This is the transcript for the video Flexible Engineering
Chris Wong 0:05
What I’m going to cover today is very briefly, what is Flexible Engineering? And what sort of careers can you get from Flexible Engineering? And then I’ll describe what Flexible Engineering actually composes of. And we’ll talk a little bit about the sort of subjects you do and hopefully, we’ll have a lot of questions afterwards, where you can ask the questions that you may or may not know that you actually want to ask about in this particular programme. So, first of all, what’s Flexible Engineering? Well, it’s actually an interesting degree, because most degrees you have most universities in Australia and around the world, you have a Bachelor of Engineering in a particular discipline. For example, a Bachelor of Engineering in Civil or Bachelor of Engineering in Mechanical Engineering, or Bachelor of Engineering in Software Engineering. This is the only degree that’s accredited in Australia, that is completely flexible, you simply get called a Bachelor of Engineering Honours. So it’s quite unique in Australia. There are degrees overseas, which do offer Flexible Engineering programmes as well and they inspired us in our programme design. So as I mentioned, we have a lot of disciplines at UTS. For example, there’s Software Engineering, there’s our Mechanical Engineering, Mechatronics, and Mechanical. There’s new Chemical Processing Engineering starting next year, and Data Science, Engineering, Biomedical, Electrical, Civil, and Civil Environmental. So we have many choices, this degree is fairly unique in the sense that you can do combinations of all the above bit of software, bit of civil etc. And of course, all our engineering degrees can be combined with, for example, business, or international studies, or with creative intelligence, medical science, and science itself. So just be aware that you don’t have to just do a particular discipline. In our case, we’ll be flexible, you can also do it in combination. In fact, flexible plus, science is a very, very common popular combination for students who want to enhance their existing degrees. So what’s Flexible Engineering? And you could ask, what is engineering first place? Well, Flexible Engineering is a particular type of engineering where you can actually design your own degree, you’ll notice that we have a common first year. So most of our subjects are the same mathematics, physics and introductory subjects, that gives you a chance to choose to transfer to another major in second year. So you could do civil introduction to civil engineering and introduction to electrical and say, Hmm, I think I like the civil instead, then transfer to the Civil Engineering degree in the second year. Or the alternative, which is my most exciting part of it, is to develop your own degree. And hopefully Dinesh will tell us his journey on how he developed his own. So it doesn’t have to be a civil, you can make your own combinations of different degrees, or build your own, I have a student who actually created her own railway technology engineering, I have a student who created a quantum engineering major by himself, by combining subjects we offer with science subjects, so Flexible Engineering gives you these choices, to let’s take a look at what you can actually do. First of all, and I’m incredibly encouraged to do this, if you wish to stay with a flexible programme, is to create your own combination. And I’m the main person to give you advice with regards to that. And most students who do this combination have a vague idea or rough idea of what they want to do. So they kind of know what combinations that want to do at this point, or talk with me. But because you may not know exactly what you want to do. A second option is to create is to choose what we call a sub major that only for subjects for in a particular area of interest that can be disciplined based. For example, you might say soft, I’ll do the software sub major, plus a bit of mechanical plus a bit of civil or how about environmental, you can make your own for example, renewable energy, I’m going to do solar power, renewable energy battery storage, in combination with perhaps civil engineering or electrical, it’s your choice, or do advanced manufacturing subjects, which you can’t do in any of the other majors. There are many choices that you can choose. So the list is very extensive in our UTS handbook. And I’ll talk about those in a moment. And of course, you can just treat it like a flexible first year like the other universities where you just try some of the sample introductions and then move in second year to the discipline that you choose. So you do have choices out there.
