• Question: Did take part in a lifechanging event?

    Asked by JeetS on 2 Nov 2020.
    • Photo: John Chinner

      John Chinner answered on 2 Nov 2020:

      Life changing for me was being brave enough to apply for an apprenticeship 200 miles away from home and deciding to go for it.

    • Photo: Sam Frampton

      Sam Frampton answered on 2 Nov 2020:

      I’ve had lots of big life changes, I have lived in the U.S.A and France during university and for my work.

    • Photo: Marina Ruiz Sanchez-Oro

      Marina Ruiz Sanchez-Oro answered on 2 Nov 2020:

      I think for me was seeing how climate change is affecting our lives more and more, the associated loss of biodiversity, the pollution, plastic waste etc. It was a wake up call to tell me, “Right, Marina, are you gonna do something about it or are you gonna sit and pretend it doesn’t affect you?” and I decided to change field to earth sciences, where I am now studying landslides and other natural disasters. It’s hard to predict these of course, but at least I can contribute to its study, which can help save lives in regions where landslides are very common.

    • Photo: anon

      anon answered on 2 Nov 2020:

      Probably the coolest life changing thing I got to experience was playing a very minor role in a major scientific discovery – the detection of combined gravitational waves/gamma ray bursts from a neutron star collision (if you’re interested you can read more about it on my page).

      I’ve also moved around quite a lot due to my work and have lived in several countries – Austria, Germany, UK

    • Photo: Roy HAWORTH

      Roy HAWORTH answered on 2 Nov 2020:

      I am not sure it was life changing but I was involved in a very small way in testing part of the Rosetta mission that put a small Science Lander on a Comet and followed the comet for a year as it approached the Sun. It was a really ground breaking mission and was very inspiring to see it all working 10 years after it had launched from Earth

    • Photo: Calum McInnes

      Calum McInnes answered on 2 Nov 2020:

      My biggest life-chaning event was when I got offered the position to do my PhD (my current job). I had worked hard to get to that stage and the offer meant that I could move across the country and pursue my dream research and get a little bit closer to working on space vehicles!

    • Photo: raam shanker

      raam shanker answered on 3 Nov 2020:

      The biggest life changing event was to move from India to the UK all by myself to study, back in 2005.

    • Photo: Steve Williams

      Steve Williams answered on 3 Nov 2020:

      Looking back the most significant event for me goes back to getting a degree because that’s what put me on the path I have been on ever since. Without a degree in Software Engineering I would not be doing interesting work and a job I enjoy which continually gives me a sense of achievement.

    • Photo: Abbie Hutty

      Abbie Hutty answered on 23 Nov 2020:

      Life changing can mean different things to different people. As a student and in my teenage years I was quiet and not very brave – I’ve always been a bit of an introvert and not a big risk-taker. So even applying to University was a big step for me- neither of my parents went to University.

      Little things that helped me to believe that I could do that were “life-changing” for me, so a teacher suggesting engineering to me and believing I was good enough to get into University to study it. And seeing an British engineering mission to Mars on the news and being inspired to really consider engineering because engineers in Britain got to do things as cool as sending a mission to Mars. And going on a “headstart” week at University, which was a week-long residential course for AS level students to learn more about engineering and the different types, and what it was like to go to University. All of those things together changed my life because they helped me believe I could take that big step.

      Then there have been loads more things like that since, little things that all together have made me believe that actually maybe I could do things that I would never otherwise have believed I could do, like doing a placement year working for a company that made satellites, or moving to a different part of the UK where I had never been before to work at Airbus. Or more recently applying to work on a Mars mission even though I wasn’t sure if I was qualified enough, or doing an interview about that mission on live TV. All of them happened because of other events that had happened to me that helped me to see that they could be possibilities for me.

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