Supporting engineering students to stay connected

Lachlan is one of the current Bogong Scholarship Recipients, currently studying a Bachelor of Engineering (Honours) (Electrical & Electronic Engineering). While it took him a while to land on Engineering as the path for him after leaving school, he thinks he’s in exactly the right place now.

“Engineers can really do anything… And then the construction and creation side of engineering really drew me to the career. When I was young, I was always playing with Legos and building stuff and planning - failing to build something and starting again. So, I think I kind of carried that through to being an adult and now I get to do that with engineering as well”

And once he worked out Engineering was the right path for him, Lachlan realised there was a family connection to this kind of work. His grandfather was a radio mechanic in the police force, and always had a lot of electronics around the house. So growing up he had an interest and good understanding of how electronics work. ‘It’s kind of in the blood’ he joked.

When talking about the scholarship, Lachlan shared with us:

“I wasn't always very academic in school, and this scholarship is for academic success... It's obviously seen as quite a hard course, so I didn't know if I was going to be able to do it. I wanted to set a standard for myself.”

“First year I tried really hard with all my grades and everything to smash it out. Not for any monetary gain or anything, but just to see if I could do engineering. So then to be rewarded with a bit of paper that says that you've achieved amazing stuff through trying so hard for school, it was that kind of pat on the back”.

And without his family in Melbourne, Lachlan is putting the scholarship to good use to make sure he can make the most of his time at university.

It's removed a lot of pressures of living away from family, and I’m living very far away from family. You've got issues with rent, groceries and school supplies, all of those costs. Taking the pressure off a little bit has made me able to enjoy life up here a little bit more.

“I can be quite a stress head. So, when there's that kind of monetary pressure, it takes away from everything else that you do throughout your day. I feel like I'm enjoying the experience at uni a lot more just because there isn't that cost of living pressure. Which means that I'm spending a bit more time training for footy in the off-season and stuff instead of working and spending a bit more time actually hitting the books as well.”

 I could put a bit of money aside from it and took a couple of weekends off work and with that, I actually went back home. I was able to use that money to go back and see my mom and dad and family and my dog. It gave me time to go back home and see the people that I've been missing, which has been really good.”