Best of luck to you AA. I personally would jump at the chance to `retrain` a person of proven engineering ability over a person who has attained all of their modules at college. In the last ten years I have seen alot of guys (and gals) joining the industry via college only to find later that they are totally unsuited to the job. Many have studied hard and fair play to them ,but when they eventually get in the real world you sometimes find these people do not know one end of a spanner from the other. Hand skills can be taught to a certain degree, but if you are not mechanically minded or posess a degree of manual dexterity then you have no place working on aircraft!
I am quite sure that this does not apply in your case and believe that prospective employers should embrace tallented, motivated, skilled workers instead of doing it on the cheap and hiring kids who can only prove they have the ability to pass exams.
Before I receive stacks of abuse from ex-college students, I am sure that there are some exceptions who make top notch engineers, but if I were the gaffer, you AA would get my vote. Good luck and stick at it.
