Can a laid back kid survive in Cooper Union?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Cooper Union
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<p>My son was accepted to Cooper Union for Computer Engineering. He does not want to attend because during the Fall Open House we had a pair of nerdy tour guides who kept repeating that the engineering students would have to get used to eating/sleeping and basically living in the lab because the school was so hard. </p>

<p>I hate to see him pass up this opportunity based on these tour guides.</p>

<p>Did anyone out there visit and have a different experience? Did our tour guides give an accurate representation & assessment of the school? My son is naturally bright in math and science but is otherwise a very laid back kid who wants to spend his down time (would there be any(?)) surfing and socializing. Currently he is leaning toward attending a large public but I hate to see him pass up the Cooper opportunity. Can a laid-back kid survive/thrive/enjoy Cooper Union or would he be eaten alive? He does love NYC.</p>

<p>We will not be attending Open House because we are already booked trip to visit a California school, so if anyone attends and can add info here, please do.</p>

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<p>Twistedsis,</p>

<p>I have the same worry. But my (so far) laid-back son says he is now ready for the challenge of true, pure hard-work. </p>

<p>I have read here in CC (the old forum, link posted below)
<a href="http://www.collegeconfidential.com/cgi-bin/discus/show.cgi?70/41651%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.collegeconfidential.com/cgi-bin/discus/show.cgi?70/41651&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>and in Students review (link posted below)
<a href="http://www.studentsreview.com/alumni.php3?SH=CUftASA&ST=NY%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.studentsreview.com/alumni.php3?SH=CUftASA&ST=NY&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>that the curriculum is really, really tough. Princeton review ranked CU as the one of the top 10 toughest schools in 2002, and said "Students praise the "rigorous" and "unparalleled academics" here, though the process sometimes resembles "boot camp."</p>

<p>One of my acquintances has an S there. She says her S is usually in college from 9 am to 9 pm on week-days, studying. She says he sometimes plays tennis in the week-ends. On a few week-ends he participates in some cultural activities. Some week-ends he goes home. And some week-ends he studies. </p>

<p>I sent all the links and information to my son, to amply warn him. I will be attending the Open house. Please let me know if you have any specific questions, I can ask on your behalf and revert to you.</p>

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<p>Oops, sorry. I dont know why the CC link goes to rutgers. </p>

<p>Please try this link.
<a href="http://www.collegeconfidential.com/cgi-bin/discus/show.cgi?70/41651%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.collegeconfidential.com/cgi-bin/discus/show.cgi?70/41651&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<h2>Please choose 'Individual schools', then the letter C, and then 'Cooper Union'. There is only one thread for CU. I will nevertheless excerpt the relevant posts for you. </h2>

<p>By Nycneedhelp (Nycneedhelp) on Monday, April 12, 2004 - 01:24 am: Edit </p>

<p>Anyways, to add on to my above post, I have decided to go to Carnegie Mellon instead. This letter by a Cooper student is the main reason why. He writes: </p>

<p>" Let me tell you a little bit about Cooper Union. Congrats first of all, and secondly, it really depends on where you live, and how much you want to devote your life to study electrical engineering. If your goal is to come to Cooper with a strong background in Electrical Engineering, then Cooper is good. I’m at Cooper because I don’t care about social life and clubs and sports. I just want to get my Chemical Engineering degree, and go to grad school. Companies recognize Cooper Union…at least companies in the NYC area. They know it’s tough, and they’re more inclined to keep an open mind, against someone from like NYU with a higher GPA. I took BC Calculus as a junior and Vector Calculus and Differential Equations as a senior in HS…and I’m still not the best at Cooper. Judging on your high school background, you’ll definitely struggle at Cooper. Freshmen year is supposed to be the easy year, and you don’t even have the classes in high school. Actually, I first wanted to go to Carnegie Mellon, and not Cooper Union. My mother didn’t let me. I live at home. So doesn’t want me to move away, so she made me apply Early Decision to Cooper and I’m bound to it. I’ve come to accept it. </p>

