Aerospace Engineering Personal Statement Example 24

There's a tradition in Chinese culture where on the child's first birthday, objects are placed on a tray and what he or she has chosen indicates his or her future career or traits.

My mother told me I was presented with a calculator, a book, a stamp and a pen. She sat me down in front of these items. With a swoop of my hand, I swept them away and crawled towards my grandfather's desk where an airplane model was sitting on.

Those were the only things I had eyes for. I have never considered myself a superstitious person. But whenever I think about that I always wondered: maybe this was my destined path?

When I was 4, I went on my first flight. The large aircraft intimidated me at first. Young me wondered: How can something so big and heavy fly? So my mother told me planes could fly above the clouds to get to our destination in a blink of an eye.

Sitting on the aircraft, I sat on the edge of my seat as I watched clouds pass by. It seemed like we were going slow, but in reality miles and miles has passed us by. I knew then that planes were many times faster than our old fashioned car.

To learn more about how they worked I used to try and build model airplanes using bits and pieces around the house and then I progressed to toy helicopters which could fly beyond my head. A kid’s dream, I would say. I suppose that was when my 'seed' of an interest for airplanes started to sprout.

It became more clear as I got older and started grasping the concept of physics and maths. I know that a love for planes itself will not immediately help me realise my dreams but that love has fuelled my interest and motivated me to become excellent in physics and mathematics.

It amazes me how important the concepts of physics and maths are and how intertwined they are with our daily lives. Although, I was always particularly enamored by mechanics in math. And I've always wanted to learn and apply that to the real world.

Being the determined person that I am I feel that I will never have enough of learning and that there is so much more to know and understand. I want to learn more about the aerodynamics, structural aspects, propulsion concepts and flight navigation and control of aircraft. So, I chose this path to study aeronautical engineering.

Once I read an article titled 'Twistable Wings Take Flight' about how twistable wings may be the future for airplanes. By changing the shape of the wings, fuel efficiency could be improved.

I find it incredible how given flexibility of the wings, a finer control of lift-to-drag ratio can be allowed to cater to different demands during a flight including warmer temperatures, higher altitudes, or stronger wind speeds.

During my first time visiting the UK, I was given the chance to visit the University of Southampton. A professor there explained to me even more about how shape-changing wings could benefit the aviation industry.

I hope to further my studies in the UK as it will open my eyes to a bigger world we can raise the bar and realize potentials. As I come from Malaysia which is a multiracial and multicultural country I have experienced how it is like to engage and interact with people of different backgrounds and values.

This allows me to work effectively in multinational teams. Besides that, I find myself open the changes in life be it to lifestyle, the environment or to the people around me. This will help me to adapt to different situations when working with different people.

A strong belief that I hold is that we should not get comfortable with what we have, only then will we keep improving ourselves.

The same goes to conventional things we see in life. Anything can be improved, even that old TV remote design. So in the future, I hope to develop and improve economically viable, ethically sound and sustainable solutions for aerial transport.