Vacation Student Review

I really enjoyed working at Arup. It was a great opportunity to learn and contribute on exciting, high-profile projects. I had site and office roles to experience different aspects of an engineer’s roles and day to day activity.

I was made very welcome into the team and quickly felt a part of the team. I was offered exciting tasks that directly contribute to the projects. I was frequently invited to out of work hours socials and football matches.

I was put at ease quickly with the idea that "no question is a silly question". All management and supervisors were willing to stop their work and help me on my tasks regardless if they were involved in the project or not.

Majority of the placement I had long term tasks to keep me busy however like all projects you have periods of hectic and quiet. However, when I had downtime other colleagues not involved in my assigned projects offered me work which was a great opportunity to be involved in different projects.

I was given responsibility to directly communicate and solve problems with the contractor, sub-contractor and architects. While on site I was given the opportunity to take control but was always supervised by a colleague. Most notably I was given a design task to be submitted to construction but was aided through the process.

I had the opportunity to use a wide variety of software that I will be using during the rest of my degree and in my career. I also built on my technical and professional knowledge from construction and design areas of the industry. My placement has definitely improved my civil and structural knowledge that wouldn't have been possible from just my studies alone.

Office was a great balance between working hard while having the opportunity to have a laugh and a joke. Everyone was very approachable and made an effort to help me settle in.

Very well organised. I was assigned to real tasks that required different skills and information that i could improve on. I was preassigned to projects with a real scope of work.

Before starting complicated tasks using software i had zero experience on. I was given the time to complete step by step guides to get a good understanding of the software.

Promising I have been told to apply for graduate roles with my manager offering a reference.

Yes colleagues had frequent socials and weekly football. Pub of the month was a good way to finish my placement.

Cost of living was zero as I worked in my home city. Socialising costs were average.

Nightlife is very good in Liverpool

Yes many events were held by colleagues.I have listed the events i was involved in during my placement. Pool tournament Pub quiz Pub of the month Football Bowling and shuffleboard at Roxy's