<p>Well at Cooper, you have to really want to go, if you are truly in love with electrical engineering, and willing to struggle through four years then you should come to Cooper Union. It’s very hard here. By graduation, Electrical Engineers have an average GPA of around 3, Chemical Engineers have around 2.7, Mechanical Engineers have around 3.4, and Civil Engineers have around 3.6 The hardest majors are Electrical Engineers and Chemical Engineers. If you come, look forward to no sleep and constant studying. After a bachelors, starting salary ranges from 52K to 57K. Business wise, there is a small group of career fair participants at Cooper. Most of the companies that are looking for interns are in the Civil Engineering field. Chemical Engineers are hard to find, and once in a while, there is an Electrical Engineering company. Only the colleges with bigger names, such as Stanford, MIT, Carnegie Mellon, and Cal Tech, have many more companies attending their career fairs. Their companies span farther outwards, while Cooper only attracts companies from the NYC area, since that is the only area that knows of Cooper well. </p>

<p>Grade inflation wise…there is none. Actually, there is grade deflation. I remember a NJIT grad school recruiting officer said that usually, they will consider seniors with a 3.0+ GPA for their grad school. He would see all the jaws of the seniors drop, because no one has that high. And then he would say, “Oh, but from Cooper, we would probably accept 2.8+” </p>

<p>Social life - There isn't any, or there is a pathetic attempt at a social life, but it’s pretty pathetic. We don’t' have a campus, and when people hang out, its usually studying together. If you're going to Cooper, you must be a nerd. If you’re not, you may not fit in. The non-nerds...they're like...an extremely small minority and they usually get kicked out because their grades are too low. As an Electrical Engineer, you have to study at least 6 hours a day to keep up with the workload. Cooper's curriculum is a little more demanding than other engineering schools. You typically have 25 hours of classes a week, and expect 30 hours of studying a week. There aren't any good sports teams at cooper. Like I said, there are attempts at a social life. Cooper's basketball team plays other nerd schools like Polytech and schools like that, because nerd schools suck at sports. Polytech beats us too. Cooper has a running club. Another pathetic attempt. I see the running club run around the school on Tuesdays. There are two fraternities. One is called the nerd frat, and the other is just the normal frat. Normal frat guys are on the verge of being kicked out, and the nerd frat guys spend their Thursday nights playing N64. </p>

<p>Money - Cooper is free…tuition. There are other fees. And the books you have to buy, they’re very expensive, and there are some wacko professors who require you to buy books that don’t even print anymore, so you have to buy them used and you have to find someone who has a book from 1960. If you live at home, it’s about $5,000. Dorming costs money. At least $9,000 for the first year, and then they kick you out. So you have to find a place for yourself. And sometimes your roommates force you out. I know some guy, he was so dirty and smelly, that his roommate couldn’t take it anymore and left. </p>

<p>Also, I feel that Cooper’s reputation is on the decline, because in the past two years, many very reputable professors have left to teach at better schools, such as Stanford and MIT. This is because Cooper’s financial crisis has led to many professors not being paid enough. So they are hiring new, very inexperienced professors. Even though they have a financial problem they will not raise tuition. They are devoted to free tuition. They just keep raising “student fees”. When I started Cooper, it was only $325 a semester. Now, it’s $700 a semester.
Since Cooper is so poor, the facilities are very ancient. For example, registration for classes at other colleges is done online. Very convenient, fast, and fair. Registration at Cooper is like a race. It’s an early camp out at the registrar’s office. Next week, I’m going to be waking up at 3AM, and getting to school at 6AM, to sit in front of the registrar’s office, so I can get into the classes I want and need. You hand in a registration card. Cooper is very old. They don’t have new technology. Even my high school had online registration for classes. I remember when I went to the open house; I saw something leaking from a pipe in a chemistry laboratory. That wasn’t so great. In 2007, Cooper will build a new building…If they beg hard enough for a couple billion dollars. </p>

<p>Workload - Cooper is a small school, with a lot of competition within your own classes. Some professors use the bell curve, in the Electrical Engineering major. Most of the professors won’t give D’s. If you fall in the D range, they just fail you, and you fail that class. Then, you pretty much get kicked out, since you can’t continue with the curriculum. Freshman year, I remember taking some Electrical Engineering classes. I didn’t sleep for several days, working on some projects. I went to school 7 days a week to do schoolwork. Now, I go to school 6 days a week to do schoolwork and I go to work 1 day a week. People who try to lead a fun or sociable life at Cooper often find themselves on the verge of being kicked out. </p>

