Nine Bristol Engineering Students succeed in Prestigious Award Scheme

Nicola Graham, Rosie Hudson, Izzy Sambles, Angus Firth, Alex Sheard, Sam Tiller, Oscar Bond, Ari Biggart and Zara Burton have each earned one of only 35 prestigious RAEng Leaders Scholarship awards given out annually to students across the UK.

The RAEng Leaders Scholarship scheme enables engineering undergraduates, who want to become leadership role models, to undertake an accelerated personal development programme. The winners receive mentoring and £5,000 from the RAEng towards training and experience, over a period of three years, to help fast-track their engineering careers.

The students, who are all studying either Engineering Design or Civil Engineering, already have firm ideas on how they’d like to use the award, both to aid their personal development and to make a positive impact on society.

Izzy, Nicola and Rosie all plan to conduct overseas voluntary work on engineering projects that can help improve health and living conditions for rural communities. Oscar, Ari and Alex are also keen to gain overseas work experience, but on projects linked to renewable energy. Angus, Zara and Sam want to strengthen their experience gained from their manufacturing-related industrial placements on technologies such as Robotics and Additive Manufacturing.

Many of the students also plan to conduct Language courses to experience new cultures and to widen their opportunities to work abroad.

Rosie Hudson, a fourth-year Engineering Design student said, “I’m extremely excited to have been invited to join the 25th cohort of Engineering Leader Scholars. I’m looking forward to using the award to undertake a language course and a voluntary overseas placement, which will help me pursue international development opportunities in my future career.”

In addition to these awards, Engineering Design graduate Dmitro Khroma has also recently been awarded a Royal Academy of Engineering SME Leaders Award for his successful development of Swytch ebikes, a company he co-founded in 2017 whilst still at University. The Award will provide Dmitro with a £10,000 training grant to help him scale up the company, which is about to launch a new version of its novel electric bike conversion kit.