Anya – Structural Engineering & Architecture
I'm Anya, I entered my degree via the Science & Engineering Foundation Year Engineering and I’m now studying Structural Engineering and Architecture. What I love most about the Diamond is the sheer variety of labs I experienced during my Foundation year.
From thermodynamics to electronics to fluids, those weekly Diamond labs stand out as the most enjoyable and memorable part of my studies. Each session gave me the chance to move beyond theory and see different engineering principles come alive right in front of me.
Out of all the labs, the electrical signals lab left the biggest impression on me. Before university, I'd never been a fan of electricity as a topic – it felt abstract and I struggled to understand how circuits actually worked. I didn't expect that to change, but the way the AC signals lab was delivered completely transformed my outlook. The experiments I carried out along with the explanations from Diamond teachers, really broke complex ideas into manageable steps and then suddenly everything clicked into place. For the first time, I could finally visualise the behaviour of alternating currents and link these waveforms directly to the concepts we were studying in lectures. I went from feeling unsure and unconfident about electricity to genuinely enjoying the topic.
Without that experience, I never would have entered the SunByte team where my teammates & I design and make a solar telescope in the iForge. In the iForge the freedom is incredible - rather than completing an experiment it's about creating for yourself. So the Diamond hasn't just taught me engineering principles – it's also given me the freedom to explore and create.