<p>At Cooper, there is hard work and a lot of it .You can expect exams weekly, since you have 8 or 9 different classes a week. Some professors’ homework assignments are ridiculous. I remember last semester, my professor said, “Homework this week, Chapters 1 and 2, all questions.” I look in the book, and it’s over 200 questions for the week. And throughout the whole semester, he assigned EVERY single problem in the book. And many people didn’t do it. I tried. I stayed up four days straight doing them, and I still didn’t finish them. I got really sick, because I was taking a lot of caffeine to stay awake. Finally, by the end of the semester, he gave us a final exam. He had three questions on it, and no one finished in two hours. And he said, “See, If you did every question in the book, then you would know how to do them.”, because he took the three questions straight from the book. But because they were like the 100th problem from different chapters, no one got up to it. </p>

<h2>This semester, I have a professor who teaches thermodynamics, but his exams aren’t on thermodynamics. People have complained, but you can’t do anything about it, because he is the head of the department. I’ve heard of a professor, who gives quizzes, on the lesson that day. You don’t even have time to study it at home or after class. He just gives you a pop quiz on that lesson, in the last half hour of class. They will not answer your questions if you don’t understand. They just degrade you. Anyway, good luck with whatever college you choose. I have to go and study…I have too many exams. Adios." </h2>

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<h2>Another post from the same thread:</h2>

<p>By Evoke1080 (Evoke1080) on Friday, April 16, 2004 - 07:20 pm: Edit </p>

<p>Hi I’d just like to congratulate those of you who got into Cooper class of 2008. I want to give you a little picture of what cooper is like during freshman year. It’s all core classes, Calculus, General Chem., Engineering Design, Into to Computer Science/ AutoCAD-Drafting, Lit, and Analytic Geometry. This is the first semester core. I’ll go through each class and what you can expect from them. Calculus completely depends on which teacher you have. My prof. gave tests that required you to know everything that was covered in the text, period. His tests were predictable because you always knew they would be hard and that you needed to study everything, there was no “is this going to be covered on the test?” questions. The only thing that he covers that might not be on the tests are proofs, he usually asks for 1 or 2 of maybe 12-18 proofs that he gives in class. He does not curve at all and most people get Cs. Other teachers are more lenient but do not teach nearly as well, meaning unless you naturally work hard or are exceptional at Calculus you might not be prepared for the harder calc courses. General Chemistry is once again all about the teacher you get. My prof was the chemistry departments Orgo chem. teacher, and it showed. Out of 10 class periods we would be lucky to get maybe 2 classes where he teaches what is on the test, the rest of the time he taught esoteric organic chem. stuff that was not on the test and which we couldn’t understand at all. His tests were fair and if you read the book you’d be fine. I don’t feel, however, that I learned as much as I could have in his class if he had taught us general chemistry. Engineering Design is an introduction to the Engineering design process, they do it a little differently every year, I had no problems with the course but the profs do expect you to work and you have to be able to speak inform of people. Programming and Drafting are easy if you know programming. Drafting can be fun or hell. For the first half of the semester you’re hand drafting and for the second half you’re using AutoCAD. You learn stuff really fast although projects can take up to 6 hours a week for both programming and drafting, longer if you don’t know how to program. Literature is normal, the teachers aren’t great but the classes aren’t hell. Analytic Geometry is simply a waste of time. The teachers don’t know how to teach and my prof. took off full credit for any mistake, and since there were only 4 problems on the test making an addition mistake could cost you 25 points. My calc prof. taught our class everything that analytic geometry was supposed to cover in 2 class periods versus Analytic Geometry’s semester worth of classes (15). That’s the first semester.
Second Semester is Calculus II, Physics I, Physical Chemistry, Chem. Lab and Literature II. I have the same professor for Calc II as I did Calc I and it is still a difficult class, all of the same comments apply. Physics is insanity. The lecture teacher is absolutely senile and no one understands what he is doing. There are egregious mistakes on the tests and his lecture are a waste of time, except when he gives us hints on what will be on the test. The recitation teachers are a little better although they can be a little arrogant at times, refusing to do problems to completion. They also cannot explain the concepts all that well. If you did not have a good HS physics class or cannot learn from the text you are in for a very hard class, however, there is a curve, and there better well be considering the average test grade was a 42%. This does not mean there is grade inflation; the average grade is still a “C”. Physical Chemistry is not too bad, though the tests are tough. A “B” is not an unreasonable grade to expect but you have to work for it and an “A” is very hard to get. Chem. lab is also very hard. You’re lab reports will take you the better part of 2 days to do well, I know some people spend less time and their grades reflect it. You have to be concise and you have to say exactly what you mean. Significant Figures count a lot in this class; it is not HS Chem where you can say that you used a 10mL pipette when you meant a 10.00mL pipette. That kind of mistake is BIG in this class. You also loose a lot of points for repeating and giving too much information. This is not a report you should save for the night before. Lit II is similar to Lit I. </p>

