How much are you expected to remember?

To become an engineer or other professionals, you go through many years of schooling where you're evaluated on a variety of subjects you're expected to know. A lot of times, it's hard to remember everything that you have "learnt" so I was wondering how important it was to remember everything, is it all that important?

For example, an engineer needs to know a lot regarding physics and chemistry among other subjects but how can you remember everything you've been evaluated on at school? I know you'll remember the main basic principles but a lot won't remain. I ask this because I'm studying to become an engineer and sometimes I forget what I've learned in depth, is this normal?

 

The things that are important will be built upon class after class until your final year. There's a reason why grads who haven't had a job within 5 years of graduating don't get a job at all - because their education has essentially gathered dust. Don't worry about anything. As long as your university is accredited, they WILL prepare you and provide you with the necessary skills required for a position. For example, you remember how to do integrals yeah? Then congratulations, you can do 3/4 of the physics problems you'll be faced with in the real world (not to mention real world engineers hardly do any brain work, it's all done by software these days).

 

what exactly do you mean by what's in bold?

Thanks for the response.

 

There's a certain gap in which employers are willing to hire you after graduation. It's less-so for administrative jobs or jobs that require little practical training or previous knowledge. Something like engineering requires that you keep up with what you know. After graduation, you'll really only retain that education for 5 years or so. I don't mean to scare you, but I don't think you'd want someone who hadn't done any engineering in 5 years to suddenly start helping to make a bridge.

Again, don't let what I'm saying freak you out. As an engineer, you're pretty much guaranteed a job within a year after you graduate. Hell, you could probably even afford to travel around the world for 2 years and come back and STILL get a good job. Just don't wait too long.

 

Will say for a lot of jobs engineering especially after three to five years you will normally find yourself in a management position and not really using a lot of what you learned in school. Fields like computer science and nursing being a lawyer you will obviously be expected to retain a lot of the info you learned because you use it almost every day. With fields like business and management rarely would you find yourself using a lot of what you learned in school at least in my experience I'm in management of product flow for a company and they tought you what you needed to know in the first 3-6 months of being on the job and what I learned in school just helped me understand some of it a little better.

 

Even when you're pursuing a university degree you're going to be going through a lot more information than you can hope to remember. If you're on a semester system you're probably taking 5-6 classes on average. That's 48 classes over a 4 year term. Nearly 50 different text books, you get the idea.

Most of it is just proving that you can learn, and then apply new information. That you're dedicated enough to follow through with things, have a good work ethic, and you've been exposed to a variety of studies.

If you're taking classes and doing all the usual stuff ,(Attending lectures, taking notes, doing the reading) as well as getting passing grades that's a pretty good indicator you're going to be prepared for whatever you're looking to get into.

I wouldn't stress too much about not remembering everything that's been presented to you.

 

Alot of engineering jobs they will need to teach you more the specifics of your job, so less of what you learn't in school

 

You got google on your cellphone these days