Turning academic hurdles into engineering triumphs: Jasmin’s journey in Physics

Jasmin Evans started her journey at the University of Central Lancashire through clearing as a Foundation Year student due to not achieving the grades she had been hoping for in her A-Levels. In hindsight, this was one of the greatest things that happened to Jasmin, as it led to a year of working on building confidence in her abilities before approaching the more complex and challenging years of BSc (Hons) Physics.

Jasmin loved her time at UCLan and admits her experience and learning helped kickstart her passion for mathematics and practical laboratory work. She mentions her course modules allowed her to “explore different streams within the physics degree” which helped her get a real sense of what she liked and was good at. This ultimately led her to then be confident enough to apply for an engineering position towards the end of her studies.

Soon after graduating, Jasmin began working as a Graduate Systems Engineer at Lockheed Martin UK, where she completed rotations in various parts of the business which aided her in gaining experience and becoming familiar with working in the engineering industry. Her duties involved supporting a fleet of eleven Warrior Development vehicles through reliability growth trials, qualification and test activities, and managing instrumentation both on-vehicle and across military ranges. This is where Jasmin first experienced working with armoured fighting vehicles.

The Warrior Capability and Sustainment Program (WCSP) came to an end in 2021, where Jasmin took some time out of the land domain to work in Maritime Defence before taking on her current role at Rheinmetall BAE Systems Land (RBSL) as an Instrumentation Engineer. Her responsibilities include data gathering during live firing trials and working on the Challenger 3 (CR3) project, a project which involves instrumenting the UK’s next generation Main Battle Tank prototype fleet to collect the necessary evidence to prove it is safe and suitable for service with the British Army.

Jasmin is grateful for the knowledge she gained from her course. “Instrumentation combines a lot of physics knowledge with engineering principles to understand the requirements of a task, and to ensure the equipment selected for the trial is suitable to provide the most accurate data.” Jasmin said.

A proud moment in her career was supporting the first uncrewed Main Battle Tank firing activities in Germany, something which included her “pressing the ‘fire’ button”. She also won the ‘Lockheed Martin Excellence’ award for achievements and commitment to the Warrior Capability Sustainment Program (WCSP).

Jasmin will always be indebted to UCLan for where she is today, her Foundation Year experience becoming a lesson which has stayed with her throughout her career, “Build the foundation and with determination and commitment the rest will follow.” Jasmin said. If she had any advice for prospective Physics students, it’d be to “Try everything and don’t be confined by the title of your degree, physics gives you a fantastic foundation that you can put to work in any field you choose.”