<p>On Cooper as a whole, you have to be able to put up with a lot of crap. Registration is hell, there is a line at 5 in the morning and you are not guaranteed classes. Some teachers assign tests on the day of registration and if you have a test when registration is scheduled you have to go later, the good news is there is no line. There is no “week off” for studying for finals; in fact my mid terms are 3 weeks before my finals. There are very few amenities including dorms (except for freshmen) so you have to get an apartment for sophomore year. If you can’t survive on your own you should not come to Cooper. There are no health services so if you need medical attention you have to go to the emergency room, not a big deal for some people and a very big deal for others. You must get all of your own food, once again this is a big problem for people who are used to their mom making their lunch. The Business office can be challenging at times since they don’t give you notice that you owe money until it is late and then you get a $100 late fee, they recently gave late fee notices to people who were not delinquent, they can be very rude as well. </p>

<h2>After saying all of that, I recommend Cooper highly. It’s challenging but if you’re willing to work hard you can get a lot out of it. You’ll definitely be more independent than you’re brethren at MIT and CMU. NYC is also a lot of fun. If you have any questions you can email me at <a href="mailto:evoke1080@hotmail.com">evoke1080@hotmail.com</a>. I’m a BE student, class of 2007, at Cooper Union with a concentration in biomedical engineering. </h2>

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<p>I am a sophomore EE at Cooper.</p>

<p>That first quotation is a load of whining. Looks like they couldn't handle Cooper.</p>

<p>The second one is much better (and though I don't recognize the e-mail, I definitely can narrow down to about five people the possible authors) - I wouldn't agree with everything, but it's pretty good. The part about putting up with a load of crap is right on - the administration is a load of crap. But knowledge is stuffed into your head rigorously.</p>

<p>The physics, though, is still a disaster. The specific senile lecturer/phsyics chair is gone, but his replacement is probably worse - while the first guy couldn't teach, the new guy also can't teach and is a jerk as well.</p>

<p>As for being laid back, as long as you make sure you are handling everything, it's probably better to be a bit laid back than to flip out about everything. I know one person who was not laid back until they had a minor breakdown, and now they have to take happy pills.</p>

<p>Tim</p>

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<p>Tim,</p>

<p>Thank you for your inputs.</p>

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<p>Thanks for all the input, it really helps.</p>

<p>Tim, do you have fun at Cooper? Are we wrong in thinking that fun rarely factors into the Cooper lifestyle?</p>

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<p>This week I had a sickening amount of work. This weekend and on other weeks I will have fun. That's pretty much how it is for me.</p>

<p>Tim</p>

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<p>really, can you all please shut the hell up? I'm going to be transferring into the cooper union and i'm really looking forward to it. The last thing I need is people criticizing cooper.</p>

<p>also, tim, maybe you could have made your arguments a little more supportive and convincing of the cooper? It just makes me so upset when i'm looking forward to this school and everyone trashes it. what's worse, people who go to the cooper union don't even come out and try to support it.</p>

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<p>Go and have a great experience......my friend tell me it is a great experience and he has NO, ZERO regrets.</p>

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<p>I thought I was being supportive...</p>

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<p>"Can a laid-back kid survive/thrive/enjoy Cooper Union or would he be eaten alive? "</p>

<p>I know I'm a little late to this post but if anyone in the future sees this, here is what I have to say.</p>

