A Week in the Life of a Civil Engineering Student

Being a student, you will have to attend lectures, tutorials, labs and everything else you would expect. But being a civil engineering student, in particular, means that you will also have to spend some time making sure you are getting the best out of these contact hours. This isn’t, however as bad as it sounds.

I made a lot of my university memories in university study spaces and a lot of the really funny ones were always before a submission deadline. Revising with friends or working together to tackle something you find challenging; it could tighten the bond you have with people and result in some very heart-warming memories. And don’t worry about getting help, the staff are extraordinary when it comes to helping you, you can email or pop into anyone’s office and they will be more than happy to help.

Also, IDP is going to be the biggest part of your week. IDP is the (multidisciplinary) integrated design project that you work on through the entire year and you can just think of it as “the event of the year”. At the time of me writing this, I have just finished my bachelor’s degree and I cannot believe I am about to say this but I will miss IDP briefings at the beginning of each year when the lecturers say, for example, “Okay, this year you’re going to build us a prefabricated building”. You can imagine the amount of work and meetings and team effort we all put into these projects EVERY WEEK but trust me it is beyond rewarding at the end.

Of course, life is not all work and your hard work needs to be balanced with some very high quality “me-time”. Personally, that tends to happen on Wednesdays (because we don’t usually have any lectures then) and on the weekend. On these days I would go out with friends or visit other cities (I am international so I would just explore the country a bit) or go out for a fancy meal or some shopping in town.

Throughout the week (even on my busy workdays) I try to also make some time for yoga classes on campus as they’re close and I can adapt them to my schedule. I also take part in campus-based extracurriculars, even if it’s a one-off art society event or something just to take a break and unwind.

So, there you go- a week in the life of a Civil Engineering student! Here are some pictures of me taking at an art society event during Sustainability Week (my engineering mind works best with triangles and lines so excuse my very weirdly shaped globe), and other pictures of me and friends on campus!