So i'm real good at electronics honest! I've been doing it for the past five years, I'm also very good at maths, design, theorizing and generally making things. Unfortunately two and a half years ago I chose to do a BTEC because I wanted to study electronics and there wasn't anywhere in my area that offered electronics A level. I received the maximum possible grade for the BTEC and I want to study at the best unis, Imperial and UCL but have both been rejected. Imperial for not liking BTECs and I assume the same with UCL but I have only just received the information and the admissions are now closed. Without sounding big headed I really am highly talented in a lot of areas and so it really depresses me when this happens. I plan on doing a PhD too. rant over...... Oh yeh the working day after I finished my BTEC I started work for a well known audio company in London. I am a support engineer but do quite a lot of elaborate work. I sent them an email asking for a job despite none advertised (my first email to any company) now they love me and my boss doesn't want me to leave to go to uni next year...
That's really bad news. Have you tried ringing the admissions office at Imperial? They were quite friendly when I spoke to them. I assume they would want you to get at least maths A level, but they might be happy to ignore the rest if you have a btec in electronics? Perhaps see if you can do maths in after-work classes and apply again next year?
Could you see if your employer knows anyone at the uni's after all its who you know as much as what you know now days, as much as i loath the fact.
Yes I rang them the women just blanked me saying that they don't accept btec despite my knowledge, work experience and employer refrences!
Where else are you looking? I wouldn't let it get you down, surely you checked before you applied whether they accepted BTECs? There are plenty of other good universities in the country for Electronic Engineering.
UCL accept it at my grade and I assumed imperial did but they don't! I ideally want to stay in London and study at the best places.
http://www.thecompleteuniversitygui...ankings?s=Electrical+&+Electronic+Engineering Any particular reason you want to stay in London? You don't have to just look at the top 5 universities, lots of them will give first rate degrees.
Quite frankly. I wouldn't spend too much time worrying about which university you go to. Once you have finished university and you are working, your university education is quickly forgotten by employers and colleagues. University is only going to get you your first job, after that its your work experience and achievements in the real world which counts. I would put actual experience and professional achievement over where someone was educated every time if I were to select someone for a job.
This ^^ As long as you do well enough to get your foot in the door where you've done your degree doesn't really matter
What about getting your employer to help fund you on a BEng with the OU? May not be what you're after, just a thought seeing as they don't want to let you go.
If you've got a good job and you enjoy it keep at it. Your'll probably have equal wages to a graduate in four years and have been earning rather than paying £9,000 per year. Otherwise do your a level maths and reply next year or accept a perfectly good redbrick offer.
What some people do, is that they apply to another University, work their ass off and get A range grades, including, any prerequisite to the program you are in, and once they have all their prerequisite , all with excellent grades, they can switch to any other University, and continue where they left off from the previous University. Basically, by getting high grades somewhere else, you prove to the university that rejected you that you can do it, plus you'll have the prerequisite needed, so they have 0 reason to refuse you. Also, you must remember, unless you are in a field that requires a degree, like you can't self thought. University degree is just there to help you get your first job (and MAYYYYBE your second, if you didn't stay long time on the first job). Employers are more interested in your skill, knowledge, and out of the box thinking. Not GPA's of 4.0 (for most tech companies), unless you want to work in research, now you need a GPA of 4.0+, like if you want to work at Microsoft Research or IBM, etc. At work, we already interviewed people, with a Master Degree even phD in their Computer Science or Software Engineering, say their know C/C++, oh and they are from a really top universities, and they have good grades. They fail at the most basic interview question to know if they can code.... At work, we start with the question: how to calculate the length of a string? They have a white board, and lots of time. It blows my mind how we got people fail at this question... I am still doing my degree, and I of course I know this answer (I had it). And those who gets this question, will fail with the second silly question. (these questions we ask, are just to make the person we interview relax and get his mind started and focus) My thoughts is that they worked so long in their field of expertise, and not actual coding, or even general knowledge that they just don't know. Also, as a student, I was shocked by the number of students that have no idea how a computer inside works. Yes they are intro course on hardware where we all know, but I expected people in the field that I study, to know more than the pure basic, and know how to build a computer. But, they just don't. Anyway, if you choose to go the work path, as you don't have a university degree, I would invest time to make it interesting. If you have a job now, focus on getting promoted and really do your best, even if it requires extra work, after work, to do research to know the required stuff. If it involves programming, make a kick-ass software (a basic calulator, tetris, snake, etc. aren't very interesting). Most employer consider your personal projects as experience. They will ask you questions like how did you do it? why? what challenges you faced? What mistake you did? and so on. Which makes the interview also more intresting, and easier for you to sale yourself. A good friend brother of mine, has an employee next to him, who is awesomely good apparently, and only has a high school degree. And he works in one of the tech companies that many of us have hardware inside, and consider kick-ass. So is just to say, don't loose hope. Doesn't mean that 1 stupid door closed that you don't have 300 to the left and another 300 to the right wide open.
I think there is an expectation from some people that masters and doctoral graduates are now experts on anything that is contained within the known universe. Typically this is from people who don't have these qualifications. Where as the reality is they know as much as anyone else that has done their under graduate degree. Only they haven't used a whole lot of it since actually graduating. They also know a good deal about a very very narrow scoped topic. In my opinion unless a job you are interviewing for is directly in line with your post grad work, then your post grad isn't going to be very much use in getting that job. At least in the world of engineering. Masters and Doctorates are a nice academic challenge, but I'm not sure how useful they really are in actually finding a job. They can be useful to add skill sets not covered in an undergraduate degree, like doing an engineering degree and a business masters for example. As for not knowing the programming questions. Well not much programming is done on a whiteboard. I wonder how they would do in front of a computer. If you are immersed in a world of C, then answering questions like that would be straight forward. If you were immersed in a world of C but haven't looked at it in a few years then questions like that can be surprisingly difficult until you get back into the swing of things.
Could be. Again, I haven't done any interviews, i am not qualified for such task. I am saying what I am being told by my co-workers.
Depends very very much on the company you're in. I used to work for an american company, that employed engineers, (BE and ME) and Doctors for the same job. The doctors usually weren't as good (practically), but were better paid. Promotion to management was equally doctors and non doctors, more dependent on who you knew then on what you could do. In my German company it's slightly different, doctors are better paid (while not performing better) and promoted earlier as management skills are expected in doctors. For certain levels of management, having a Doctor is....well a big plus. You'll hit "a glass ceiling" depending on your education level in an hierarchic company. Pretty much mirrors the education system for these countries. Americans don't really care about WHAT you studied, but WHERE you studied (and who you know) (a BE from MIT is valued higher than a ME from bushbushtech) Germans don't care WHERE you studied but what degree you reached. (a doctor beats an ME beats a BE, no matter where they studied)* Beeing good at what you do, in the long run in a large company, doesn't really matter. Sadly. *(which is why the US/UK BE-ME and Uni rep. system doesn't befit Germany) Mind you in small companies this is radically different.
The London part explains why you've regarded Imperial and UCL as top universities. Otherwise I'd open a can of warms on you for not recognising Southampton as top Electronics engineering uni. Do give them a ring.
