Path to a Career Change (PART 2)

For the newcomers, you can find Part 1 here.

I got lots of feedback after I released the first part. I also realised that there are too many people who have the same feeling that I have. I want to emphasise that I’m no expert, other people may have different experiences during their college life at METU. I’m just here to share mine. Before judging me you must also understand that I’m just an average person who got in METU and had these experiences…

Second and Never Ending Half of the College, Struggling with the Department

In the second half of the college, my course failures continued. Whenever I think I studied enough I was failing. This made me even more careless about the department. After two mandatory summer internships, I began to realise that theory and practise are two very different things and I was learning the theoretical part most of the time. 

This wasn't the only problem of course. There were more people enrolled in the department than there were supposed to be. The number of people aren’t determined by the university itself. Therefore, I can not blame college for this but it is what it is, the department was way too crowded.

The over crowdedness of the department is mostly caused by the people who failed prerequisite courses. This means that you can not take the following course and this situation is increasing cumulatively. The number of such students shouldn’t be underestimated because that is why the average graduation time of the four-year program becomes six years.

Due to the high number of people in the department, most of the students couldn’t take the courses they wanted to. Some of the METU students or graduates would know how difficult and stressful it is to enrol a class they wanted to or even enrol for any one of them at all.

So it was impossible to get the course you want especially if you are an average student which most of the students were. On the other hand, the workload of most of the courses were ridiculous. There was no time other than just studying; no hobbies, no sports, no self time… 

When there were three semesters left for my graduation, a snowball effect happened and I was near the edge of dropping. You know what they say: “The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.” This sentence summarises my METU adventure for me because when I was on the greener side of the fence, I realised that it wasn’t at all but how would I know before I crossed to the other side? 

The road was wrong for me. I knew that crystal clear but I came all the way here so far. Even if I wanted to go back, it was the same amount of walk. In addition to this situation, I had no backup plan. Even if I dropped out of college I had no idea about what to do next. So, until I had a concrete plan, I continued to study. 

Unexpected One: COVID-19 & Graduation 

While all of these were happening in my life, something happened late in 2018, something amazing and I met the love of my life and with his amazing love and support, I continued the battle for the last three semesters. Before I graduated, he moved to Sweden and the long distance began. Right before my last semester, right before Covid 19 happened, we decided to get married in December 2019. 

I usually talk big and make jokes about getting married before graduation but here we are 😅😅 But my defence is the circumstances demanded this. While I was studying, we needed the permission of residency card for me to move to Sweden right after graduation without the waiting period.  

Everything was on track and the pandemic hit in March 2020. My classes became online which I was very happy about because I didn’t want to go to campus even before Covid 19. With the last motivation crumbles I have, I tried my best. Eventually, the battle is over and I won. I can even say that it was over in a victorious way because my last semester’s GPA was 3.5/4. 

All in all, METU/Civil Engineering is a great place to pursue an academic career. But when it comes to real job experience on the field, it is not the place to study civil engineering for those who aim to work in developed countries.

Civil engineering is one of the professions that is determined by the country levels and codes you studied in. It is very specific to the circumstances you have in the country from whether it is in a seismic zone, and what degree, to different codes and specifications the region uses. I don’t even want to mention language barriers other than English and Turkish.  

Today, I can say that college experience gave me most of the discipline to write this blog post. It taught me to manage my time, organise myself and even do the things that I hate sometimes. It showed me that when you do something you have to do it as a whole, no room for careless work. 

Overall it was my choice to study this area and it wasn’t for me. This doesn’t mean that it doesn’t work for you. I’m the one who should be responsible for my choices and I’m. Now, I know the problem and I have taken the necessary steps to solve it. 

Additionally, I must say that if you are choosing a profession, I believe it is important to think about its future potential. For example, what will this profession look like after four-five years? Of course, it is not possible to predict the future, I mean who can predict such a pandemic but there are some signals to be considered I guess.

There will be Part 3 which is about moving to Sweden and some of the difficulties I faced during the job search as a "civil engineer" and beginning of a new career.

Thank you for reading all the way here. Stay safe 🤞🏼