So this are examples of what sort of sub majors or B Corp threads you can do. This example on the left hand side of chemical process engineering is just coming up next year, it started off as a Flexible Engineering sudden major, and it’s become a full on major for next year. Digital engineering is an option where you can learn about things like CAD and Cam called Building Information Modelling. We’re creating some areas and things like Humanitarian Engineering and mountain manufacturing. I mentioned quantum already that’s got some quantum subjects out there. Renewable energy is really important, and sustainability. So you can choose some of these nescent fields, they’re not don’t really exist yet. But you can build your own. And of course, on the right hand side, these are discipline specific ones, you can do biomedical plus, plus whatever Civil Environmental, that you want, electronic, data science, mechanical, mechatronic, and software. So these ones on the right are the standard disciplines, but you can do a small version of it in combination with something else. So it’s quite flexible in that respect. So I’ve got a whole bunch of choices here. I like to find out, what are you interested in. So let’s have a quick poll to see what you’re interested in. So we’ve got a whole bunch of fields here to choose from. And let’s see what you might want to try. So there’s been quite a few choices now on biomedical and civil, but probably the largest number so far is mechanical and mechatronics. So it’s an interesting field in electrical, as well as preparing and renewable energy. Nobody’s choosing events, manufacturing, which is quite interesting, and only one person who’s unsure. So we do have a broad range. But I would say it’s roughly equal now between civil and mechanical, slightly more mechanical, but civil environments are the largest choices out there. Okay. So it’s interesting to find out that you do have some areas that you are interested in civil and mechanical, to top most popular ones. Right. So hopefully, we’ll find out more what you wish to do later. So why study engineering in the first place? You know, we’ve got the disciplines of engineering. Engineering itself is actually a really broad term. It’s, we live in a world where everything is engineered, and engineering is a form of engineer meeting, I create, innovate. So everything we do in engineering from biomedical, even the COVID, drug vaccine generation, technically, those are engineered in factories, we manufacture the drugs, that’s biomedical engineering, field, and chemical processing, as well. We also have incredible rates of technological innovation. Just look at social media, how everything’s go, and also virtual reality, everything’s changing so fast. So choosing something like flexible means you’re not fixed. I just literally spoke with a student just before this webinar about career choices. And he wasn’t sure between mechanical civil my father, I mean, do civil, you know what, if you choose flexible, you’ve got the choice. So you can choose to move on, or develop your own field, if you wish. And quite frankly, we don’t know the future. So choosing options with flexible means that you can adapt your engineering career as we find new careers that appear in the next four or five years, because that’s your that’s the length of our degrees. And the thing is engineers were supposed to be pioneers, we develop new things to do really helpful things for industry for global needs. You won’t find anything in the world that isn’t engineered in some way. People maybe formerly engineers are not formal. That’s it’s still the process is still there.
So engineering is actually a very, very hot and in demand industry. People expect us to innovate things like iPhones are devices getting smaller and smaller every day. Technically bigger, but they’re actually like supercomputers now. Robotics, new things. We’ve seen the war in Ukraine with drones, for example, autonomous systems and not autonomous systems. 3d printing solutions, people are printing body parts. Now would you believe it using 3d printing, as well as prototyping things that might be interesting, like car parts, for example. And finally, big things happening now, especially with COVID health innovations. A lot of people are working on designs for getting around that. So engineering is so broad, we can do many, many things. So let’s go for some samples of what sort of careers you can do. Now, this isn’t necessarily specific to flexible, but I’m going to talk about the sort of careers we’ve had from Flexible Engineering students. Now, you can do a career related to your combination of subjects. For example, if you do a civil Some major, you can also work in the civil field. So we have students doing Flexible Engineering. They did the civil subjects, and they got recognised as civil engineers. But a very common combination from those combinations is called project engineers or site engineers, you’ll find them they’re got mostly civil with a bit of perhaps system or project management skills as well. A lot of entering consultancy needs students who are flexible, who have maybe not just a particular narrow field, they might have a bit of civil bit of software bit of robotics, for example. And that’s a very combination with combined law degrees, for example, planning research, regulatory bodies, like local council, they need people who are not who are familiar with not just one particular discipline, but multiple Civil Environmental impacts, some legal or project management aspects is a good, good combination. And of course, there’s contractors, the big mining, or the big tunnelling companies in Sydney, they actually have a lot of students who do multiple disciplines engineering, to work on things like tunnelling involve many disciplines, not just civil, not as mining, for example. And other fields, you can go into like transport. One of my recent graduates for this year, she worked, she actually created her own railway engineering degree, and she works in transport. We have quite a few flexible engineers who did your work the finance injury, so they work on things like intellectual property, Project assessment, things like that, to the skills you get a very broad and combining with another green makes it even more more broader. Quite a few defence students doing into the Defence Force and things like aeronautical, for example. So there’s different pathways you can get through flexible in that respect. Now, what do you actually study? Well, you can look up the UTS handbook, to find out what the flex what subjects you can choose. But effectively, in the flexible degree, every combination of every subject through every discipline is available to you as a flexible student. So you every subject available and every major is available. So you still do the Common Core, that’s the red stuff, which is like math, physics, engineering, design, project management, and you have some common core choices as well, like introduction to civil introduction to mechanical, it’s your choice. And then you focus it in the next middle stage. And then you choose options. And the options are typically things that broaden or deepen your Flexible Engineering. We give you prepackaged advice, if you wish to read it, we call them threads, or you can make your own in combination with consulting me. And of course, you have electives, which can be in any field, not just engineering. So I did mention, a really useful thing to do is to combine your engineering degree. And it’s quite a popular combination with Flexible Engineering, I would say the top two is a Bachelor of Business and Bachelor of Science. Those are the top two combinations with the Flexible Engineering programme. Science in particular, for people doing things like biomedical, or in the future, doing things like environmental engineering, because you do a lot of science subjects and those particular majors and chemical processes, as well will be an interesting combination, we have to a few modifications to your plan to fit that because there’s duplicates in both degrees, but I can work with you on that one. And of course, Bachelor of Laws, which is engineering science, it’s also flexible as well.
