I don't know if i'm academic or not since I didn't attend school past 11. I used to get mainly B's and sometimes A equivalents then but the work was simple and I was always daydreaming. From that I taught myself maths GCSE in around 9 months doing roughly 2 hours a day. It was quite fun and I managed to get a B grade.
When I was a kid I played legos a lot and had virtually no guidance. I loved assembling and taking commodities apart. I was always curious how things work. Even know I walk around the house wondering what's the science behind how the computer works. We use all these commodities yet have no idea. I want to design my own or at least know how to customize them.
Solving real world problems and helping design or create somethings that are actually useful is a dream come true. I don't want to be just a clog in a business giving customer service.
While I think I have the ability to be an engineer I feel I have my own unique issues. If I have to do something boring, I need to know why it's useful or it will be a struggle to learn. Luckily maths is fun in itself but certain topics are boring to me. For GCSE biology it's basically memorizing theories. Then you just regurgitate what you read without any investigation. They even tell you the body needs x and y but don't tell you why most the time. This is quite boring. I want to know the reasoning behind things and can't blindly accept statements.
With maths there is one correct answer and I can experiment with numbers myself. I can delve off and do unrelated problems if I desire. I am the type of person that would rather learn how information was discovered and be left in a lab to experiment.
If an engineering degree consists of only memorizing formulas and facts, following a strict set of guidelines on how to design and designing specific products then i'm not sure if I want to do one. If studying will improve my problem solving skills, give me the fundamentals I need to go out there and create something useful, then I would love to study engineering.