Undergraduate Degree Programmes

Interdisciplinary Approach

The School of Engineering follows an interdisciplinary (general engineering) model, which means all engineering students study the basic underpinning concepts and fundamentals of engineering during their first two years before specialising in their chosen discipline in Year 3.

For the first two years of all programmes you will study a common core covering the basic principles of all branches of engineering. In these two years you will follow courses which will give you the choice of at least three of the School’s main disciplines to specialise in. In the later years you specialise in your chosen discipline:

More information on the structure of our degrees can be found here.

There are several benefits to our interdisciplinary approach.

Firstly, you can use the first two years of your degree to explore your interests in engineering before making an informed decision about what area of engineering to specialise in, while at the same time studying the core fundamental elements of each discipline - Chemical, Civil, Electrical/Electronic, Mechanical and Petroleum.
Secondly, you will benefit from a broad-based engineering education that will develop the wider range of expertise and skills that are increasingly demanded by employers today.
Thirdly, the more comprehensive expertise gained at Aberdeen will be particularly useful later in your career, when leading teams of engineers from across different specialisms.

MEng and BEng

At the School of Engineering we offer MEng and BEng degree programmes in a wide range of specialisations. The MEng is a five-year Honours programme and the BEng is a four-year Honours programme, both of which are accredited by the Engineering Institutions (see Becoming a Chartered Engineer).

After the first two years, you have the opportunity to pursue the 5 year Masters of Engineering (MEng) or 4 year Bachelor of Engineering (BEng) degree in your chosen discipline. Our 4-year BEng programmes are accredited as fully meeting the educational requirements for IEng and partially meeting the educational requirements for CEng.

Optional Courses

Students also choose optional courses alongside their core engineering courses. Optional courses are designed to give students a greater breadth of learning and to improve employability by further developing your other skills and knowledge. For example, you can choose courses in Languages, Mathematics, Sciences, Computing, Social Sciences, Management, Arts and Music, subject to normal timetabling restrictions.

Lectures and Laboratories

Each Engineering programme is taught through a combination of lectures, tutorials and laboratory (lab) classes. Lectures are held in lecture halls and are quite different from the kind of classes you will be used to from school. In addition, you will attend labs where you will conduct experiments and receive practical demonstrations of what you have learned in your lectures. Tutorials are run as small classes where students work on example problems with support from their tutors.

Work Experience and Employability

Engineering Work Experience is a 15 credit 2nd year course designed by the School of Engineering in partnership with the University’s Careers Service to develop students’ work readiness. The course embeds careers education in the academic curriculum and provides students with a work-related learning experience through employer-hosted consultancy-style projects. In addition, we offer regular industry engagement opportunities throughout your degree programme, including guest lectures by industry experts, industry-based projects, site visits and other career and networking events.

Field Trips

Engineering students also benefit from the University’s location in Energy Capital of Europe through numerous field trips and site visits to local companies. Field trips are especially valuable as they allow students to observe how the theory learned in lectures is applied in industry and also because you can learn more about different engineering careers from the industry professionals that you meet.

Personal Tutors

Each student is allocated a Personal Tutor in first year. Your tutor will meet with you several times throughout each year of study, either individually, or in groups. The role of the tutor is to provide pastoral support, to help ensure that you gain as much as you can from your time at university and to guide you towards other support services when necessary.

Engineering Disciplines

Explore the different options on offer at Aberdeen

Chemical Engineering

Discover how chemical reactions and the physical properties of matter can be harnessed to create world changing technologies for a sustainable environment.

Civil Engineering

Understand how to design, build and maintain physical infrastructure to support society and the economy and protect the natural environment.

Electrical and Electronic Engineering

Learn to develop future technologies such as driverless vehicles, robotics, medical equipment and the next generation of mobile data transmission.

Mechanical Engineering

Design and manufacture machines, technologies and systems to make the impossible possible and tackle the ever-changing challenges of industry and society.

Petroleum Engineering

Design and develop front-end engineering technologies to recover, process, and transport petroleum products.

Engineering Disciplines

Chemical Engineering

Virtually every product in modern life has probably been created using the input of a chemical engineer at some point. Chemical Engineers make creative and imaginative use of engineering principles and science to develop processes in which materials undergo chemical or physical transformation into useful products for society to use. The types of processes chemical engineers help design include Energy production; Oil and Gas processing; Waste water and effluent treatment; Food processing and manufacturing; Pharmaceuticals and medical products; Carbon dioxide capture and storage and many more.

If you are interested in how chemical reactions and the physical properties of matter can be harnessed to create world changing technologies, and want to contribute positively to making the life of the human race better and to the development of a sustainable environment, then you should consider chemical engineering as a career choice.

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Civil Engineering

The work of the Civil Engineer centres on sustainable design for the built and natural environment. Civil Engineers design, build, maintain and manage roads, railways, dams, buildings, airports, hospitals, schools, harbours and sports stadia. They design water supply and water treatment systems and river management, flood and coastal protection schemes. Civil Engineers are involved in seeing major infrastructure projects through from design to construction and completion.

If you are interested in making lasting positive improvements to society in sustainable design for the protection of the natural environment, in improving the quality of life for millions of people using novel building techniques and materials, then Civil Engineering is the career choice for you.

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Electrical and Electronic Engineering

If your interests are science, technology or mathematics, then consider electrical and electronic engineering as your career. You will use your imagination, your creativity and knowledge to provide society with the complex systems it needs. In your future career you may design the machines that supply our energy needs, or you may design complete computer systems on a silicon chip. Working with photonics you may be instrumenting the ocean depths, or creating stunning electronic displays. Whatever path you take, it will be interesting, it will contribute to society’s needs and it will be rewarding!

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Mechanical Engineering

Mechanical engineers design and develop everything that moves or has moving parts, ranging from spacecraft and aeroplanes to racing cars; from household goods like refrigerators to the small motors that turn a CD in a CD player; from robotic control of machinery to nanotechnologies; from mechanical hearts and artificial limbs to fitness machines, and from oil and gas exploration and production technologies to wind turbines.

So, if you are interested in the mechanics and dynamics of movement, have aptitude and fascination in how things work, want to use engineering principles and science to shape the world around us through the development of new materials, technologies, processes and products then you should consider mechanical engineering as a career choice.

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Petroleum Engineering

Petroleum Engineers harness the chemistry and mechanics of oil and gas production to make them work together in both extracting oil and gas from the ground and its processing as well as providing a useful fuel and feed-stock for further chemical processing. Virtually every product in modern life has probably been touched in some way by oil or gas - from baking a pie in an oven to building a composite fuselage for an aircraft. It is not surprising therefore, that as the oil starts to run out, petroleum engineering will become more demanding; requiring an ever more diverse range of skills.

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