Applied Mechanics Placement Student Review

I've really enjoyed my placement year with regards to both the work and the company. I have been able to work on a variety of projects involving vibration and stress analysis/testing which were areas I didn't think I would enjoy working in. I've been allowed to work independently and given a fair amount of responsibility showing the company trusts me. The work has been interesting and engaging (a good mix of hands on work and computer based) for the most part and the majority of people I have worked with have been very friendly and helpful. I feel I have learned a lot from this year not just in engineering but also in the working environment.

I feel the work I was given ranged from quite basic and simple to more engaging and challenging work which made me feel more valued by the company and my department. I felt helpful to my colleagues when I was able to provide help and recognition gained from my department was nice. The nature of my work was to provide testing and results to other departments. Some people I worked with were very friendly and would make your work feel valued while others would just expect results from you and leave it at that. If I offered advice/input to someone, the majority of colleagues took this on board and appreciated it.

My supervisor was very key to development during my placement as I learnt a great amount from him from start to finish. He took me through the majority of my work in the year and also offered great career advice Everyone in my department was happy to help where they could and were also instrumental in developing my engineering knowledge through the year. I went through a managerial change during my time in the department and both managers offered good support and guidance.

At the beginning of the placement, I was still picking up the required skills and learning a lot about the work so opportunities were small. After a couple of months I was able to pick up a lot more projects and remained fairly busy throughout the rest of the placement. Other than a couple of quiet days, I was kept busy either with my own work or from offering my help to other people. Very rarely did I feel overwhelmed by the work I had on my plate.

To begin with I wasn't given much responsibility with my first few projects but not long after I was allowed to work independently and have larger amounts of responsibility. While I didn't work as a project lead where I would have total responsibility, there were still projects where I felt I had been trusted with important work and felt more like a full time employee.

I developed a lot of engineering skills as well as working environment knowledge which I am sure I will use again after I graduate. While I think some of these skills could be used during my degree I feel they will mostly help me with the working world. There was some theory I learned during the year which would be helpful if I covered relevant modules at uni. I was also offered the chance to use a project from my time at Cummins as part of a final year dissertation but unfortunately this wasn't something I would be doing at uni next year.

I worked on a separate site to most other departments at Cummins so the office I worked in was only for my department of 6/7 people. The atmosphere was quiet because of this but also very relaxed and friendly. The office itself isn't particularly nice but as I spent half my time working on test rigs and on more hands on work I didn't mind this so much. Unfortunately the site I was on had no canteen and limited kitchen appliances so lunch would always have to be home-made food.

The placement was organised reasonably well but I feel more support could have been given with arranging/finding housing for new placement students (possibly taking over houses of previous placement students). There was good communication of training and other placement events but I remember feeling rather unprepared coming into the year which could have been helped out by giving more information about the placement at the beginning of the year)

I feel the company invests a lot in their placement students. We had multiple training days which were made more engaging than normal. Opportunities were provided to work on a range of projects and learn a lot about the different aspects of engineering covered at the company. I even had a 2 day course watching one of their engines being made from scratch which gave great insight into the manufacturing process. The company does try to provide students with the opportunity to cover as many aspects of the company's operation as possible.

As I worked on a site completely separate from all other students it was harder for me to socialise outside of my department. There were times I was able to socialise with the other students but these weren't as often as I expected coming into the placement. If Iworked in any other department then socialising would have been much easier.

I was living in Rugby not far from Daventry which offered reasonably priced accommodation to rent. Nights out would usually be either in Rugby or out in Leamington and Coventry where the cost for a night out isn't too bad. The cost of living was generally average for living out in the midlands and came to pretty much the same as I was paying while at uni

The night life in Daventry itself is pretty non-existent but I generally went out in Rugby or Leamington and Coventry. The night life here isn't too bad (Rugby is a less studenty night out) but they don't compare to nights out in London/Birmingham/other bigger cities). Getting taxis back home weren't too expensive either

Cummins does offer EEEC and other activities to do outside of work such as go karting and badminton. I didn't do these but I did play 5 a side football most weeks after work with other people from the tech centre and really enjoyed this. There were even socials organised around this and departmental meals which were good to meet people outside of the working environment