Wednesday, 26 October 2016

Extended work placement student Dominic Birn-Pratt - Student Case Study



My name is Dominic Birn-Pratt.


I am currently studying at Strode’s College in Egham, where I am taking A Levels in Further Maths, Chemistry and Physics. While I have no specific plans for a future career, I know I would like to continue working in and studying maths. I hope to go onto a good maths specialist university or a Russell Group university.

I applied for the placement because I wanted to gain experience with mathematical modelling and help me determine what kind of job I wish to do in the future. In addition, I applied in order to help widen my mathematical understanding. While I have previously taken in part in similar extra-curricular Maths events, I have had little practical experience of applying my mathematics skills and knowledge in a work context.

 I spent my three week work placement with Jacobs Engineering, where I was tasked with developing a model to forecast the cost of maintenance of railway stations in Greater Manchester. I had to research various methods of simulating asset degradation, before deciding which best suited the available data. In the end, I succeeded in creating both a linear and an exponential degradation model, which could be transferred and applied to the various assets.


I feel this placement has not only helped me understand some of the more practical aspects of mathematics, but also it’s help me understand the importance of clear, high quality data. If you do not have the information needed, then you are very limited in the models available to you. 


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