Advantages & Disadvantages

     Just as there is with all jobs, Chemical Engineering has its up-sides and down-sides. It is important to realize these before making any crucial decisions:

Advantages

1. Money

     For most people money is a big factor when choosing their career for the fututre. With chemical engineering this is not an issue, because it is one of the higher paid engineering practices.

2. Job Security

    Because of the never ending need for chemical engineers, and the high demand and low supply of them, once you have a job as a chemical engineer you usually are in the driver seat when it comes to whether you keep your job or not.

3. Fulfillment

    this may be a more opinionated advantage, but when working as a chemical engineer you really are making a difference with what you do by making other peoples lives easier and safer. This sense of fulfillment is definitely an advantage.

Disadvantages

1. Years of Schooling

      Even though chemical engineering is only a fraction of what medical doctors would go through, but it is still most definitely difficult.

 2. Health

     When working with all the toxic chemicals needed to create a finished product, accidents may seem easy to occur and can directly effect your health.

3. Pollution

 Many reactions that you create, have by products that effect the environment and can really contribute to global warming. This may not be the easiest thing to think about for some.

Personal Characteristics & Abilties

     To become successful in a career, you have to have certain qualities and strong points that make you not only the best person for that job, but also allow you to enjoy your job as well. It is important for anyone to realize their strengths and weaknesses in order to build and improve. For a chemical engineer one would need to:

Learn Continuously:
     With the ever changing world with new and innovative ideas coming your way, to be a chemical engineer you have to willing to learn and continuously grow, be able to assess personal strengths and weaknesses, and plan and achieve to reach your goals.

Think & Solve Problems:
     It is important that a person in this field can assess situations and indentify problems, be creative  and innovative in exploring new possible solutions, be ready to use all areas of knowledge to solve problems and make decisions, and be able to check to see if the solution works, and act on opportunities for improvement.

Be Adaptable:
     This person should also be able to work independently OR part of a team, carry out multiple tasks, be innovative and resourceful, be open and respond constructively to change and learn form mistakes.

Be Responsible:
     A responsible person can set goals and priorities; plan and manage resources to achieve goals; assess, weigh, and manage; and be responsible for actions of oneself and group.

Participate in Projects & Tasks:
    This person is able to plan, design, and carry out a project form start to finish with well defined objectives and outcomes; work to specific quality standards and specifications; and continuously monitor the success of a project and identify ways to improve.

     These are the top useful skills for a person in the chemical engineering field, and any other strengths or abilities can be helpful in being successful in your career.

Occupational Outlook/Salary

   Because of our society today, and how our success is based on the dollar values we make, the big question that every single person asks about any career is "How much money will I make?". It may sound bad, but this is always going to be a big question when deciding upon a career, and it all depends on where you see yourself in the future. For chemical engineering, the average salary for any person in this field usually is not an issue.

Average Entry Level Pay:          Average General Pay:                 Average Senior Level Pay:

     19.88 $/hour                                35.00$/hour                                    69.95$/hour

                                                 Average Annual Salary:

                                                     76, 473.00$/year

     On the flip side, no matter how much you are getting able to get paid, if you can not find a job you will not be getting a paycheque anyway. That is why an occupational outlook on the career your looking to get into is so important. Especially for chemical engineering, it can tell you the amount of available jobs and where even though there is a lot openings mostly everywhere for this job

     For example, I have brought up two available job postings simply found by searching online:

~Job Posting #1~                                             AND                                          ~Job Posting #2~

    Another thing to look at it is where one can be hired, and this chart breaks down the places in industry chemical engineers can work:

Educational Requirements

     Generally for this type of career, there is a wide range of career opportunities that one can get into from a single university degree or apprenticeship. As an example, we can use McMaster University: 

One can take:

    -Bachelors in Chemical Engineering [or related engineering program] (4 to 5 Years)

    -Sometimes followed my a masters/doctorate degree

    -Co-operative Education is available in many different work placements for this study

    -Following the education, one would need to be licensed by a provincial association of professional engineers:

• Graduate from program
• 3 to 4 years experience in field of work
• Pass provincial standard exam

   -once licensed by province, one is now certified as a Chemical Engineer

   Although not everyone has to take the exact same career path, for there are many ways to receive the knowledge you need to become successful in any occupation you desire. Feel free to use this as a general guideline, or example of one path you may want to take, but keep me in mind there are many different opportunities for you to look at, for example apprenticeship opportunities. Sometimes is it even good to hear about the job and education from people going through it, so here is a site that you can take a look at, and get advice form people who are, or are going where you want to go:

Click on the link below:

              ~Working as a Chemical Engineer~

Job Description

So, What's a Chemical Engineer?

A question with a wide variety of responses that everyone asks when they stumble upon a new career oppurtunity. This can be answered briefly for a chemical engineer:

Chemical engineers research, design, and develop chemical processes and equipment, oversee the operation and maintenance of industrial chemical, plastics, pharmaceutical, resource, pulp, and food processing plants and perform duties related to chemical quality control, environmental protection and biochemical or biotechnical engineering. Chemical engineers are employed in a wide range of manufacturing and processing industries, consulting firms, government, research and educational institutions.

This short video describes the daily life of a chemical engineer: