<p>IEEE is founding a "Center for Pre-College Engineering Education." Seems like a very small amount of money, but I guess it's a start. How do others think the U.S. could involve more students in engineering?</p>
<p>one way might be to increase the salary differential.</p>
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<blockquote> <p>one way might be to increase the salary differential.>></p> </blockquote>
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<p>I'm not sure what you mean...DH is an engineer. The day he graduated from undergrad school he was making double what I was making as a teacher with ten years of experience and a masters degree. His salary has risen steadily...his compensation is actually quite good.</p>
<p>thumper1, maybe I can explain what simba means. You are comparing the starting salary of an engineer, the field with one of the HIGHEST starting salaries, with that of a teacher. It is a national shame how little we pay teachers, but you've chosen about as diametrically opposed a comparison as you could.</p>
<p>Engineer salaries rise for about 10-15 years out of school but then level off. You can find loads of charts and discussion at <a href="http://sd.znet.com/%7Eschester/calculations/salaries/salary_curve_analysis.html%5B/url%5D">http://sd.znet.com/~schester/calculations/salaries/salary_curve_analysis.html</a></p>
<p>What simba points out is well recognized by many; engineers start off high but you hit the roof relatively early compared to other professions. If you are smart enough to make it thru an engineering education you probably have the brainpower needed to make it thru law school, accounting, medicine, etc. There are many other professions/jobs in which the liberal-arts grad starts off low but within 10-15 years has matched the engineer and by her/his 50's has far passed the engineer.</p>
<p>One of the most effective (and fun!) ways I've seen to involve more students in engineering would be to enable every student at every school to get involved in FIRST</a> Robotics. Younger students participate in their Lego</a> league and competitions, and older students go straight to [url=<a href="http://www.usfirst.org/robotics/%5DFIRST%5B/url">www.usfirst.org/robotics/]FIRST[/url</a>] participation and competitions. If the entrance fees weren't so high, every school in the country would do this, I swear. It is more fun than you can imagine for the kids, and the competitions are a sight to behold. Everyone has a complete blast of a good time, and the kids are totally jazzed about planning engineering projects, building things, testing their theories, solving problems, and bringing their ideas to reality by learning the basics they need to know to succeed. It is the best training for real-world engineering work I can think of (including the collaborative aspects of working as a team), and if we could find a way to bring this to more schools across the country, you'd see students flocking to engineering schools in droves. I wasn't surprised to hear from my S this spring that a very large proportion of the students at the Olin College of Engineering candidates weekend he attended were involved in FIRST Robotics. And from the participation in the robotics team at my sons' school, I see that it's not self-selecting: kids who weren't initially interested stopped by to check it out after seeing some demos at Club Day, and were hooked. Pretty much every kid who participated in the robotics team has gotten excited about engineering. I see it in action and it works. Now. How do we make it happen more universally?</p>
<p>Starting my Ds soph year, our school invested in "Project Lead the Way", a series of HS classes intended to interest students in engineering. My D took the first one, loved it, and is now taking the whole series. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, they are not honors, so her GPA/class rank will take a hit, also her transcript will show 3 years of industrial technology; I dont know how colleges will view this.</p>
<p>Hey, MikeMac:</p>
<p>You said, "There are many other professions/jobs in which the liberal-arts grad starts off low but within 10-15 years has matched the engineer and by her/his 50's has far passed the engineer."</p>
<p>I have found plenty of information about starting salaries, but haven't found any statistics for salaries 10-15 years into a career. Would be interested in either statistics or your opinion about what career prospects long-term may be better paying than engineering.</p>
<p>In support of what MikeMac stated, I found this link:</p>
<p>mootmom- Our PHS is just now starting FIRST robotics (S missed out as he is now an "alum"). The teacher who started it is especially pleased with the phenomenon you mentioned - it is not just the science standouts who are participating. A wide variety of kids from the strongest academically to those who never thought of being Honors or AP types are drawn in and loving it.</p>
<p>I don't know why it was so slow to come here, but maybe when it hits small-town NE,that is an indication that you're getting your wish.</p>
<p>PS - could you teach us how you do that "link" thing with your words instead of the <a href="http://etc%5B/url%5D">http://etc</a>. etc.?</p>
<p>Hi, KingFalcon:</p>
<p>There is some miscommunication happening somewhere. MikeMac said there are some liberal arts grads who eventually will surpass engineers in their earning power. I didn't see any liberal arts grads mentioned in the story you linked, maybe I missed it.</p>
<p>I am under the impression today an engineering grad will start at about 45-50k, and with luck, may eventually get to 100k. Maybe I am wrong about this assumption. I don't know of any liberal arts grads that would surpass what engineers would make, though there very well may be some. I am not an expert on what particular career paths pay. I know Doctors and Attorneys will surpass engineers. I would like to know what liberal arts grads will eventually surpass the engineers income. If I missed the specific occupations in that story, please point them out. </p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>You are right, as a prospective student in the sciences, I read that article for its comparison of the salaries of engineers, lawyers, and doctors. I suppose I overlooked MikeMac's statement that liberal arts students can make this much too; I was particularly focused on his statement that engineers' salaries top off after 10-15 years.</p>
<p>KF:</p>
<p>I probably was not clear enough in my question to MikeMac, too. My question should have been phrased, "I would like to know what liberal arts graduate careers will eventually surpass the engineers income", or something to that effect.</p>