<p>Yes, a laid-back kid can survive Cooper Union rather easily if he knows <em>how</em>. I am an Electrical Engineer who graduated in 2003. About a quarter of my classmates were lazy slackers and all of them got passing grades with ease.
A lot of people say "Oh, Cooper Union is such a tough grind." The challenges that make the Engineering and Architecture schools very tough are present in any applied science school: Advanced mathematics, advance science, difficult to understand concepts, professors who are not competent at teaching at teaching these concepts, and demanding exams. In fact, I spoke to some engineering students from other schools. We compared exams and I found their exams to be consistently harder.
The two things that are unique to Cooper Union is the requirements of 135 credits for graduation (as opposed to 120 credits in most schools) and much more laboratory work. In freshman year, the electrical engineering students are already building clocks, calculators, and games out of electronic chips. By the time, we get to junior year, we were expected to build virtual curve tracers, audio amplifiers, and X10 receivers from scratch.
However, I went through most of my time in Cooper Union getting 8 hours of sleep a night. I noticed that the lazy slackers in my class knew how to do certain things that allowed them to stay on top of their workload: time management, setting their priorities, and not allowing the stress to get to them.</p>

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<p>Thanks!! </p>

<p>You've really made me feel better about applying ED. This year has been hell for me (18 hours a week at work + pres of 4 clubs + engineering magnet school = no sleep) and from the things I've read it made me think I'd have it even worse at Cooper. You've really made me more at ease. Thank you!</p>

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<p>I'm a senior at Cooper and I guess I should put in my input aswell... now that i'm at the end of this magnificent cooper journey...</p>

<p>Everybody who is planning or is about to attend Cooper would obviously want to hear how beautiful life is when u're here. but let this be your first invaluable lesson as you step out of your comfort zone and into college... look for reality and truth and base your decision on that rather than picking your college first and then trying to look for the lala land statements about the college that will keep you happy.</p>

<p>Reality: Cooper Union is tough... there is no denying that and nobody doubts it. But how tough is it? forget everything you've faced so far in High School... because in all honesty high school is pretty much a joke compared to a school like Cooper. and Yes, i'm talking about high schools with all the APs of the world... that you might have taken. Not all majors in Cooper are that hard... but the tough ones... namely EE and ChemE are going to keep you up many nights in a row. People who say ALL engineering colleges are equally tough... are just trying to make you feel better... I have a bunch of friends from high school who went to different colleges and when I compared my schedule with them or my courses with them I usually burst out laughing. As an example one of my friends who is also doing the same major told me how hard his class was in his school... I asked him what he was doing... (his junior year)... and it was the same stuff that we had done in cooper first semester of sophomore year. further evidence of the difference - one of my friends could not handle cooper and had to leave to go to another well known engineering school in nyc... He now has a 4.0 and still has more time than me to enjoy life. </p>

<p>i know a lot of people are going to blame me for being discouraging after they read my post... but i believe you need to know what it really is like rather than come here and realize that it was the wrong decision for you. I want you to also realize that I am not bashing cooper... I am simply presenting it to you... as it is.. or has been for the past 3.5 years. </p>

<p>the good part? Aside from the technical strength that you will hone here, once you come out of Cooper... you can do ANYTHING... there is no amount of stress or problems in life that will be too big of a challenge to you. I can guarantee it. your GPA might not be all the way up there but in knowledge and sharpness you can own any 4.0 student from the other schools. The worst that can happen once you make it through cooper is you apply to companies that think u're not smart enough based on yr gpa... so you start out slow... but in the next few years... I wont be surprised if you endup owning the company itself. </p>

<p>So yea... no regrets about going to Cooper what so ever... It pushes its students to their limit yes... but it is at this limit that you realize what you are truly capable of.
Good luck in your decisions...</p>

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<p>This is an old post but I felt compelled to put in my 2cents. I graduated from cooper ChE in 2007 and I too have no regrets. I agree with the above post that ultimately the school is very rewarding- you absolutely go through a lot of challenges, academic and ones having to do with a huge ego-crush, but when you get out, and are back in the real world, you realize that comparatively you know a hell of a lot and are much smarter and better equipped to handle things than other people with a similar background. </p>

