Advice for a uni student...
Hello,
Sorry if this is posted in the wrong place, this is my first time posting!
I'm a second year Physics degree student who is seriously looking into flying as a career after uni. My father is a commercial pilot and I flew with him in the cockpit my entire childhood all over the world so from a young age I have seen all sides of the job often doing trips back and forth with him without getting off the plane or waking up at 3am/night shifts/uncertain employment at times..and so on..this is what I've wanted to do for a long time and now is the time I have to build up my CV to make sure I get a place on a sponsorship. I am writing to ask 2 questions.
1.I have A Levels in Psychology (A), Maths (C) and Physics (D), and AS Levels in Sociology (A) and Critical Thinking (A). The "D" for Physics resulted in having to sit a Foundation Year at Uni which I achieved a "first" for and I achieved a first for my first year (last year). I'm sure everyone has these excuses but everyone in my A level Physics class ended up doing a foundation year with very similar grades (my D was the highest!!!) and we found out afterwards that everyone in the year before also did foundation years due to Physics grades..what I'm trying to say is that I'm good at Physics!!(As shown by my firsts so far..) but my college/teacher were awful for it!! But I'm sure an application form/interviewer is not interested in such a long story. I see myself getting a First (or at least a high 2.1) for my Physics BSc and I was wondering if this would "cancel out" the Physics A level grade..? I'm considering changing from Physics BSc to Physics MPhys (an extra year which would give me a Masters instead) as I feel this would help my application to a sponsorship program. However this would make it more difficult to achieve a high grade overall! (And I am near enough sick of uni) Any thoughts on this?
2.What sort of work experience could I get and is it even useful? I'm planning to book myself onto some trial flight lessons soon. The physics department are very keen to find us placements over the summer and there is a two month long placement with a company that develop flying simulators for training pilots There is another which deals with jet engines. (I don't know anything more than that at the moment). Would this be helpful to my application?
Any advice would be appreciated