<p>I'm an undergrad in top five IE program. Currently, my gpa sits right at a 2.8 and I'm a sophomore. I've struggled through calculus and physics (mostly from poor high school prep) but made it. Are there any IE's who are willing to give me advice? I'm seriously considering a switch out of the major mostly because I'm not sure how well I will do going into harder and harder classes. My math grades have gotten much better but only with a TON of remediation and tutoring. I'm in a couple of IE classes right now and I'm averaging about 80's on the tests and these are considered to be the easier of the classes. Does anyone have any advice on whether or not to stay in and risk not doing well, or find something else that I can succeed in?</p>
<p>Why did you choose this program/major in the first place? What interested you about it? Was what you learned the first 2 years what you expected to be learning? Try to fill in some more detail about yourself and what motivates you. :)</p>
<p>I am not an IE grad but was a Civil E structural grad who ended up in aerospace structures. I was a manager who did a fair amount of college grad hiring for the company. </p>
<p>All engineering majors require good math skills, just the nature of the beast. (Curious, did you skip some of the lower level college math classes due to having AP credit from HS?) Do you now understand the math? If so, then you’re probably good from here on out. Most of the time, the math required to solve an engineering problem is somewhat a subset of what you have probably learned so far. And you probably will use the same solution methodolgies over and over again, getting to know them real well. Best thing to do is talk to some juniors and seniors and ask to see what work they are doing. Can you do it is the real question?</p>
<p>A 2.8 GPA isn’t a total deal breaker at this point. If that was your final GPA, then there is a problem as most companies (mine included) would require a minimum of a 3.0 to be considered for a job. Saying that however, I would look at the applications classes (ie. junior and senior level classes typically) in the area I was interested in for the job being offered and calculate your GPA in those classes only. I placed a higher weight on that GPA than your overall GPA. So, you would have to maintain a 3.2 or higher to get the overall GPA up and this would make you a better candidate overall.</p>
<p>The job market isn’t so great right now, so the higher the GPA the better. You do have to “overcome” your current GPA no matter what field you go into (engineering or not). </p>
<p>If you like IE, stick with it. You will always do better in something you like. You will perform better in your career if you enjoy your work.</p>
<p>Thanks for your responses!
I didn’t skip any lower level math classes, I got a C pluses and B’s in all of them. So, not decent, but not a true mastery of the material either. As far as my motivations are concerned, I chose industrial engineering because it was such a broad field. I would like to go into operations research or management systems engineering, a field where I could take the applied mathematical skills I will learn and use them to better solve problems companies have. So, I suppose a sort of consulting job or something along those lines would be awesome. I know that I have the opportunity to raise my GPA and I know it needs to be above a 3.0, but I’m not sure with the difficulty of the courses if that will happen. Currently, I’m in calculus 2 (integration) and doing well, but I do work a lot more at it than my peers who’ve already had it in high school. The first two years of my undergraduate curriculum are foundational classes that don’t really have much relevancy with your major, so I have only one or two classes to base my enjoyment of Industrial Engineering off of.</p>
<p>Could you get more tutoring over the summer to make sure you understand the calc that you’ve already been through? Just what you wanted. 
It may be easier for your classmates if the material is repeat for them. Do you have more calc to take? This was a long time ago but we were on qtrs. and had 4 qtrs of calc followed by differential equations. Integrating was in 2nd qtr. so if you have more to take, better not to fall behind.</p>
<p>You may or may not have more math beyond that, best to find out. Will you take statistics? Completely different, maybe your knack. The higher level classes become more specific to your field and a lot more interesting, IMO, and may not require any more math than you’ve already learned. Sounds like you’re mostly through the general requirements of any engrg. degree and can start to focus on what attracted you to IE in the first place.</p>
<p>I had a housemate (GeoEng) that had a similar gpa after working her butt off. She just had to work harder than many for lower grades. Her necessary work ethic has really paid off for her and her company.</p>
<p>I would change to another area of engineering because, frankly, there are less jobs for IE majors. My friend’s son graduated from Columbia in 09, still hasn’t found a job.</p>