So you can combine your degree, I highly recommend you consider that if you want to do that. And last but not least, I think we mentioned Carmela earlier mentioned that there’s diploma in professional engineering practice. That’s what you do to six months internships, your first internships in second year, and your second internship is in fifth year. So that’s an advantage over everybody else, that when you finish your degree, you have one years professional experience. For engineering become a a professional engineer, you’re required to have a certain number of years of experience before you can be chartered as a proper engineer. And that’s required, especially in New South Wales under the new regulations. So this means that you don’t lose any time if you do a four year degree at another university or this university. You still have to have two to three years experience to get a chartered state. If you do the diploma and professional engineering practice, Engineers Australia have recognised this diploma as a whole year’s worth of work experience. So you’re in exactly the same position as anybody else during a four year degree. With one subtle difference. You have work experience. Plus typically graduates from this programme have a high I pay because you now you’re not a graduate immediately. You’re a second year second year graduate student, engineering student. And it’s also extremely valuable to because you build up a network, both internships are with different companies. So your first internship, the junior internship, maybe with, say, a government department, for example. And your second internship could be with a commercial company, many of our students gain their jobs through the context you gain from doing a Diploma in Professional Engineering Practice. So, I like to introduce our one of our students during the flexible programme, and Dinesh, so Dinesh, if you probably like to explain who you are, and what you have done so far, and why you chose Flexible Engineering. Over to you, Dinesh. Hey,
Dinesh Chandolia 15:52
everyone, my name is Dinesh and I’m, in my fifth year studying Flexible Engineering and some major in Mechanical Engineering. So I started my degree in 2017. And I started studying Mechanical Engineering. And I realised this is not something for me. And I switched to Mechatronics Engineering. And I started doing coding, I started doing programming, I started working with more towards automation side. And then I realised, this is not something that’s for me. So I switched, again, to Flexible Engineering. And while I was studying Flexible Engineering, Chris made me realise that I have already finished the subjects that could put me in I have my sub major as Mechanical Engineering. So even if I switched my degree three times, I’m still finishing it in five years, because you This is really flexible. All this subjects that I studied, I got credited for it, and they got transferred. So particularly, I didn’t waste any time in my degree. Once again, I started, I am finishing my five years degree in five years. And as Chris mentioned, about the professional engineering practice. So for my first internship, I worked in a hedge back company, that stands for heating, ventilation and air conditioning company. So even if I was studying Mechatronics, back then I was in a mechanical company, and that is completely fine. You could be studying Mechanical and be employed by a mechatronics company or studying Mechatronics, or be employed by a mechanical company. That’s super normal in terms of Engineering jobs. And the second internship that I did was in a company called as Hilty, Australia, so they work with fire stoppers. So just a brief background, if you don’t know what fire stoppers are, let’s just say there’s one room that has fire in it, and like it’s burning. So fast toppers are used so that the fire in this room stays in this room, and it doesn’t spread in the entire building through ducts, or the doors and stuff so that they have these devices that are called as far as toppers. So this is what where I was working. And after working in two companies, I realised I don’t like working in these companies, it may be suitable for someone else, but it’s not suitable for me. So doing like professional engineering practice provided me with industry experience. For my friends, I know they enjoyed working and now they’re working in the same companies where they did their second internship. But for me, I didn’t enjoy that. But it made me realise like I have skills and towards something else. So now I’ve started applying jobs and stuff. And jobs in terms of strategic and operation side, you must be thinking as an Engineer, you just have to do an Engineering job, that’s completely wrong, you could be working in Defence or you could be working in Project Management, or you could be working towards the strategic and operations side of a company. And as an Engineer, all you need is problem solving skills. And if you have that you are going to get hired. And like when I chose Flexible Engineering, I understood that, that I like subjects from it as well. So I picked up subjects like Introduction to Data Analytics and stuff that helps me to understand the data and how we can predict the data and provide it to data engineers. So Flexible Engineering provided me with an advantage of studying like bits and pieces from every other engineering fields that are possible, and made me realise what my strengths and weaknesses are. So now I’m prepared for industry. And now I’ll be passing it to Camilla to talk more about the adjustment points for your backgrounds.
