I understand. Maybe Barnard is a much better fit for you, I don’t know?. I am personally biased towards LACs but in your particular situation it is hard to make a case for Barnard even if you were to be accepted.
In regards to this point, although I don’t agree completely with William Deresiewicz you might find his article helpful (his book is good too):
Another good source is Frank Bruni:
https://www.amazon.com/Where-You-Not-Who-Youll/dp/1455532681
Edit:
This is a good running thread on what to expect at OSU engineering.
In my personal opinion, the weed-out courses I can ever think off are:
Mechanical Engineering (Engineering Statics, Engineering Dynamics, Mechanics of Solids, Thermodynamics 1, Fluid Mechanics, Heat Transfer, Mae 376 Applied Math)
Civil Engineering (Structural Analysis 1 and 2, Soil Mechanics)
Electrical Engineering (Circuit Analysis I, Physics 2 Electromagnetism, Physics 3, and Intermediate Mechanics)
Engineering and Math Core Classes (Linear Algebra 1, Diff Eq, Discrete Math, and Partial Diff Eq)
Chemical Engineering (Physical Chem 1 and 2)
Premed, and Bioengineering (Evolutionary Biology, Organic Chem 1 and 2, Biochem)
Physics (Quantum Mechanics 1 and 2)
Computer Science (CS 1 and 2, Data Structures, CSE 220 Systems Programming)
For my experience I had more difficult time with Statics, and CS 1 and 2 classes, especially my CS professor was not that great. Please feel free to share which class was hardest, and weed-out class in your universities. I am currently taking Diff eq, Lin…