Me too. And no further. Life is tough trying to engineer things when you don't know enough about math. That's what has held me back. Severely.In highschool I learned the basics of arithmetic, algebra and geometry
I got my EE degree in 1978 and since then, I've used nearly every flavor of mathematics mentioned by others above, at one time or another.So I'm 15 and I really want to become an electrical engineer and was just interested in what kind of maths they use day to day because surely they don't use EVERY topic that they were taught in high school?
Don't be afraid of math. Math seems scary, but it's not. It's actually really cool. If you want to be an effective engineer, you want to be reasonably good at math. Everything non-calculus is linear - aka 'on a line', whereas calculus is used for in-exact things, relational things where it isn't exact, it just has to be close-enough- like real-world stuff.Hey everyone,
So I'm 15 and I really want to become an electrical engineer and was just interested in what kind of maths they use day to day because surely they don't use EVERY topic that they were taught in high school?
Thanks,
If you already really enjoy maths then just explore any topic that takes your fancy that you enjoy - it will come easy then.Hey everyone,
So I'm 15 and I really want to become an electrical engineer and was just interested in what kind of maths they use day to day because surely they don't use EVERY topic that they were taught in high school?
Thanks,
Take all the required math you can and do as well as you can but it you are not great don't despair.Initially you need algebra and trig to get through the classes in the first years of college, Then you do need to understand calculus. Then you need to understand the math that goes with the physics. The trig is what works with vectors, which are important if you ever need to work with forces of any kind. Than an amazing thing happened. In an actual engineering system doing real world stuff much of it became regular basic four-function math. When adding a safety factor calculus and integration reduce to geometry and multiplication. We never made machines that were "only just" strong enough, because those ones never were "strong enough", and they would break. Of course none of us ever designed consumer junk products, it was always things that were not allowed to fail. When reliability matters most the world is much different than when minimum cost to produce is the king.
If you want to work for NASA that might be a bit different because the time frame is slower and the budgets are greater and any failure is huge and seen by the whole world, live and on replay.
And aside from all that an engineer needs to be able to communicate accurately and cleanly with no chance of errors. So an adequate vocabulary and great communication skills are important.