<p>Cooper is also great in that it is tight-knit. Its tough on everyone there and it bonds the students because you don't really know what its like until you experience it. A lot of things are all student-run; students make things happen there. Its like a big family because you spend a lot of time together studying and learning and being pretty much stretched as far as you can go mentally and academically at times. But you grow from it and you learn to handle it and I think its worth it. </p>

<p>Now being in grad school I can say its not easy, but relatively, much easier than cooper undergrad because I went through 'the grind.' I work half as hard here and get better grades. But I guess that's another forum. Anyone want to chat or have qs email at <a href="mailto:antiquark7@gmail.com">antiquark7@gmail.com</a></p>

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<p>sprnkls - what grad do u go to?</p>

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<p>im an international student who is most likely to move to new york to attend cooper come fall 2010… but i have read terrible things about cooper… new york… on this website and others! that manhattan is so expensive you will have to take drastic measures to survive… living day to day hand to mouth… if you not at school you will be working in the early hours of the morning…that you dont sleep and can find yourself very sick and no with money for medical aid…</p>

<p>and cooper itself… that only the engineeing department is good (im going to do art and design) … that the students and the faculty are arrogant and full of crap… no one helps you… you fail at school and find yourslf jobless after four years of hell… that the no tuition thing is a joke cos you end up paying for all these ““other”” costs… that you have no social lfe…cant even go to the gym… and no friends either, jus classmates from cooper. that the school’s reputation has gone down the toilet…</p>

<p>wat the heck am i suppose to think? no one has anything good to say.so did i waste my time? have i jus sold my soul to the devil? where else am i gonna find a full scholarship even if i start looking for somewhere to transfer as soon as i get there…can an art and design student please answer me please!! this is ridiculous… and the other cooper people jus keep quiet and dont defend their own school!!! oh right… they dont have the TIME!!!</p>

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<p>The architecture and art programs are top notch and are considered among the best. Who told you they weren’t? The school’s reputation has not “gone down the toilet.” What makes you say that? Maybe it’s not well known among the general population, which is certainly true.</p>

<p>I think what you have to understand is people naturally like to complain. The grass is always greener on the other side. However, there’s some truth to some of these statements. </p>

<p>You will spend a lot of time working and studying… moreso than the average school. You need good time management skills. </p>

<p>New York City is an expensive place to live… one of the most expensive cities in the country. I remember seeing somewhere that the cost of living in NYC is 4 times that of Pittsburgh, PA. Then again, it’s also arguably one of the best cities in the country to live in (which makes it so expensive).</p>

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<p>So I’m a junior in High School, and I’d been considering CU for engineering…
I’m your average strong math/science person (Calculus BC, AP Chem, As in sci/math, passed the AMC, etc) So two questions… </p>

<ol>
<li><p>I really haven’t had any opportunities to try engineering.
From what I can see, once you’re in engineering, there really isn’t room to try other things. Does this mean I shouldn’t go if I’m not 100% sure that I love engineering?</p></li>
<li><p>If you’re GPA is like a 3.0 below, doesn’t this make it harder for you to go to grad school?</p></li>
<li><p>My parents told me straight out that I’ll have to pay my way to college. I’m a non citizen so a lot of the scholarships are out for me… How exactly expensive is CU?</p></li>
</ol>

<p>Thanks…</p>

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<ol>
<li><p>You don’t have to love engineering, but it is an engineering program so you’re going to need some combination of quantitative ability and work ethic to succeed. What you do with it is pretty flexible. I graduated in the late 90’s and since then several of my classmates have used that engineering background and gone on to careers in medicine, law and business. </p></li>
<li><p>A low GPA does make it more difficult, but from my experience most admissions departments are familiar with the Cooper Union and its rigorous grading. GPAs are lower than at most schools, but like I mentioned earlier, several of my classmates were still able to continue on at medical / law / business / graduate school.</p></li>
<li><p>Cooper Union is tuition free, but you still have to pay for books, lab fees, etc. I don’t know what they are these days, but I don’t think I spent more than $1,200 or $1,500 a year. Like many students, I was also a native New Yorker and lived with my parents during college, so that $1,200 a year was the total cost for me.</p></li>
</ol>