Cal Poly SLO vs U of Utah Electrical Engineering

Colleges and Universities A-Z Cal Poly San Luis Obispo
1

Right now, I am debating between whether to attend Cal Poly SLO or the University of Utah as an electrical engineering major. If some parents or students familiar with or attending these colleges could share their experiences on this thread, that would be great! Any opinions and pieces of advice are appreciated.

Cost: I received a full tuition scholarship at University of Utah, so the net cost of attendance is $15k per year. I received the $2000 Outreach Scholarship at Cal Poly, so the the net cost is $35k per year. However, I am fortunate that my parents have saved enough money for me to attend either school without taking out loans. I think that Cal Poly may have a better program, especially since the school is focused on educating undergraduate students.

Cal Poly: The college is in a great location on the California coast, and San Luis Obispo is an awesome college town. There are small classes, great connections to Silicon Valley companies, and so many great engineering facilities open to undergraduate students. There is also the learn by doing philosophy that helps students gain practical experience in their field with project based learning and engineering clubs that participate in competitions. The engineering program is also highly ranked in the nation and well respected by employers.

However, I am concerned about how long it takes to graduate and class availability, since their 4 year graduation rate is pretty low. I am also curious about whether engineering students have time to take business courses as a minor.

U of Utah: I was accepted into their honors program, and the scholarship obviously makes the cost a lot cheaper. The honors program would allow me to take smaller classes and help me to get to know my professors better. The facilities are also impressive, and the PRAXIS labs would offer great interdisciplinary research on solving global problems for students of all majors. There are many opportunities to combine engineering with entrepreneurship or business administration courses in the business college. There is also great skiing near the university.

However, Salt Lake City is not as nice of a college town, and the conservative and LDS influence would not be ideal. The university is also a commuter school, which would not be good for someone coming from outside of the state.

Right now, I think I am leaning towards Cal Poly right now, and my parents support either choice.

2

Cal Poly’s acceptance rate is approx. 30% compared to 80% for Utah. Additionally, it sounds like Cal Poly fits you better as a student—But the big ? is whether it is worth it financially (twice the price)??

My D is planning on taking as many GE’s as possible during the summer at CC’s or States (some are online), but you should talk to SLO about OOS taking classes over the summer and how they transfer.

3

My son was in the same boat as you. As an avid life long skier and racer, along with the quality of the engineering program and the scholarship, The U was high on his list. He decided though to choose Cal Poly for several reasons. The weather and location didn’t hurt, but in the final analysis, the quality of engineering and the companies that recruit at Poly sold him. He too got the $2000 outreach scholarship and it has renewed for him. He would have been OOS at Utah and is at Cal Poly.

With that said, let me dispel some perspectives you have about both schools, Utah first.

Even with the LDS presence, SLC us a very progressive town. It’s under 50% LDS and the current mayor is a lesbian democrat. Although it is a commuter school, about 10,000 students live on campus and are tight knit. Unlike Poly, if you’re an everyday kid (not returning from a mission, raising a family) the culture is to live on campus all 4 years. It makes Utah fell much smaller, in a good way, than it is. They have big time sports too that the students go nuts for, not only FB and BB, but women’s gymnastics and volleyball. They pack the arena. So, there’s LOTS to like about Utah.

Now for Poly. First, the graduation rate is improving, but lots of the programs, including EE, are longer than 4 years by design. If a student goes one quarter past the 4 years, it counts as 5 in their statistics. If you bring in a reasonable amount of credit, don’t dodge time slots or professors, don’t have to repeat any classes and know the scheduling system well, you’ll be fine.

The ME curriculum is 5 hours longer than EE. If my son stays on his current pace and decides to do the 4+1 Masters program, he’ll have all the requirements completed for his BS and only about 20 hours remaining on his Masters. So yes, it’s VERY doable. You won’t likely however have time to minor in anything except possibly math. The curriculum for engineers is packed. That’s for the best anyway. Companies hiring engineers to be engineers often pass over students with business minors. It dilutes the quality of their engineering. If you want a management track, lots of companies will pay for an MBA after you’ve been there for a while.

I hope that helps.

4

Cal Poly also offers several resources for students trying to develop and get into startups/entrepeneurship. Other than a major entirely dedicated to it, there are start up career fairs, a dept offering free law and consulting services, a brand new housing complex specially to house entrepeneurs, a summer immersion program called the Hothouse that will help you finance and bring an idea to fruition, and roughly 3 clubs with speakers (including Praxis last week).

I would also like to back up that going one quarter over 4 years counts as the 5 year metric. A big reason for this is that Cal Poly pushes it’s students to go into co-Ops and to take time off from school to get work experience. 4 years is very doable

5

As a current EE student I can speak to the program.

I also turned down a full-ride scholarship to UCLA’s EE program for Cal Poly. I primarily chose Cal Poly for the smaller classes, incredible location, and campus climate.

Speaking directly to your concerns:

  1. Yes, classes are hard to come by and they will continue to be. This is a statewide problem with the CSU system. In fact, the faculty had a strike planned next week because of the poor pay for faculty and decreasing course sections and increasing class sizes past 40 students. This was swept under the rug for the upcoming open house, and they ironically came to an agreement before open house.

  2. I don’t know anything about Utah, but if they are a research university then they probably have much better lab equipment. One of the EE labs has equipment dating to the 1970s, still in use, and the lab manuals have images from the same era. It wasn’t until last year they received oscilloscopes without floppy disc drives.

On a different note, it is a great place to live and I’m happy to be living here. Many of the top companies (Even outside of silicon valley) recruit at Cal Poly, and the reputation extends to the east coast. As an intern on the east coast the past summer I met several people who were affiliated with Cal Poly. The classes are still relatively small, and you will have a much easier time getting the one-on-one time with professors whether it’s help in your courses or career advice.

Running out of time but if you have any specific EE related questions feel free to ask. Again, the biggest drawback would be the broke CSU system, but beyond that I am happy with Cal Poly.

6

Cal Poly all the way. My son is a future engineer and I can’t think of a better school than Cal Poly.

7

Thanks for all of your advice, everyone! I am happy to say that I have committed to Cal Poly, and I think it was the best fit for me, both academically and socially.

8

You won’t be sorry. Make sure you go to WOW. Good luck.