Mechanical Engineering Summer Intern Review

It was a really good placement with lots of opportunities to work on things that I felt would help me and that I could get involved with. The environment was very friendly, although there is a clear age gap in the office between the older engineers and the 'future talent'.

Everybody was friendly in the office, but it was slightly difficult to know how well I was doing because I lacked feedback. Later on, they said they were really satisfied with my work, but telling me along the way would've been helpful so I knew I was on the right track or what I could've improved on.

Primarily, I was given tasks and left to get on with them without much interference between the start and completion. That being said, if ever there was something I was unsure of or needed help with, there were an extremely supportive team around me who were happy to answer any questions I had and explain things to me if necessary.

The placement is entirely led by the individual, so if you want to sit around and do nothing all day then you can probably get away with it (although you won't receive very good feedback), but equally you won't learn or gain experience. I launched myself into the work and let my colleagues know if I was running low on things to do, so that I could make the most of my internship. This was really beneficial to me, because it meant I kept busy and wasn't bored and learnt the most that I could've as well.

In the nuclear industry, there is such high importance that the work you're doing is right and safe to be operate, that it goes through several checks whether you're a placement student or a full employee. This was reassuring to me because it meant that I knew if I'd made any slight errors or there was something that could be improved then it wouldn't lead to an incident further down the line. I did have autonomy on some tasks that I worked on, but they were the less engineering based ones like managing training materials and writing articles for the company news bulletin.

I've genuinely learnt so much about using different software, the nuclear industry as a whole, office life... I definitely think these skills will be useful to me in the future and I was glad that I was pushed outside of my comfort zone in the placement. I think it's been great for my CV as well because I now have a lot to talk about in interviews and so much relevant experience to almost any engineering career.

Honestly the office environment can seem a bit flat at times. With everyone just sat at their desks working hard, it's a really different environment to the manufacturing facility that Cavendish has that I was visiting. I think people are just busy, but it can come across that it isn't a really dynamic and fun place because the office is a bit boring. This was just my office though - when we visited other Cavendish offices such as Aztec West and Dalton Avenue they were much more exciting places to be and they had a much larger future talent community as well.

The internship was quite well organised but the greater selling point was that it wasn't so fixed that you didn't have the flexibility to go where you wanted or work on projects that interested you. There were some initial IT issues that I think are probably fairly standard wherever you go, but these were ironed out in the first couple of weeks.

It would've been quite easy for them to not really bother with me too much given I was only there for 12 weeks, but I think it is what you make of it and if you show and interest and ask lots of questions then they're more than happy to share their knowledge with you and give you opportunities to take part in lots of interesting things. They are extremely keen to get interns onto their graduate scheme, so it's also in their interest to train you well and make sure you've got a good insight into the company and the industry as a whole

Cavendish Nuclear as a whole are desperate for future talent all across their business, and this presents an amazing opportunity to really go wherever you want to go and whatever you wanted to do. They are keen to invest in you and help support you through professional milestones such as becoming incorporated or chartered as well. Also the internship feeds very well into the grad scheme and they'll be eager to keep you if they can (providing you're doing a good job)! They have set up an assessment centre day for us a couple of months after the internship finishes, and it's rumoured that job offers are very likely.

The grad community are really close-knit among their year groups and frequently do stuff together (one year group went to Brazil!) so there's definitely a good social life if you're a grad and are interested in that sort of thing. I think placement students are slightly different because they want to grow the scheme but at the moment it's quite small scale, so there may not be many other interns at your location. You do get to meet the rest of them at events that are planned for you during the summer and there is a project that you work on in small groups with interns who may not be at the same location as you, so it's a good opportunity to network with the other interns as well. I've made friends with some of the grads in my office though, so I have been on multiple meals out and trips etc with them, so I think if you want the more social side of things it can still be found.

I was doing an internship in my home location, so I didn't need to rent a house or anything, but the Leicester area is fairly reasonably priced on the whole. It's probably quite comparable to most Uni cities and towns in terms of the cost of living, but is quite middle of the road (ie not super pricey like London but also not as cheap as if you were to travel further north).

The nightlife in Leicester isn't too bad - there are more vibrant cities for nightlife but there's definitely a good time to be had and plenty of places to go if you want a night out while you are on your placement.

It sort of is what you make of it, like if you get involved with the grad community and integrate really well with your team then I'm sure you'll be invited out to lunch or dinners etc, but they aren't going to randomly invite you if you don't seem interested in your colleagues. Equally you could always organise something yourself if you think doing something with your colleagues would be a fun idea. A lot of the older employees have families etc though so are less willing to join, but the grads are quite a safe bet for some fun.