Aerospace Systems [BEng/MEng] personal statement example

Why do you want to study this course or subject?

In a Year 9 STEM club I was given a small quadcopter that drifted towards the wall of the sports hall whenever it tried to hover. Our teacher showed us how to trim it, but I wanted to know why the drone could not correct itself. Reading about flight controllers taught me that they combine gyroscope and accelerometer data and use feedback to adjust each motor's speed many times a second. Their behaviour depends on how well those sensors and control loops are matched to the airframe. That idea, that an aircraft is a set of interacting systems as much as a shape that produces lift, is why I want to study aerospace systems rather than a course focused only on aerodynamics or structures. I am interested in how sensors, control laws, propulsion and structure have to be designed together, and in how engineers plan for a component that fails or gives misleading data. Living near a regional airport has also made me curious about the less visible work that keeps aircraft flying, from inspection schedules to the records that make every task traceable. I enjoy problems where the mathematics has a direct physical consequence, and I want a degree that builds both the theory and the practical judgement needed to design reliable flight systems.

How have your qualifications and studies helped you to prepare?

My A levels in Maths, Further Maths, Physics and Computer Science have each fed into the questions I care about. For my Extended Project I built a thrust stand from a digital kitchen scale, a lever arm and a small brushless motor driven from a school bench power supply. I measured the thrust of two propellers across a range of speeds and compared the results with ideal momentum theory, which treats the propeller as a disc that accelerates air. The measured thrust for a given power was always below the ideal value, as expected, and writing up why taught me to separate losses such as blade drag and tip effects from errors in my own set-up, like friction at the pivot. In Computer Science I wrote a Python simulation of a single-axis pitch controller. Tuning the proportional, integral and derivative terms showed me how easily a fast response becomes an oscillation, and how sensor noise is amplified by the derivative term. Solving second-order differential equations in Further Maths then gave me the language to describe what I had seen as damping, and a Physics practical on damped oscillations let me test that understanding on a real spring system.

What else have you done to prepare outside of education, and why are these experiences useful?

Through my school's careers adviser I spent three days shadowing at an aircraft maintenance organisation at our local airport. I observed licensed engineers carrying out a scheduled check on a turboprop, following each task card and watching how torque values and inspections were signed off. My own role was limited to helping return tools to the shadow boards, which I quickly learned are checked so that nothing is left inside an aircraft. What struck me was how much of the work was careful verification rather than repair. For two years I have worked Saturdays at a garden centre, unloading deliveries, rotating stock and helping customers find plants and materials. Training two newer staff members on the till and the returns process has made me better at explaining things clearly. I also play tenor horn in a community brass band. Weekly rehearsals and an annual contest have taught me to prepare my own part properly because the sound depends on every section, and to accept detailed criticism from a conductor without taking it personally. Outside the band, I still fly a small drone in open fields and have started logging its flight data to compare with my simulation.