BA or BSc, and University Choice (Merged)

[rich49]

Hi,
I am looking to apply to a university at the moment but I need to make sure I make the right choice, I am thinking of taking a degree that deals with aircraft systems (electrical, fuel, hydraulic etc) but I am not too sure. I was wondering what other people here are studing and were at? Are they any degrees that would help me or increase my chances of becoming a pilot?
Thanks for any help

[B1GGLES]

RIch49,

Give Bristol Uni a look. I studied an MEng in Avionics there from 94-98 and it was well worth it. Course contained all the elements you mentioned with enthusiastic, ex-industry lecturers and Bristol has some great airline industry affiliations....BAe, Rolls, Marshalls Aerospace to name a few. Most of the grads from my year have gone into the aviation world. Couple of RAF entries, BA pilot and various engineering roles.

B1ggles

[Pilot16]

deleted

[Crowe]

Hi Rich

Don't worry too much about doing a degree that seems "relevant" - I don't think it'll help you get a pilot job (although as Biggles points out, it may get you contacts, which does help).

Do something you enjoy, and are good at - things like Physics or Aero Eng will probably be useful at for the ATPL writtens, but at the end of the day if you can do maths A-level say, the ATPLs aren't that tough, as long as you have the time to spend on them.

And just have a bloody good 3 or 4 years!

Some people will probably say that if you really want to be a pilot, don't go to uni, just spend the money on flying - well ok, but if you can get a decent degree (I'm not talking about some noddy effort in Knitting Science from Little Bogden College), it will set you up - god knows flying's not the most secure job ever
:(

You can only go to university once - you can fly for the rest of your life - anyway join the UAS and do both on the cheap.

Good luck

[tomcs]

Hi! I am going with B1IGGLES. I am going to Bristol uni in October to start an Meng in Avionics!! And I'm looking forward to it...


I'll do the commercial flying after i hope!

Tom

[Awyrennwr]

I did BEng Aerospace Systems Engineering at Coventry.
Basically what the systems are what they do and how to design them. Everthing from the most complex of topics like data bus systems and aerodynamics, to air conditioning systems.
Was 22 UCAS pts last time I looked.
Would also recommend looking at Southampton. Thats where the forces send their aero engineering cadets.
As for relavance to becoming a pilot, the knowledge you gain will help you with technical subjects in the ATPL's. It also shows dedication to the aviation industry. Also, if it all goes wrong a very attractive career in engineering will be there to fall back on.

[rahaney]

Hi all, just to say i'm at Bristol uni at the moment and although i'm not doing Aero Eng
i'm doing computer science in the same faculty.

Bristol for my first year has been great - pretty expensive though - just generally london prices now - ish.

I would reccommend bristol highly - just a note about BUAS - they only have about 17 places a year for volunteer entries - i.e. not cadetship/bursary.

Due to this number unless you are very very close to or can pass the medical for a pilot at cranwell you will not get in.

I wear glasses and although good enough for an ATPL they are not good enough for the RAF- so be it. That is why i didnt get in - i have some mates in it though and they say BUAS is excellent.

Halls wise if you havent decided yet i'll give you a brief run down

Catered - Churchill or Wills - I'm in churchill and whilst the food is not great it has a fantastic atmosphere and lively social scene. best in uni!
Wills is erm erm i dont know how to phrase it exactly but it is predominantly for "rahs" - people with more money than sense (apologies anybody who's there or has been)

Self catered there are again two to choose from
Goldney is the best and its closer in clifton secondly
Durdham with the other halls in stokes bishop.

There used to be a flying club here which got subsidised flying at filton - about 30 mins away in a car however the person who organised it left last year.
I would be well up for any interest to go flying whether cost sharing or ? as i already have my ppl and am at the mo renewing it though a C.O.E.

If you are coming to bristol then drop me a line at [email protected] or here and i'll answer any questions you might have.

see ya next year.


:D

[sickBocks]

rahaney, I recommend that if the BU Flying Club (with links to Aeros at Filton) has been deactivated since the departure of the people running it why not reactivate it yourself. Would look fab on a CV - and you get to know when the A/C are being from positioned to/from FZO from GLO - bargain, if not free hours.

sB

[The Greaser]

rich

If you want the best Aeronautics degree then I suggest from experience Imperial College, London. At least if you hate the course, which most people do (it is far too hard!) then you can **** about in London for 4 years. It is the best.

[Genghis the Engineer]

I have a ten year old aero-eng degree from Southampton, and still have contacts there. The degree was tough, but I have used huge amounts of it in my life since both as an Engineer and as a pilot. It can't be insignificant that about 1/3 of the military or ex-military test pilots of my acquaintance (which is quite a few) have Southampton aero degrees.

