Unconventional Environmental Career Paths

Posted by Sophie Lennard (Monash Environmental Engineering Society) on 20 August 2018

MEES partners with EIANZ discuss unconventional career paths in environmental and engineering careers.

Thursday Week 4 was our first industry event of the semester, where we hosted the Environment Institute of Australia and New Zealand (EIANZ) to discuss unconventional career trajectories for people interested in environmental and engineering careers.

The night kicked off with short speeches from Hydronumerics, Monash Uni, Engineers Australia, and EIANZ, discussing the diversity of their career paths so far, jumping between academia and consulting and running small businesses. We then held a Q&A panel where students from every year level could ask our speakers questions. In an engaging discussion, we talked about how to not feel fake and exploitative when networking, how to identify your passions, the benefits of traveling, and the pros and cons of mentoring schemes. After the formal discussions, we then socialised over pizza and donuts. This provided an invaluable opportunity to talk with speakers and fellow students in a casual and friendly environment.

Mirroring our industry night in Semester 1, the MEES and EIANZ industry night highlighted that environmental engineering degrees can lead anywhere, from water systems modelling to starting waste-to-energy businesses and working in research. It is very common to change jobs multiple times until you find the right fit. Everyone agreed it was valuable to talk to real working engineers and environmental scientists, who had evolved their careers into businesses.

Among the attendees were final year students at the start of their career paths, first year students learning about the wide range of opportunities that environmental careers can offer, and high school students who were keen to start exploring their passion for engineering.

Everyone was left excited and more curious about their futures. We would like to extend our thanks to EIANZ for their assistance and look forward to more collaborations in the future. Our next event, our Final Year Project (FYP) night in week 6, will provide more immediate information on the capstone unit of engineering degrees.

Find out more about the Monash Environmental Engineering Society