Power Academy - a graduate's perspective
Past and present Power Academy scholars describe their experience of Power Academy and outline the reasons why they opted for a Power Engineering course:
Caroline Opiyo
Paid Work placement
Caroline Opiyo, a recent Power Academy graduate from the University of Manchester, feels that one of the best features of Power Academy is the paid work placement: ‘What I enjoyed most though was my summer placement. I was treated as a valued team member and offered challenging projects that were important to the business.'
Why choose Power Academy or a power engineering course?
Caroline had ‘always been interested in high voltage engineering’ and therefore felt sure that Power Engineering would be her ideal career. Caroline asserts that ‘The Power Academy is absolutely the best way to start out and keep in touch with the industry. This was invaluable to me as it as it improved my understanding of the course material because I was able to apply it to real life issues in industry. All in all, there is no down side to applying for the Power Academy programme. You only stand to gain from it. ’
An opportunity to mix with the 'Movers & Shakers' of the Power Industry
Caroline found the annual seminar particularly beneficial and suggests that Power Academy students will find that it provides ‘a great opportunity to mingle with the “movers and shakers” within the power industry.’ She points out that ‘Students would seldom otherwise get the opportunity to meet and talk to the directors of major power companies’ or to meet ‘some of the best academics within this speciality. It is absolutely brilliant for networking.’
Greg Metcalf
Why choose Power Academy?
Greg Metcalf’s Power Academy scholarship provided him with much needed financial support throughout the final two years of his degree at Manchester University. In addition to enabling him to ‘get a foot in the door of a leading company’, Greg states that: ‘The combination of a bursary and payment of tuition fees has made such a difference.’
Greg has the following advice for potential applicants: ‘I would advise anybody thinking about applying to the programme to just do it, there is nothing to lose by doing so. The rewards and experience on offer are a fabulous opportunity not to be missed.’
Paid work placement - an opportunity to work with top grade engineers
Like Caroline, Greg found the summer work placement to be one of most valuable aspects of the Power Academy experience and comments that ‘My summer placement with National Grid was the most fulfilling and exciting work placement I have undertaken. I got to work with top-grade engineers working on real-world problems around the UK, who were more than happy to pass on their expertise. I was given the opportunity to work on my own project, which was both technical and relevant.’
Power Academy seminar
Greg comments that ‘The summer Power Academy Seminar was also a very well organised event that brought together some of the leading people in the industry.’
Anna Johnson
Why study electrical engineering?
Anna Johnson, who is currently studying for an MEng degree in Electrical and Mechanical Engineering at the University of Strathclyde states that she decided to opt for engineering because she particularly ‘enjoyed studying maths and physics and wanted to be able to apply what’ she had ‘learnt to real world situations.’
Paid work placement
Anna has just finished her first work placement with AREVA T&D and describes it as follows: ‘The work has been interesting and I have learnt a lot about HVDC schemes and some of the aspects of designing an SVC station…I found it a bit daunting at first as I had never worked for a large company before, but everyone was friendly and willing to help and explain even the simple stuff to me.’