accordingly more goal-

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oriented. Because they are more focused, if you choose the vocational route you should, in the process of picking the course you will take, also plan how and where you intend to enter employment and tailor your plans accordingly. You should also ensure that you get hands-on work experience that is appropriate to the work you intend to do, even if that

University Placements

Sandwich courses and independent work placements offer two distinct routes into work experience whilst at university. You can organise your own placements by contacting companies directly or, if you’re lucky, there may be links between specific employers and university departments. There are also a few schemes that can help (see below). Experience is attractive to employers. It testifies to both your commitment and familiarity with their business. And for those who haven’t ventured off the academic path before, it can be the all-important step from theoretical know-how to future job opportunities.

www.yini.org.uk provides opportunities for a paid year in industry before or during university in many sectors, not just SET or Design.

www.step.org.uk is geared towards summer placements and can help organise paid project work in small and medium-sized firms.

www.projectshop.org.uk is an online brokerage site that match-es engineering students with the opportunity to work on industry-linked projects for final-year coursework.

www.work-experience.org A general portal with many links and some listings. It also gives sound advice on how to go the DIY route.

www.insidecareers.co.uk/eng/placements lists many place-ments in engineering, whereas www.ied.org.uk has pages where students advertise themselves and showcase degree work.

www.iaeste.org is the place to look for an SET placement abroad.

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experience is unpaid. In some cases, you may choose to do a vocational course after completing a degree in order to have practical skills alongside your academic ones.

The advantages of vocational training are straightforward: you progress more efficiently into the career you want. You will still get to interact with others training for the same profession, and you may be able to combine the course with paid work, leaving you with less debt and immediate employment. On the other hand, if you need or want to change your career direction later you may be less equipped to do so than if you had a broader, more flexible educa-tion to draw on. For more see the vocational learning site (www.vocationallearning.org.uk).

Mentoring

A mentor can be a friend, an able adviser and role model or usually all three. The SETNET network (www.setnet.org.uk) runs a science and engineering “ambassadors” scheme that links up enthusiasts from the working world who can act like mentors to classrooms of students. Later on in life many employers also recognise mentoring as a way of helping workers to bridge the gap between the expec-tations of newcomers and the reality of working life. New recruits are teamed with an experienced worker from a similar background and are encouraged to discuss their experiences and frustrations with someone who has already learned the ropes. Particularly notable are the schemes for women run by the UK Resource Centre for Women in Science Engineering and Technology (see www.setwomenresource.org.uk) and the Institute of Engineering & Technology (www.iet.org), which has a mentoring service for all.

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Apprenticeships and On-the-Job TrainingApprenticeships offer another option. A Foundation Apprenticeship lasts for about eighteen months and leads to NVQ level 2 and a technical certificate. Once you have a Foundation Apprenticeship under your belt, you can choose whether to continue your education and training in other ways, or move on to an Advanced Apprenticeship. These take at least two years, provide you with the skills you need to become highly effective in your job, and give you the option to move into higher education. For many jobs requiring physical skills the traditional way to learn was through an apprenticeship to an expert; often you would move into that expert’s household. Modern apprenticeships are funded by the Learning and Skills Council (www.lsc.gov .uk), which offers more than 180 different apprenticeships across more than eighty industry sectors. They are prima-rily intended for those between the ages of 16 and 24, but an adult version is being devised for those 25 and older.

It helped that I was taught my craft skills by craftsmen, not academic teachers, but the greatest gift I ever got was to be imbued with an insatiable curiosity

about everything and never to be frightened to ask if I didn’t understand. Too often today people see not

understanding as failure rather than the signal to start asking for answers.

Tony, a self-employed plumbing and heating engineer

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Most employers pay £70 or more per week to apprentices, and apprenticeships are part-time, so you can combine them with paid work or further study. When you complete your apprenticeship, you will receive an NVQ, Key Skills qualifications and a technical certificate such as a BTEC National Diploma or a City & Guilds Progression Award. Apprenticeships lead to an NVQ Level 2, and Advanced Apprenticeships lead to an NVQ Level 3 and can help you enter higher education.

The good side of apprenticeships and other types of on-the-job training is, of course, that you are being paid to learn rather than paying someone to teach you. You should be able to worry less about finding a job after graduation – because you already have one. You know that the skills you are being taught are the ones your employer wants. And doing an apprenticeship does not stop you from going to university later on, when perhaps you’ll have a clearer idea of what you want to study and what you want to do with your degree.

Companies vary in their approach, however, and you should look closely at the specific employer with whom you seek to train. Some take a broad view in which you learn a variety of skills in a variety of settings and have some over-all career flexibility; these companies may think more in terms of developing employees. Others are more restrictive and oriented toward fitting apprentices to do a specific job – and no more. In these companies you are likely to have less scope to progress in your career and less support if you are interested in gaining further qualifications.

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Ultimately...The choice is yours. There are good reasons for looking outside of SET or Design for a career or study. However, you will only know what you are missing if you seriously consider all the options. Good luck and happy hunting.

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