@GLYToo We attended the Engineering Preview day and it was very good. Here are our impressions of the day.
Campus is growing - they are building the 2nd phase of the Academic Services buildings (to house new classrooms and offices). 2nd building is almost completed. The 1st building was completed last Fall and it looked great. Huge classrooms and conf rooms with the latest multi-media, comfortable seating, open spaces, and even a food kiosk outside the classroom …
Parking was a little confusing since construction is on-going. You park by license plate # so make sure you pay for it at the station the end of the lot if you are coming in from the main entrance. Park only at the YELLOW marking lots.
We arrived at 9:00 AM and check-in at the student center. They gave us a schedule for the day and realized that the session won’t start until 10:00 AM. In the mean time, we walked around and talked to various groups, clubs, advisors, etc… Lunch are provided for both students and parents so that was a very nice touch.
Session started off with the COO of TAMUG, Colonel Fossom - a very impressive person who made a case for prospective students to attend TAMUG. Dr. Foster was next and he explained and discussed about the Engineering in Galveston program - and why we should consider other engineering programs in Galveston as well. Dr. Figlus also went in-depth about Ocean Engineering and its opportunities. Just trying to give parents and students an idea of the possibilities that exist for studying in Galveston. Very informative.
Next, the students went as a group to a Q&A session. Parents stayed behind for lunch. When the students came back, they went to lunch while the parents went to a Q&A session. Free lunch so that was good.
The parents Q&A session was setup with a panel of 8 - each from different departments, student life, academic services, engineering, financial aid, corps cadet, etc… It was moderated by Dr. Donna Lang. The panel then take questions from the parents for an hour straight. We thought this is a great idea - you get answers straight from the sources and there are no ambiguity. Most questions are already answered on this site, but some notable answers are below:
Math Placement Exam (MPE) - for Galveston Engineering student, they are taken on the 1st day of the NSC (instead of 2nd day for CS students).
Panel members stressed that you need to study for the exam to be place in Math 151. Very important for Physics 218. If you don’t make the grade for Math 151, you are placed in Math 150 (similar to pre-calc), but will still be on schedule to apply for ETAM in Spring 2019.
ETAM - difference between Engineering Galveston and Academies: Galveston min. 2.0 GPA for all TAMU courses. Academies min. 2.0 GPA for TAMU courses, min. 2.5 GPA for academies equivalent courses.
Stats wise: of all the Galveston engineering students in the program, 76% of them apply to CS and got accepted to an engineering major. (Note: this is for an engineering major - not necessary your 1st, 2nd, or 3rd choice major - no analysis on them yet). However, this meant that 24% of students did not got accepted and/or dropped out of the program.
Payments are broken down into 4 - Sept, Oct, Nov, and December. You don’t have to write one big check.
Student life/housing: Director of housing recommended applying ASAP once you made a decision. He said though he would put a freshmen application in before a senior application if they run out of room - so no worries there. Visited Pacific hall and it is a 4-person suite, with 2 rooms - all sharing the same bathroom and shower. Nice, clean - decently size rooms. Each person is allowed a small fridge and microwave. You can rent them per brochure they gave when you check-in.
The director mentioned that 3 out of 4 students have a vehicle. So definitely it is needed since they are so isolated on the island to move around.
Overall, despite the early confusion, I thought the engineering day was well-run and very informative. We liked the Q&A format a lot since you have access to all the right people. Even after the Q&A session, the folks made themselves available to us to talk afterward and answered additional questions. All the TAMUG staffs genuinely seemed to care about the students and their success and empathized with the decision process the parents have to go through.
My son didn’t give us any hints what he thought about the day. He made some quick friends with a small group so that might affect his decision. For us, this will allow us to make a more informed comparison between TAMU and UTD.
Hope this helps …