I’ve been accepted to both schools as an aerospace engineering major but I’m having a hard time deciding between the both. Can anyone expand on the programs and student life that are offered at both schools.
Cal Poly is a larger, older, stand alone department. UCI is a subset of the ME department. My suspicion is that Poly has more AE facilities too, but I haven’t been to Irvine. Poly students can concentrate in astronautics or aeronautics. Their grads are sought after. For an undergrad, I’d think CP would win hands down. Have you visited both?
@bee4world I am in the same situation right now lol
hopefully we can make the decision together!
Yes I visited both and I’m having a hard time deciding between both of them. I feel like Cal Poly will offer a lot more for me as a freshman but Irvine is a lot closer to home. Irvine and SLO both also have a nice campus but I’m worried I won’t have anything to do in SLO
First, no matter where you go, you’ll be busy with school (if you want to be successful and stay in aerospace :D). They are different locations otherwise. Irvine has more city things while SLO has more nature things. My son mainly hikes, goes to the beach or plays intramurals. He occasionally goes to LA or SB with friends.
There’s plenty to do at SLO, but not to mention that Aerospace engineering doesn’t leave for much free time anyways.
The Cal Poly aero department is strong and has a wind tunnel, composites lab, cubesat, polysat, etc.
Fun fact: Cubesat was established in 1999 between Stanford and Cal Poly and has now become a national success!
To expand on what @r77r77, said, many schools have CubeSat programs. At CalPoly, that’s PolySat. They design small satellites that have some academic purpose, study the atmosphere, take images of earth, etc. There are corporations that use them too.
The interesting thing about Cal Poly, is that CubeSat, also a student driven organization, but with several professional employees too, is housed at the school. It’s not just another pico satellite program. Every CubeSat, commercial or academic, is sent to CubeSat at Cal Poly to be tested, loaded into a launcher and delivered to the launch vehicle. CubeSat arranges all the LVs and is responsible for the manufacturing of the launcher, the PPOD (Poly Pico-satellite Orbital Deployer). This is all done by students.