Carmela Espinosa 19:33
Thanks Dinesh for that, um, so yeah, we’ll be moving forward to what you guys are probably hoping to learn more about. So in our UI guidebooks, that is really, for the Faculty of Engineering both. And for it, we do give a selection rank which is actually not your raw ATAR. So So Election rank is actually your ATAR plus any adjustment points that you will be awarded during the US grounds. So basically, this will give you a more, more opportunities for you guys to get a course with us. But just please be aware that these adjustment points are capped at 13 here at ETS. And for those who are confused about what adjustment points are, you may know them as bonus points if you are talking to your your high school teachers or even your guidance coordinator in that part. So these adjustment points can be given for a number of factors with and they include completing the UTS and engineering it questionnaire, which I recommend everyone. If you guys are interested in studying either an undergraduate engineering degree or IT degree to do this is what I did when I was in your 12 as well. As well as that you can also get adjustment points for getting good results in relevant HSC subjects, which is what we call the year 12 subjects scheme. For the good results, there is no need for you guys to do a separate application for that the adjustment points will be automatically collected as part of your results when you do receive them in December. On top of that you also have your gender, and any special circumstances that you think that you are applicable to. If you guys would like to learn more information about adjustment points and selection ranks here at UTS, you’re more than welcome to take a photo of the QR code on the screen today or even scan it to take you directly to our website for more information.
So moving on, this won’t be really relevant if you guys are currently in year 11 and your 10. But this will become more relevant once you are in year 12. But those of you currently in year 12. Hopefully that is will get as much information from these from this particular slide as well. So currently, we are in May, and we currently have our scholarship applications open. So if you’d like to apply for any type of scholarships that you would be interested in, please feel free to send in your applications now to be considered for them as well. On top of that, we also do have our open day, hopefully, this year will be the first year that we finally have it in person on campus on the 27th of August. So if you guys are any, anyone is welcome. So if you are a parent guardian, Teacher, your 1011 12 even in year seven or eight, you’re more than welcome to visit our campus on that day. So yeah, hopefully you guys can see on campus, then for current for current year 12 students currently trying to figure out what to put down for their preferences. Please don’t work. Try to stress up about that too much. I remember being really, really stressed out about it myself. So in in UEFI, there’s actually several offer rounds that you can actually obtain offers from. So each of these offer rounds has a end date where you can’t actually change your preferences until the offers offer date for that offer round does come out. So feel free to actually change your preferences between each of these offer rounds according to what suits you the best. For those of you asking already on the q&a q&a button about if flexible engineering can be added onto your preference list you can definitely do so you can definitely add that on your preference list straight away if you guys would like to edit now you can do that as well. As well as doing it with combined degrees such as a Bachelor of Business, for example. So those preferences are already are readily available on the back website. So there’s no need to stress about that. And then you do have your HSC exams in October and November. And then you will get your A tars and your HSC results release on December so Feel free to go through the U key dates on the US website for more information. Or otherwise, feel free to also visit our website for more details. Moving forward, we also do have the UTS early entry programme back again, we did start this last year and we’re bringing it back this year. So if you are a current domestic or international onshore year 12 student you are eligible for this programme. This is a really great programme because it allows you to receive an offer before you actually sit your final HSC exams are equivalent. If you guys are taking the IB, for example, your are still eligible for this programme as well. There’s no big application that you really need to do for this. This is basically will become available between June and July and we’ll close it September. dates have not yet been confirmed. So please be please check our website for more details. And for more updates. This is a very easy application which will be made through a UTS online application portal which is separate to the US application portal. So that will be directly on our website. And there is no additional charge for you guys to apply. So it is free to apply with the offers if you are successful provisional offers will be released in October before your HSC commences. And if you do take up on that offer, all you have to do is sit your HSC or equivalent to fully complete your provisional offer. So to get more information about the ETS early entry programme and how your points can be maximised. Please feel free to again, take a photo of the QR code on your screen or even scan it right now.
Last but not least we do have a number of student support services that is that you guys have access to once you are a student at UTS. Bridging courses are offered in mathematics, physics and chemistry during your orientation period here at UTS, before you start your official classes. I personally did mathematics extension one even though do we even though I did it in high school, I thought I needed that little bit of further help. As well as physics not having done physics at all. These courses definitely did help me. So if you guys are in that situation, fret not you guys are more than welcome to apply for bridging courses before you even start your classes if you guys didn’t end up coming here at UTS. Last but not least, we also do have classes called V pass or in the long term, Peer Assisted study success, which is available for some subjects. So what you pass is is a free tutoring classes which is run by high performing students from previous years, who is here to support and help you be successful in those subjects that is being offered to you. So this is truly available for you guys to utilise during your time here at UTS.