Look also at Bath, Glasgow, Loughborough, Kingston, Hatfield. Imperial's reputation is of being somewhat aimed at researchers rather than practical engineers, and I suspect that a relatively practical engineering degree is probably most use to you as a potential pilot.

G

[Laurie Benn]

Have you checked out the London Guildhall University web site at: http://www.lgu.ac.uk/ca and followed the link to "Foundation degree" to get details of our Foundation degree in Aviation Management & Operations programme?

This brand new programme for both pilots and aviation managers hits the streets this September and has been designed in close collaboration with airlines, airports and other agencies. This followed on from over 600 responses to the questionnaire that could be accessed through PPrune where we asked what people WANTED to study.

[FlyFreeWbe]

I'm thinkin of going to loughborough university to do an aeronautical BEng degree...should be interesting :)
The uni is a very cool place too. I got a special tour around the new technology department at the time, and that was brilliant! The teachers involved you straight away and got your hands dirty :D Gr8 fun
Food was good too

[rahaney]

sickbocks

Cheers for the idea and info m8 already have one reply to my earlier posting - any more takers.

if your around bristol and fancy a flight email
[email protected]

if its not raining down here that is
:D

[mjkukin2]

I have just started my first year at UMIST. Although i was going to study aero eng, i decided not to. i prefered chemistry a level and maths so decided to do chemical engineering.

just a point to take into consideration with whats going on in the aviation industry at the moment, many of my friends are not finding jobs within that industry and have upper first and second calss degrees.

That put me off.lso if i dont make it as pilot all ill have is a aero eng degree which i only did to become a pilot. do something you enjoy

PS dont do chem eng it is so f***** hard.if you are lookin to do aero i recommend aero at umist and i think thay have atsrted a joint degree with manchester uni in avionics. ucas points around 24-26

[P.Pilcher]

I've said before on this board and I repeat what others have said:'A' level maths and physics is quite deep enough for the ATPL exams. At Uni, you want to read a subject in which you will get the best degree (i.e your favourite one). As a graduate airline captain who has now lost his job twice in the last 12 years, I am glad that I can rely on such qualifications to enable me to earn an income in a field very divorced from aviation. This is particularly important if your health falls below aviation standard as you age. Loss of licence insurance is rarely enough.

Best of luck

[Danza]

Just a quick note, you've got to have a look at Liverpool, good course and helped by the fact we've just had brand new v.expensive flight sim built.:)

[rich49]

Thanks for all your help,
has any one got any knowledge of coventry university?
I appreciate all your help,
rich

[Danza]

I've got no information about Coventry, but my advice would be just to do your research. Phone up and have a chat with the admissons people, go and have a look round. I've been to lots of Uni's on my travels and some places just "feel" better than others. In the end it's your decision, I'm sure a lot of the top Uni do very good courses so it might come down if you like the place or not.

Good luck with whatever you choose.

[crazypilot]

We have 9 wind-tunnels at Cranfield. Bloody hard course though. The uni is meant to have a good reputation though, especially i the aviation industry (so we're told)

CP

[spudskier]

Obviously flight experience is quite important, but looking to the future, after the regionals, do major carriers care if the degree you have is a B.A. or a B.S.??

for instance, if it came down to two people in the hiring process (maybe a job in the right seat of a 737) who both had basically the same amount and quality of flight experience and one had a B.S. in Aviation form a decent school, and one had a B.A. in aviation from a decent school, would the degree matter? or would it come down to references and who the employer knew better? or possibly the nitty gritty details of each applicants quality of flight experience?

my big concern is whether or not I should go for a Bachelor of Arts degree in Aviation (4-year degree) or Bachelor of Science degree in Aviation (also 4-year degree, but more math and science involved that doesn't necessarily pertain to your career of choice...) either way I get the same flight experience from the school to become an instructor and go from there...

thnx in advance for advice!!!

[no sponsor]

I don't think it matters so much, personally. At my university, it was possible to do a MA in Mathematics, since the faculty you joined determined the degree you got.

It would make a interesting discussion to break the ice at an interview!

[steamchicken]

Well, the University of Salford in the 1960s gave only BSc degrees, even for languages. My degree is either the one or the other depending on where you take it. Keele (I think) considers all its degrees to be scientific as well. Outside the UK/Commonwealth/USA it don't exist. In German the word Wissenschaft is used for all subjects and for intellectual life generally, although it translates into English as "science". Therefore you have German university courses in Theatrical Science and Literary Science as well as Genetic Science. It's merely a matter of form.

