While we are happy to be here giving maximum information we can, we thought it will be prudent to give information first on what is civil engineering and then proceed to tell more about the different courses available to pursue the study called “Civil Engineering”.
How and when did Civil Engineering evolve as a separate discipline?
It may be noted that Civil Engineering is the oldest engineering discipline next to Military Engineering, as it was first the military that contributed in constructing infra-structures. At a later stage, it was thought that civil infra-structurerequires a more focused approach and hence was detached from the military personnel to be made a separate discipline by itself. It was this background that gave it the nomenclature “civil” to differentiate it from “military”.
In other words, Civil Engineering, is responsible for the infra-structure of the whole world and that include potable water supply, sewerage, power generation plants, power transmission, navigation, canals, bridges, railways, metros, runways, tunnels etc., Various sub fields do exists in the world of civil engineering and they include, construction engineering, soil engineering, transportation engineering, irrigation engineering, structural engineering, hydraulic engineering, etc. It is said that Civil Engineers apply the principles of geotechnical engineering, structural engineering, environmental engineering, transportation engineering and construction engineering to residential, commercial, industrial and public works projects of all sizes and levels of construction.
Generally the civil engineering works are more associated with Construction Engineering as conspicuous civil works are all based on construction. Construction may be residential, commercial and infra-structure oriented like building road, railways, airports, bridges, dams, highways etc.
Career Growth in the Field of Civil Engineering:
Wikipedia quotes, ”There is no one typical career path for civil engineers. Most people who graduate with civil engineering degrees start with jobs that require a low level of responsibility, and as the new engineers prove their competence, they are trusted with tasks that have larger consequences and require a higher level of responsibility. However, within each branch of civil engineering career path options vary. In some fields and firms, entry-level engineers are put to work primarily monitoring construction in the field, serving as the “eyes and ears” of senior design engineers; while in other areas, entry-level engineers perform the more routine tasks of analysis or design and interpretation. Experienced engineers generally do more complex analysis or design work, or management of more complex design projects, or management of other engineers, or into specialized consulting”
In our second and final post on “Civil Engineering – An Introduction”, we shall discuss the various disciplines of Civil Engineering briefly so we get a holistic understanding of Civil Engineering.
Further Details : Ignou study centre in Chennai
