hello i really want to work for boeing, nasa, or lockheed martin in the near future. My school doesn’t offer aerospace engineering so i am planning to transfer to a school that offers aerospace engineering. my gpa wasn’t good enough for gatech but my cousins got in with a 3.6 so i plan on transferring there because they said i would like it there. so i wanna know what schools did you guys go to for your aerospace engineering degree and what was your gpa. plus where do you work? thanks!
You don’t need a degree in aerospace engineering to work at those places. They hire mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, computer scientists, and materials scientists in droves. They hire more MEs than AEs, generally (though there are a lot more MEs in existence corresponding to that).
@boneh3ad ik that but i feel as if ME is really general and i will like AE better
USC for AE works at Norththrop, daughters friend. I know no other AE.
What year are you? You’re already planning to transfer just because your school doesn’t offer aerospace? Why do you assume Georgia Tech will take you as a transfer?
General advice around here is that not only is an aerospace major largely unnecessary, it may even hurt you as being too specialized. It could close other doors. You can just major in mechanical and take courses or concentrate in aero. That makes you attractive to those aerospace companies (if otherwise qualified), while still holding a more versatile mechanical degree if aero doesn’t work out.
Why Boeing, Lockheed, and NASA? Great companies, but what about Northrop Grumman, SpaceX, BAE Systems, United Technologies, Raytheon, Textron, GE, Rockwell Collins, Ball Aerospace, Exelis, L-3, etc.?
SpaceX is cool but a slave ship.
I went to PSU for EE, got an offer from Lockheed but went to work for Northrop. If that helps.
My brother got an EE and CS at CSU, he worked at Boeing then Northrop.
Another one graduate from UCI with a Master for ME, he has being working at Boeing for years.
So you don’t have to study Aerospace Engineering, I agree with others, you can get boxed in with that major.
@DrGoogle what about a double major?
Some of you are exaggerating the limitations of an AE degree.
It certainly isn’t a requirement to have an AE degree to work in aerospace but there are some positions which do favor AE degrees (as well as some that favor ME degrees). For the most part though, AE and ME degrees are considered interchangeable in the eyes of most employers.
And if that’s not enough, the unemployment rates for AE’s and ME’s are roughly the same at ~3% (source BLS). AE actually has a slightly higher predicted growth rate at 7% compared to ME’s 5% (source: BLS).
TL;DR: Pick the degree program that interests you more. Your job prospects are good with either degree.
Post #8, maybe, but it’s hard. If you are AE you have more chances to work with defense or gov organization. If you have other degrees you can cover the non defense and non gov section.
My husband and I worked for Boeing before(but less than 10 years)but not as long as my brothers and one of my sister in laws. They been there more than 25 years plus.
We only came to defense companies after the dotcom bust. So I don’t know that many companies that in commercial hire AE majors. I can only think of SpaceX and companies that make drones that Google or Amazon type of companies invested in.
I worked at Boeing for a few years in the late 80’s so don’t know how relevant my information will be. My department did a lot of operations research, computer simulations and modeling. My undergrad degree was from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. (Boeing kindly sent me to grad school at USC while I was there.) Off the top of my head, the people sitting near me were graduates of Stanford, Washington, Washington State, Case Western, MIT, USC, UCLA, Oregon Tech, Iowa, Michigan, either North Dakota or North Dakota State (can’t remember which one), Portland or Portland State (again can’t remember), Cornell, Seattle University, Wichita State, Texas A & M. The guy sitting right in front of me went to a little LAC, but I can’t remember the name of it. We also had a few people who had gone to European universities.
Smartest group of people I ever worked with in my life, and we could go to lunch and have intelligent discussions about everything from the latest engineering and tech, to politics and world affairs, to sports.
The most common degree was probably math. Out of about 60 people, only two of us had CS degrees. The guy next to me had a PhD in Fisheries and was hired because he was great at statistics. Most of the rest had various engineering degrees like IE, ME, Aero. A lot of us also had military experience, including me.
Boeing had a list of preferred universities back then, but it wasn’t impossible to get a job there if your school wasn’t on the list.
From the family members and friends who have worked with NASA, Lockheed Martin, Northropp Grumman, and Boeing, they all went to either a state school or international university.
I interned at Boeing twice and now work for a major defense contractor. I went to Michigan, but I noticed that the schools engineers attended are often dependent on the location of the company they work for. For example in Seattle, lot of Washington, Washington state, Seattle university, etc. Top engineering public state schools are very well represented as well no matter where you go due to the sheer size of these programs. Surprisingly I have not seen a lot of people from top private schools (MIT, caltech, stanford, ivy league, etc). Also you see engineers from smaller less known schools all over the place, but they’re often outliers (and probably the top of their respective classes).
If you want to work in the aero industry, I would definitely recommend going for an AE. College is what you make of it, and your success if dependent on how much advantage you take of the resources presented by the school. AE major will not pigeonhole you and I’ve seen many AE graduates go into other industries. Good luck!
Post #13, you don’t go to schools and work at Boeing because they probably don’t pay you more.
Mostly state schools.
Just curious, how do salaries (and benefits, advancement, etc.) at Boeing, Lockheed, and Northrop compare to other aerospace/defense companies?
Post #15, those 3 are tops, so I assume top compensation, but my sister who worked at head quarter of Northrop and she said it’s the best run company. The top boss went to MIT for undergraduate.
I have not been in the job market for a few years, but at the time of my hiring salary offers were comparable between major aero companies. This is more dependent on the location of the job with cost of living taken into account. For benefits (401k, PTO, etc) I’d rank it: Northrop > Boeing > Lockheed > Raytheon. I’m afraid I can’t go into more detail though. Glassdoor.com is a good resource for this type of info.
Apply to all of them, find out yourself!
My undergraduate is in Optical Sciences and Engineering (went to University of Arizona) and I work at one of the major defense contractors mentioned at the bottom of post #4 (not Boeing, Lockheed, or NASA). All the places you mentioned hire engineers from all backgrounds, so you could still get a non-Aerospace Engineering degree and work at these places. In my work area alone we have EEs, MEs, OEs, people with Physics degrees, math degrees, etc.