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Help ! - Need advice on Engineering degrees and Physics degrees ?

Hi all, I really need your help about deciding which degree I wish to pursue at University and which universities to apply to.

Basically, I enjoy physics and some elements of maths and so am very interested in studying either physics or engineering at university (though I'm leaning towards mechanical engineering).

I'm studying the following AS levels:
Maths
F. Maths
Physics
History
Geography

and will study the following A2 levels:
Maths
Physics
Geography

I'm expected to get 3 A's at A2 level so I'll probably met the requirement for many universities.

Which degree should I choose - Physics or Engineering ? I've looked at mechanical engineering but which engineering branch has good job prospects in the future and is fairly well paid which I could apply to study based on my AS and A2 subjects? (It would also be soooo helpful if someone could explain the main engineering branches because I only know about mechanical and civil at the moment)

Also, do you guys have any recommendations for 5 good universities for Physics or Engineering (especially Mechanical)?

Thanks so much for any help or advice you can offer to a young, naive sixth form student,
Ross

Reply 1

NatashaJB

well, in terms of demand, I'm guessing environmental engineers would be pretty popular right now. But tbh I think job prospects are pretty good for engineers as we will always need them, and we are constantly in need of improving current designs and methods.

As to branches, there are many, off the top of my head - Mechanical, structural, civil, marine, electronic, aeronautical/aerospace. There are also quite a few unis that offer a general engineering course that gives you the opportunity to study all the branches at first and then specialise in a certain are in the later years of the course.

As to recommendations for good unis, it depends which branch you decide to do as to which are the best, but you tend to find with science-y subjects that any of the good universities teach a good course. i suggest that you just have a look at the Times/Guardian league tables for an idea for good courses, then have a look on the internet/get prospectuses and just see which places/courses you like the look of.

hope that is of some help

Reply 2

WhySoLimey

as far as i remember when i was aplying the only unis that do general engineering are oxbridge and something else like durham.

as for which has the best job prospects after uni they will all have pretty wide range, hard to say which will be widest.. i went for civil and theres been no shortage for me.

top few for civil are something like bristol, bath, southampton, imperial etc..

Reply 3

WhySoLimey

Original post by scott8anthony

I know a bit about engineering and physics courses at university, and would say physics can be more satisfying as things tend to be derived from their most fundamental aspects, whereas engineering is more 'here's the equation, lets see how we can use it'. So it depends what you gain satisfaction from, really.
I would recommend, however, that if you choose physics or engineering to study further maths at A2.
As for the main branches of engineering, I really don't know how people who aren't doing a general course know what one to choose; one can look up descriptions on wikipedia etc. but it's not like studying the topics. After ~1.5 years I'm still very undecided.
Having said that, many universities have a very general first year, with the option of swapping to a different specialisation thereafter. The main branches are mechanical, civil, electrical, chemical (and biomedical, what I probably want to do :tongue:

) amongst others. There's a fair bit of overlap on the maths involved, and engineering problems nowadays require skills from a lot of different areas.

thats not true (for my civil engineering at least). every equation we use that i can think of atm was derived from the fundamentals..

Reply 4

WhySoLimey

Original post by scott8anthony

So your lecturer went into detail about the strong nuclear force before introducing the elementary theory of beam bending?! Who was this person?!

I jest, I jest; come to think of it, a lot of, indeed, most of the equations we are given are also derived. Perhaps what I meant was engineering deals with more 'everyday' problems and involves more common sense, whereas physics deals with the fundamental aspects of nature that don't appear to have as much application to everyday problems at first glance.