<p>MikeMac says there are "many other" liberal arts grads in other career paths who will surpass the engineer. I may be giving my son bad career advice by encouraging him to stick to engineering and would like to know what these other high paying careers would be. </p>
<p>Best wishes to you.</p>
<p>DH the engineer gets at least a 5% raise per year, plus an annual bonus. In these economic times, I don't think that's bad...and he's been an engineer for 20 years.</p>
<p>Engineers with big firms don't work nearly as hard as medical residents or lawyers who are trying to become partners. In my book that's a plus, but those other two groups reap the financial rewards. Although engineering is described as a profession, it is really more like a corporate career. You could make the megabucks if you were in a Silicon Valley startup a few years ago, but otherwise you are in a very nice upper-middle-class job -- as opposed to folks in biglaw and medicine, who are wealthy.</p>
<p>Several things are worth mentioning regarding the salary of engineers. Many of the most talented engineers are transitioned into management after 10-15 years and thus avoid the salary plateau. An engineer who eventually earns an MBA is a most coveted combination in many industries and the salary plateau in this case is nonexistant.</p>
<p>Engineering is also a field where it is quite easy to start your own professional engineering consulting business. The competition is not astronomical and renumeration can be quite high Compared to a doctor or lawyer whose salary is based on his own work product, an engineer with a consulting business with say 15 engineers/draftsmen/field inspectors/lab techs, etc has himself and 15 other people generating income for his business. I know of many engineering consultants earning $200,000+ per year.</p>
<p>jmmom: FIRST is headquartered in Manchester, NH, so I'm surprised it didn't hit your area early! If you or someone you know has some spare time and is in for a treat, volunteer to be a team mentor: it's so rewarding!</p>
<p>As for the links, sure, here's a little lesson. If I wanted to link the FIRST Robotics main site (<a href="http://www.usfirst.org)%5B/url%5D">www.usfirst.org)</a>, I could either type it out as I just did (which will turn it into a link and, if it's long, abbreviate its content in the post) or I could use tags, like those used to make text italicized or bold, to turn the phrase "FIRSTRobotics" into a link. I would type:</p>
<p>[ url = <a href="http://www.usfirst.org%5B/url%5D">www.usfirst.org</a> ] FIRST Robotics [ /url ] </p>
<p>but take out all the spaces if I wanted it to be:</p>
<p>[url=<a href="http://www.usfirst.org%5DFIRSTRobotics%5B/url">www.usfirst.org]FIRSTRobotics[/url</a>]</p>
<p>gnusasaurus, first things first. If you are giving career advice to your son based on financial rewards I'd argue that you're already sending him down the wrong track. I won't go so far as to echo the "do what you love, the money will follow" mantra because I don't believe it. On the other hand, I do like the overall sentiment; an extra $30-60K a year in a higher-paying career won't buy happiness if every morning brings you to a job you hate.</p>
<p>A much more eloquent essay on choosing careers is [url="<a href="http://www.fastcompany.com/online/13/ldrplus.html%22%5Dhere.%5B/url">http://www.fastcompany.com/online/13/ldrplus.html"]here.[/url</a>] Written by a career consultant, I think it is must reading.</p>
<p>Now for those liberal-arts jobs. I already mentioned 2 career fields in the first post that are filled by liberal-arts grads. Doctors and lawyers. Where do you think the med & law schools get their students from? Even that quintessential pre-med major, biology, is offered at every LAC in the country. In my book kids who graduate from a LAC have a liberal-arts degree; maybe you've got a different book.</p>
<p>How about those without a grad degree? As for other careers for the liberal-arts grad, I know people in public-relations and brand management who make $120K or more and they're just starting their 40's. They're not managers, just happy in their field as individual contributors. And I'll save you the trouble of posting a rebuttal; those are just 2 anecdotes, who knows if they apply to anyone else. I'm not about to spend time trying to prove liberal-arts grads can surpass engineers; if you don't believe it, fine with me.</p>
<p>BTW if you're pushing engineering be sure to factor in offshoring. Just yesterday the following AP article was in the paper
[quote]
HYDERABAD, India (AP) - IBM Corp. on Tuesday opened its fifth software development center in India and announced plans to hire 1,000 programmers in the new center by the end of 2005.</p>
<p>``We are very excited by the skills and talents and the productivity that come from our team in India,'' Frank Kern, IBM's vice president for Asia-Pacific said, inaugurating the center in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad.</p>
<p>IBM currently employs 23,000 people in its four Indian centers at Bangalore, Pune, Gurgaon and Calcutta.</p>
<p>Companies such as IBM and Hewlett-Packard use the offshore business model to provide low-cost software development services to their clients worldwide. India is the world leader among a handful of countries where wages are low and skilled workers plentiful.
[/quote]
But, hey. If you think liberal-arts grad are doomed to low salaries for the most part, or that engineering is a guarantee of a good job, I'm not here to dissuade you. If you want to quible over what "many others" means, I'm not going to debate you. Do your own research, reach your own conclusions, your son is the one that lives with the consequences of your steering and not me.</p>
<p>my brother barely graduated high school- he joined the service a couple years after and took about 17 years to finish his degree in electrical engineering at a 2-3rd tier school. He has been retired from AirForce for about 5 years, and with his military pension he is doing very well supervising workers who make glucose meters. His company is prepared to pay his graduate school tuition and once he gets a grad degree would give him a big boost in pay and position.</p>
<p>A way to create future US Engineers?</p>
<p>I guess I'd try locking a male engineer and a female engineer in a building during a blackout and seeing what happens.</p>
<p>Why do people have to make things so complicated?</p>
<p>The US doesn't need engineers. It needs people who can manage cheap foreign engineers in third world countries. In the future language skills and cultural knowledge will be at a premium. You can hire a six pack of PhDs for the price of a car mechanic here but you have got to make sure they understand what you need done and don't steal your intellectual property and with it your business. Management is where it is at.</p>