<p>CA incoming senior</p>
<p>3.8 UW [4.1 W]
2010 SAT I [690 CR, 720 M, 600 W]
[2000 first try, 670, 680, 650]
720 SAT II both Math 2 and Chemistry
4s in AP Calc AB, AP Enviro, AP Chemistry
Class rank top 10% or better [Not sure] out of 500</p>
<p>Senior schedule:
AP Stats
AP Spanish
AP Microeconomics
AP Calc BC
AP Physics
Orchestra
Bible as Literature</p>
<p>Civil Engineering Major with concentration in structure. No intended change</p>
<p>Cal Poly SLO
Cal Poly Pomona
Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology
Bucknell University</p>
<p>Odd looking choices, I know. SLO is my number one choice, although I would really like to attend a small private school. Any other good engineering schools, such as University of Michigan or University of Illinois, can be considered although public school fees for out of state students are not worth it when the Cal Polys are in my state. </p>
<p>Any advice? I am retaking my SATS again one more time in October.</p>
<p>why not shoot for the UCs? I worked wih structural engineers in the past. Cal Poly-SLO folks never impressed me. The school is looked upon as a workshop/practical school by some in the field where they teach you to do the problems only, with minimal emphasis on the theory.</p>
<p>Seeing as I would like to work in the field, practicality places ahead of theory. Also, my parents don’t approve of UCs (father takes interns from UCLA and they “know very little that’s practical”)
so I have no intentions of going to UCs when the calpolys are better deals</p>
<p>That is a shame. If you want, you could probably apply to Industrial or some other backdoor easier engineering program and switch to civil for CalPoly. The issue is the other schools on your list are less practical (even CalPoly Pomona if you can believe it). I am a firm supporter of theory. It will allow you to think outside of the box and come up with creative solutions when you have complex problems/architecture. I can’t tell you how many dozens of SLO students I had to tutor at grad school. They were similar. Give them a problem that was slightly different from the book, and they would have no idea. Granted not all of them were like this, I came to realize the professors at SLO crank out sweatshop engineers who can do repetitive design problems fast.
If you like the routine with limited prospects in the current economy(structural engineering is a ridiculously bad field right now) then by all means, choose SLO.</p>