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Middle_OAB is a bright lad, with some challenges.
He is a straight 'A' student in Physics, Chemistry, Maths, Computing and Graphic Communications. Maths he is often top score in year.
He has mild additional needs, leading to very low literacy levels (meaning those grades above are amazing...). He just failed English prelims due to such poor literacy, and struggled with essays in exams for Business Studies so 'only' a C grade.
One of those that bosses will love - hard worker and really creative problem solver at times, who verbally is excellent. Just do not ask him to spell or write a long report...
School is being *Rubbish* with careers ideas for him, so I am trying to help.
Suggest me some roles / areas where Maths, Physics, Computing stuff should be to the fore.
Even better if there is a Scottish, Sheffield, Manchester or Liverpool company he could approach for a couple of weeks work experience....
Is he in to coding? Where in Scotland are you based?
Engineering, half of us can't even spell our own names!
Absolutely engineering those of us that can spell our names do so with handwriting so poor no one can tell if it's spelt correctly anyway!
Engineering is basically just problem solving and drinking coffee.
Cyber security** - analysis, problem solving, very relevant and in-demand, constant change and a load of sub-disciplines to focus on. No hard hats and not much pointing though.
** Cheesy but industry accepted term.
Engineering + however many we're up to.
Have a google for a consultancy near you if he wants to do design / theory type stuff or a local mechanical eng company for more hands on stuff.
AMRC out at Rotherham?
STFC Daresbury Lab:
https://www.stfc.ac.uk/about-us/where-we-work/daresbury-laboratory/
I work at the RAL lab in Oxfordshire. We have work experience people in all the time. Excellent place to work, has an apprenticeship scheme if university doesn't suit (although the apprenticeship does involve getting a degree, but work at the same time).
Cheers all - lots of ideas.
He seems less 'hands on' and more 'maths and coding' type - but I may be wrong....
The suggestion of cyber security stuff is one that intrigues, and I think that is what he and I were trying to puzzle last night. He has done a bit of coding, but found the Coder-Dojo difficult to be at. Perhaps I need to re-try.
Elder brother did a couple of weeks here with a company in our building that builds robots - with frikkin' lasers - for such random things as fish injection, undersea work, clean lab etc... Middle seems less bothered by the bolting robots together, more into the theoretical and mathematical patterns type stuff (if that makes sense), hence why I am puzzled a bit.
Check out CodeClan
Seems to have a high student to job ratio and will give him a range of skills to pick out what he enjoys most.
Depends on the branch of engineering, but once you get through the first few years where you just do calculations for the person above you it can get really quite 'wordy' writing technical reports and such.
The good news is I was hopeless at that too, my biggest problem was a level geography which was essay based exams in the 2nd year. The teacher just showed me how to structure a paragraph that would always guarantee full marks. Went from C on a good day to dropping only two or three marks in the whole exam.
Statement
Explain
eXpand
Example
Diagram (with labels)
sum UP
Divide the number of marks for the question by 7 and that was how many paragraphs were needed.
15 years later I still write technical reports in the same format! Its very dry but its easy to read.
would have thought engineering in some fashion matt.
My lad is engineering nuts, we ditched English as soon as we could with the blessing of universities - school weren't happy - "but, English", however he's thriving at Strathclyde, aero-mech, currently ERASMUS at DTU in Denmark. He's now finding the maths quite challenging...
he also would be classed as difficult or needing assistance in some categories, has a registered liability which gives him extra time in exams and a scribe device sometimes.
He's been trying for internships here and at DTU, Space based or aero based, would have thought in Central Belt there must be a speciality that would suit. He quite enjoys the coding to some extent.
I must say I would come under the same umbrella, luckily I found a vocation in coding in 6th year due to an inspiring teacher and that's been me ever since...
And for maths and problem solving, Process (chemical) Engineering* Design is very maths based, because you can't see what a fluid is doing unlike a concrete or a I beam or even electricity.
Only downsides are the cyclical oil price and having to explain to people what it is you do.
*not the six sigma people in suits who've stolen the job title, the people who design petrochemical plants.
cyber stuff -- couple friends on Iain are doing computing which I'd have through would be up your street -- on starting slow at local college, other is away at Abertay doing ethical hacking (!) - would that sort of thing suit at all?
one off the wall idea re computing might be testing, product quality and so on, as searching for patterns - e.g. as in the hacking / security / crypto above - or trying to find a way of breaking applications might quite appealing. It's what I've ended up doing and it seems to provide an outlet for me.. (oil and gas applications, but that's immaterial - I'm not an oil & gas engineer!)
GCHQ -Â https://www.gchq-careers.co.uk/index.html
I work for a consultantancy i came jn from a maths degree that i failed.
We work in river a flood management/analysis and engineering. In house software development. River and coastal modelling. Water sampling. Site work. Structural assessments. I do alot of 3d design work.
Are you actually looking for experience? We're based all over but my office is in edinburgh i can ask if you like?
I do write reports but genrally their small and shit
Has he done any of the GCHQ online tests? Clearly a way from the North but potentially maths heavy.
Academia?
Was going to recommend GCHQ as well, might be worth looking at MI5 too
You mentioned he's taking Graphic Communications. I'm not familiar with what the curriculum is for that, but if he's got strong creative skills then he could always consider visual effects (VFX). Many disciplines within VFX require strong maths, programming & creative skills - i.e. creating simulations for building destruction or large-scale natural phenomena. I've worked in VFX for 15 years and it's a consistently challenging & rewarding industry.
In the short term this may not be that helpful as most VFX studios are down in London. Long term, if it's something he might be interested in, there are excellent degrees at both Teeside and Bournemouth Universities. This Q&A is a good overview of how technical and creative skills come into play in VFX:
http://www.tomorrowsengineers.org.uk/articles/3626
If it sounds interesting enough to him, I could have a word with my mum/sister. Their Sheffield company deals with sterilisation of surgical instruments and similar, audits, microbiology lab work etc.
They're always happy to take budding work experience folk on.
^that he would *love*
Aerospace or fluid dynamics types have maths coming out their ears.
Most kinds of coding are (mostly) all about algorithms.
Specialist coding jobs (VFX mentioned above) tend to involve a bit more theoretical work.
Written communication won't be a hindrance if my experience of engineering and software is anything to go on, problem solving skills are top priority with a side order of technical subject knowledge.
Based on my experience (physical sciences PhD / research, and now working as a software engineer), I'd suggest science is out (you probably spend more time reading and writing than doing anything else), but software / engineering definitely worth pursuing - many of my younger colleagues struggle to string a sentence together, but they get on ok 😄
matt_outandabout: was it my mum's company or the VFX above? Let me know and I can get the ball rolling if you want...
Mi5 is probably a bit dull, fsb on the other hand.....
Lots of the big engineering companies run education / work experience and internships e.g. BAE Systems, Rolls-Royce, MBDA - usually advertised on their websites.
Might also be worth looking at the Royal Aeronautical Society website as they have a bit of info on education and outreach programmes.
Software Engineering is a UK-wide critical skills shortage
In a previous role I ran an education and skills programme - not having English isn't too much of a problem if interested in doing an Advanced or Higher Apprenticeship as it's usually maths that trips up applicants.