[scroggs]

No, UK airlines (or the military) don't give a damn. They don't ask you for a degree in the first place, so they're hardly likely to complain about what degree you choose to do. An MSc in Underwater Basketweaving and Seaweed Preservation is fine, if that's what turns you on.

Neither will it feature greatly at interview, unless your degree is a particular interest of one of the interviewers, other than to establish that some thought went into your choice of university and course. Even if it's just that the place you chose had the best bars and a 10:1 female:male ratio.

We find ourselves repeating over and over again on this forum: your degree subject does not matter either at interview or with relevance to your ATPL exams or your later career as a pilot, with the sole exception of those tiny few who wish to be considered for test flying. For God's sake, just go to university and enjoy it, making the best use of the opportunities afforded you when you're there. The only factors in your choice of degree should be; a) what do you enjoy and; b) will it help you make a living if you don't make it as a pilot - which many of you won't.

[Dusty_B]

Engineering is tough. In Arabian countries, an Engineer is refered to by that title, like a Doctor or Professor is over here. But the title 'Engineer' has been devalued by washing machine fixers calling themselves Engineers.

(I jump down anyone's throat if they call themselves an Engineer when they are not.... you'd be pissed of if you called a doctor in the Yellow Pages only to find out that he's got a St. Johns First Aid Certificate).

But I digress!

Engineering is hard work, with lots of lectures and lab time. It is a great degree to have (BEng is much better than BA or BSc:D ), but if your ambition is to be a pilot (an not be an engineer), don't fall into the trap of thinking that Aeroengineering will help you. In the long run it probably doesn't, because you work your nuts off doing the academics instead of having fun and going flying.

I changed my course in week 7 from Aero Mechanical Systems to Software Engineering because it gave me a slacker timetable, and enabled me to go flying. With Aero, I had just 3 timetable periods (55mins) and Wednesday afternoons off each week. Software gave me two whole afternoons, and a couple of midmorning slots off each week. That was a slack timetable at RMCS Cranfield (they have to keep those Army Officers busy doing something, can't be trusted by themselves)!
One of the other studes on the Squadron spent three days a week at the airfield in his second year (Philosophy, Oxford). When a Reading Stude appologised to the Boss in the ops room for having 3 hours of lectures that week, and having to miss a day at the airfield, the Boss saw my face and suggested that the other guy leave the room quick!

If you choose Engineering, be very sure that you will have the time, energy and motivation to see it through to be an engineer - not just to be a Pilot. If being a pilot doesn't work out, you'll be falling back on your degree (like me).

If the Guildhall course had been available when I was filling in the UCAS form, it would have been my first choice.

This is my penny, my experience. I'll get flamed by others who have done Engineering, succeeded, and thoughorly enjoyed it. Perhaps they have forgotten how many people started their course in the first year, and how many actually stuck with it and passed first time in their third year. Less than 50% did in my year.

[Paddington*]

As has been said before, it really doesn't matter what your degree subject is (or indeed whether you have one at all) as long as you've shown that you're academic enough to pass the ATPLs. Yes, there were some engineering graduates in my intake but equally my colleagues had studied economics, geography & business studies. Just do a subject that you enjoy.
My company asked for either Maths & Physics A levels OR any degree. A degree is a useful fall-back in case your flying plans don't work out but not essential for the job.

It's more important to demonstrate an interest in aviation - which you can do with a UAS or a flying or gliding club. So the amount of time that you'll have left over after lectures might be more important than the subject itself!

Best of luck & enjoy the student life!

P

[stick&rudder]

Rahaney,
tried to e-mail u, but something or someone would not allow it! bloody computers.....
anyway, i'm off to bristol, aeronautical engineering in October.
wondered if u could give a quick run down on all the halls at bristol:
churchill,
hiatt baker,
badock,
also
durdham
university hall
cheers, the accomodation prospectus was a little hard to read between the lines of!

[Genghis the Engineer]

Well said Dusty. The title Engineer is incidentally also legally defined in Italy and Germany, and for the way they treat it might as well be in the USA. It's pretty-much only the UK that has dishwasher repair "engineers".

As somebody who did an Engineering degree, became an engineer, and became a pilot as well, not instead (not through the UAS, I got dropped out of that through an inability to ever make the airfield in between lectures) I think what you say is very true.

I think what people say about doing any degree that you'll enjoy and pass is true for those with no ambition beyond the ATPL. If you want a long and fulfilling career in aviation, then an engineering degree or appropriate science degree is likely to do you far more favours than something that just gives you BA(Hons) after your name and little else of saleable value.

G