Any engineers here?

[Peanut]

Disagree that Civil is not versatile (bias: I'm a Civil engineer).

I'd go with Chemical, Civil or Mech. I think with any of those 3 as yor foundation you can pretty much learn whatever is required on the job. Unless you get a super technical job. But even then...

[GranteedEV]

Mechanical is probably the most interesting in my personal opinion, but with Civil you can probably go anywhere in the world, and instantly find a job.

[CaptainYooh]

Originally Posted by GranteedEV

...with Civil you can probably go anywhere in the world, and instantly find a job.

No.

[Looch City]

CaptainYooh has something against civils?

I have personally found it pretty versatile during work terms in oil & gas companies.

[CaptainYooh]

I don't. I do have something against categorical statements like "instantly finding a job anywhere in the world", that's misleading even as a figure of speech. Civil Engineers trained in Poland, Zambia and Canada would have a lot of re-training and re-certification to do before being able to practice interchangeably. Codes are different in each country and very specific. So are job markets.

Civil engineers are happily employed when the economy is good and supportive of civil projects in all market sectors (public and private), and economic segments (infrastructure, superstructure/buildings, industrial). When the economy is down, civil engineers are as much at risk as other engineers unless they are employed by the Government. I would agree though that all three levels of Government in Canada employ more civil engineers than petroleum or mechanical.

[GP_Matt]

I don't think it matters in a lot of cases. I have been out with five engineers who work together on a project and had no idea what disciplines the other took.
The degree often gets you in the door but you specialize from there or go to project management.

[jeffman]

Originally Posted by Banner

Thanks a lot guys, appreciate all the replies. Looks like i'll be leaning towards mech if my GPA will be good enough to get in. Anyone know the best way to get summer/co-op jobs and internships when you don't really have a lot of contacts or connections?

U of c career link, indeed, or google calgary engineering summer jobs

[troutman]

I wonder if Engineer is the most common profession on CP, and in Calgary overall?

http://www.canadianbusiness.com/list.../2014-calgary/

Most in-demand job for this city:

Job: Electrical Engineer
Typical Salary: $76,793
Other Top Jobs In Demand: Pipeline Engineer, Mechanical Engineer

[CaptainYooh]

Originally Posted by troutman

I wonder if Engineer is the most common profession on CP...

That would be really sad, if true, considering the overwhelming grammatical disability of so many posters

Engineers do take technical writing, you know.

[Dentoman]

Originally Posted by Jude

if your main goal is to make a lot of money and hate your job, become a dentist!

Ouch!!

[My2Cents]

APEGA (Association of Proffesional Engineers and Geoscientists of Alberta) which all engineers/geoscientists are members of post a salary survery every year. Its pretty detailed breaking salaries based on experience and accountabilities.

http://www.apega.ca/members/Publicat...arysurvey.html

In general when you graduate you become an E.I.T. (Engineer in Training), and it literally means that. What you learn in school is a good background into the theory of engineering, but doesnt give you the skill set to sit down at a desk and do a job. What you do post school during your E.I.T. years is the actual real world skills you will learn. The degree you get (mechanical, civil etc) will strongly help you get a job in a certain field but its the learnings on the job that will control your skill set. For this reason summer jobs/internships can be important as you can learn what a "real" engineer job does day to day as well as make connections.

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by troutman

I wonder if Engineer is the most common profession on CP, and in Calgary overall?

http://www.canadianbusiness.com/list.../2014-calgary/

Most in-demand job for this city:

Job: Electrical Engineer
Typical Salary: $76,793
Other Top Jobs In Demand: Pipeline Engineer, Mechanical Engineer

No wonder its so in demand, no one will work for $75k in this city as a P Eng.

[Nufy]

Originally Posted by CaptainYooh

That would be really sad, if true, considering the overwhelming grammatical disability of so many posters

Engineers do take technical writing, you know.

Yeah but the EIT's do the actual report writing...

The engineers read, and approve.

