My placement and graduate role at Airbus

Sushmita travelled from her home in Hyderabad, Southern India to study Computer Science at the University of Huddersfield. She shares her experience of her placement year and subsequent graduate role with global aerospace giant, Airbus.

During her time on placement, she saved the company an impressive sum of £50,000, with the work she completed of such a high-standard that Airbus UK was able to reduce the amount of work they usually subcontracted to the IT industry for work related to coding and computer programming.

“One of the main reasons that I applied to Huddersfield was the opportunity to do a placement year in industry. The chances of getting a job are high when you do a placement in the UK, and the Placement Unit at the University helped me to prepare my CV, cover letter, and practice for assessment centres and interviews.

"During my placement at Airbus, I worked in the Information and Communications Technology department as an Information Management Intern. I worked on software tools which were used to design parts of an aircraft.

"I worked on four major projects at Airbus, which included a software tool for designing the ribs present in the wings of an aircraft, and a tool to design the fuel tank. Both of these software tools were really complicated, and they were integrated with a computer-aided design tool called CATIA.

"All the projects I worked on helped me to develop my technical and interpersonal skills.
On my placement, my role was completely based on Python programming language, which I was able to learn and implement in my final year project when I returned to University, which was a collaborative project with Airbus.

"I am currently in the second year of my graduate scheme. The scheme lasts for 2 years 3 months and during this time I get the opportunity to move across different departments in the form of short 3 – 6-month placements and learn more about the company, different ways of working and gain a variety of technical skills. These short placements provide a great change in environment and day-to-day tasks and helps my colleagues and I in pushing ourselves to our limits and to adapt quickly to changing environments. I am currently on a placement with Airbus Defence and Space and this has been a whole new experience. Throughout the week, 80% of my time goes into technical tasks and the remaining 20% goes into team meetings, business updates, personal development and STEM activities for example. This has really given me the opportunity to not only develop my technical skills but also enhance my interpersonal skills and business knowledge.

"My bachelor’s definitely provided me a strong foundation for all the technical tasks I perform on a day-to-day basis. In some areas, I am able to apply the theoretical knowledge I attained from my course in the real working world and it’s very interesting and exciting to see the practical application of the subject I learned. The placement year showed me the business side of the role and the differences between academic and business styles of working. I definitely grew as a person during my placement year, and I feel a lot more confident now. All of this has really helped me in adapting quickly to my current job and giving a 100 percent in everything I do.

"I think doing a placement year plays a key role in providing a great start to your career. As a placement student, we can learn a lot about how companies work and how the technical knowledge attained from our degree can be applied in the real world. Based on my personal experience and the person I am today, I would strongly recommend anyone to choose a degree with a placement year."

 

Are you interested in finding out more about placement opportunities at the University of Huddersfield? 

Placements are a valuable part of the courses here at Huddersfield. Due to the ongoing Covid-19 situation, placement opportunities may be more limited, but with our excellent industry links and connections we'll still do everything we can to ensure you have access to real-world experience throughout your course.

We know how much employers value graduates who have real-world experience on their CV and that is why we encourage our students to make the most of the opportunities available during your time at Huddersfield.