Having been a Rochester Bridge Trust Arkwright Engineering Scholar while studying towards her A-levels in 2013-15, Åsa is now a graduate structural engineer.
After completing my A-levels and a MEng in Civil and Structural Engineering at Newcastle University, I joined a graduate scheme at Mott MacDonald in London as a graduate structural engineer.
My work came about through a summer internship and a wealth of work experience placements I had undertaken throughout my summers at university. This gave me an important insight into the world of engineering, which area I wanted to specialise in and also if I wanted to work in a large or small company. I joined Mott MacDonald during the last Covid lockdown, and luckily knew most of the team and company structure before I started working from home alone!
I have been here for just over two years now, and am enjoying the diversity of projects I get to work on. The London Structures team is quite niche, specialising in stadiums, major oversite developments and airports. I have been lucky enough to work on the new stand at Anfield Road (Liverpool’s football stadium!), a new Gaelic football stadium in Belfast for the Euros 2028 and various airport extensions. Most recently I travelled to Toronto to work on a subway extension.
This range of projects is exposing me to the vast array of engineering disciplines and experience, along with communicating with architects and clients on a daily basis. While I enjoy the analytical side of this work, I have focused more on the project management, collaboration and networking with other people, as I work towards chartership with the Institution of Civil Engineering.
After the support received from the Rochester Bridge Trust helped me so much in my career so far, I wanted to support other young engineers. Firstly, I became a student mentor for Arkwright Scholars and assisted in the interview process. Most recently, I encouraged Mott MacDonald to support a scholarship for the 2023-24 academic year, which I had the pleasure to award at the ceremony in London. Hopefully this is a charity we continue to support long into the future!
Read more about Åsa here.