[CaptainYooh]

Originally Posted by Nufy

Yeah but the EIT's do the actual report writing...

The engineers read, and approve.

PMs read and approve. The real engineers do write their own stuff.

[V]

Ugh, if you're an EIT don't work in my department. We have four. One works for a poly sci major, one for a business major, one for the EIT that reports to the business major, one one that works for a P. Eng. Poor guys/girl are getting no professional development.

[nieuwy-89]

I am a Civil Engineer and have found it to be a versatile and rewarding career path. I chose Civil because I wanted to manage large infastructure projects (heavy civil, dams, bridges, industrial plants, transit systems). And that's exactly what I do now so I guess it all worked out.

In my experience Civil or Mechanical give you the broadest base to start from. Lots of options including technical/management, public/private, local/international.

I don't think you can go wrong with any discipline as long as you enjoy it.

[TSXCman]

I took Mechanical because I wanted to eliminate chemistry and programming (both super import skills... and I actually learned later that I liked Chem).

Mech is good to learn a variety things. I ended up getting into pipelines professionally, so work as a Pipeline Eng. or Project Eng. as of last week. I work with a lot of Electrical and Mech, with some Civil sprinkled in.

Civil would have been my next choice. I really liked Statics/physics in equilibrium. I think it would be exciting to go to a growing city and work on some massive building.

Use your first year to decide what you really like and dislike. You will succeed much more if you have some enjoyment/passion, rather than pushing through for completion.

Good luck!

[Wormius]

I am going to necro-bump this old thread, as the question of use of the title, “engineer” has popped up with some tech companies being upset over not being able advertise positions for “software engineers”. Personally, I don’t see what their contention is or why they can’t recruit if they use a different job title, like “software developer”. If the candidate is a P.Eng or something, maybe they could change the job title to reflect that. It’s probably even in their best interest to distance themselves from being an engineering company due to permit to practice fees and rigmarole.

I am kind of two mindsets here; I don’t care if software developers are called software engineers, but I don’t know why a company wouldn’t just avoid the issue and use software developer as the job title.

[kermitology]

Originally Posted by Wormius

I am going to necro-bump this old thread, as the question of use of the title, “engineer” has popped up with some tech companies being upset over not being able advertise positions for “software engineers”. Personally, I don’t see what their contention is or why they can’t recruit if they use a different job title, like “software developer”. If the candidate is a P.Eng or something, maybe they could change the job title to reflect that. It’s probably even in their best interest to distance themselves from being an engineering company due to permit to practice fees and rigmarole.

I am kind of two mindsets here; I don’t care if software developers are called software engineers, but I don’t know why a company wouldn’t just avoid the issue and use software developer as the job title.

We use developer and I’m Sr. Manager, Engineering. But, engineer is a title, and jobs shouldn’t be posted as engineer unless you’re specifically filling it with a P.Eng. I’ve complained to my own company in the past for using engineer for non-engineers.

I let my P.Eng lapse when I moved to BC. I’d been non practicing for years. Didn’t want to bother. I no longer refer to myself as an engineer, despite having an electrical engineering degree and previously had the title.

[d00little]

Originally Posted by Wormius

I am going to necro-bump this old thread, as the question of use of the title, “engineer” has popped up with some tech companies being upset over not being able advertise positions for “software engineers”. Personally, I don’t see what their contention is or why they can’t recruit if they use a different job title, like “software developer”. If the candidate is a P.Eng or something, maybe they could change the job title to reflect that. It’s probably even in their best interest to distance themselves from being an engineering company due to permit to practice fees and rigmarole.

I am kind of two mindsets here; I don’t care if software developers are called software engineers, but I don’t know why a company wouldn’t just avoid the issue and use software developer as the job title.

I know APEGA and perhaps other Canadian engineering associations were trying to fight it in the past, but I think the tech boom has gotten so big it's pretty much made the fight futile. Don't thing APEGA can fight the likes of Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Apple that all hire their developers as software engineers.