this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2023
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Mechanical engineering 101, us sparkies don't get to learn that stuff until we get into the real world. Not bitter just disappointed in my uni.
Really? I'd have thought EEs would learn it in the context of something like circuit breakers using bimetallic strips or the effect of heat-cycling on soldered joints.
Seems like EEs are not taught a lot of practical things in school.
Yes. The field is way too broad and has been for decades. I have all this knowledge in my head that I never get to use (integration of 1 over the square root of arctan squared of x cubed), knowledge that would have bern useful in the 1970s (this is how to build a class C amplifier without soldering), and knowledge that would have been useful but wasnt taught (this is what FLA is).
The ideal would be to break it up into a few different degrees. Guys and gals working in Software Defined Radio shouldn't have the same training as those planning powerlines.
I lost it on an intern a while back who wanted to drop out because "we aren't learning anything practical". Yeah I know kid, get your piece of paper and get to work.
I've heard almost the exact same thing from MEs as well. Both are sooo broad. I mead I get WHY they try to teach you anything and everything, but it does seem overwhelming and at the same time seems like you haven't learned anything useful even when you really have. You simply don't know if you'll be working at a nuclear power plant dealing with thermodynamics or a car maker mostly dealing with design or as a project manager at some other company dealing with vibrations. There's just no way to know. The path your work life leads is impossible to predict so they sort of have to teach you a little about everything.
Damn, I'm an EE and my university wasn't too bad for having a good mix of theory vs practical. But I'm aware a lot of EE courses don't do that.
BTW, are you Australian too?
Nope. I might have been to harsh a bit. My sub-field (controls and automation) is notorious for being poorly documented and most of the tech being very vendor specific. So you learn on the job.
I am sure plenty of the semiconductor EEs will disagree with me.
Ah yeh, fair enough. I didn't do any controls and am. Now having to learn a bit for my job, but I like learning at work. It's more fun than university.