Choosing an affordable engineering school - Ohio

College Majors Engineering Majors
1

Many thanks to this forum. I am enjoying reading the information you all are sharing. It has been very helpful.

My son is beginning his senior year in high school. He is interested in engineering but doesn’t know which type yet. He has a 34 on the ACT (36 Math, 33 Science, 34 Reading, 32 Writing). He has a 3.9 unweighted/4.55 weighted GPA and is in the top 3% of his class. He will have completed 7 AP classes by graduation.

Although I think his stats could put him in the running for some prestigious schools, the price tag that goes along with them is not in our budget. We can pay around $20,000 per year, and will not take out any debt. We generally don’t qualify for much, if any, need-based aid.

We feel fortunate to have some good state options. We like the engineering programs at Ohio State University, as well as at the University of Cincinnati. Both have a good co-op program and seem to have a solid reputation (at least locally) for engineering. They both cost around $20,000 per year, but he should be eligible for at least $6,000 in scholarship money - hopefully more. He has other options available to him for free tuition or a free ride at schools like Wright-State in Dayton, Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and University of Alabama. Their engineering programs appear to be ABET accredited.

My question is - if he’s not attending an Ivy, or one of the really prestigious engineering schools, how important is it regarding WHICH state school he attends? Will he be at a disadvantage when it comes to getting a job if he went to a school that is not in the top 100 for engineering? If he went to a school where he gets free tuition, he would be able to use his college money toward grad school.

Any suggestions for private schools that have a good reputation for engineering AND give significant merit aid? I have seen schools that are $60K+ per year and will offer $20K in grants/scholarships, but those still remain over our budget.

Any suggestions for state schools that have a good reputation for engineering AND offer scholarships down to in-state rates?

He would prefer a tech type school over a liberal arts college.

Thanks so much.

2

First, let’s dispel the Ivy myth. Except for Cornell, they aren’t very good for engineering. So skipping the Ivy debt will cause him no harm at all.

Where a person wants to work after graduation has just as much impact on his/her job prospects as where they go to school. For instance, if he knows he wants to stay in Ohio, he’ll have lots more options at the job fairs at the state schools than he will at the job fairs at MIT or Stanford.

I don’t know much about Alabama, but those on CC whose kids have taken advantage of the deal tend to rave about it.

If it were me, I think I’d opt for Miami. The college of engineering does not have a doctorate program. That means their primary focus is on undergraduate teaching, not doctoral research. They also have a highly regarded honors program. Lastly, it’s a pretty campus.

3

Thank you for your response. My major concern about Miami is that they don’t do co-ops. Maybe I have been brainwashed into thinking co-ops are more important than they are?

4

Miami does have internship opportunities. I think there are pluses and minuses to each method of getting experience.

5

This may quell your fears. There are similar pages for each department.

http://miamioh.edu/cec/academics/departments/mme/get-engaged/intern-career/index.html

6

My son has similar stats and had opportunities at Purdue, Ga. Tech, and others but at a high price. We visited Miami and he loved it and got some decent money. We feel good with the Miami decision. They have a beautiful campus and town and nice facilities and professors who teach (vs grad assistants). They are generous with AP crediting. They emphasize that everyone gets a liberal education which we like. Might be worth a tour to see if it works for your son.

7

Unless there is a specific geographic reason for choosing a school, the most important thing is to be at an ABET accredited program. Miami is perfectly fine as are Wright State, Cincinnati and OSU. While not all programs require co-op, most of them have co-op opportunities.

You should also look into the [url="<a href=“http://theaitu.org%22%5DAITU%5B/url”>http://theaitu.org"]AITU[/url] schools. They are all tech schools and a number of them give very substantial merit aid. One of them might fit your student best.

8

Have you looked at the lists of colleges linked from here?

http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1678964-links-to-popular-threads-on-scholarships-and-lower-cost-colleges.html

Among the automatic full tuition or better scholarship schools listed at:

http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/

the following that he qualifies for have engineering:

Alabama - Tuscaloosa
Alabama - Huntsville
Tuskegee
Howard
Florida A&M
Louisiana Tech
Mississippi
Temple
Prairie View A&M
Utah State

9

Miami’s engineering program is VERY limited. I would encourage a very close look at their facilities compared to others in the state. Check out Case Western. Your son has the stats and they are known for decent merit. Good luck to your DS!

10

@Cheeringsection - I’m curious why you consider it VERY limited.

I’d take for myself and recommend to my kids a New Mexico Tech or a Rose Hulman for undergraduate work nearly every time over a university that focuses on graduate level research. For graduate school maybe I’d agree, but a BS EE that’s ABET is a pretty standard thing. Getting a good dose of liberal arts along the way is a very good thing, IMO.

11

Have you looked at Toledo?

In full disclosure I graduated from Miami a tidy few decades ago, before they had an engineering school. Have been working as an engineer (embedded systems, on-vehicle computers mostly) since the mid nineties. IMO, no, it doesn’t matter a whole lot where one goes for an undergrad.

12

With $20k per year budget, there is not many OOS choices for good engineering schools compared to the in state options.

13

There was a time when I would have agreed with 50N40W comments. I have a couple of examples why I no longer agree that it does not matter what school where one goes for an undergrad degree.

Ten years ago, my company used to recruit graduates from a wide range of schools including top tier, HCBUs, and programs that most people are not familiar with. However, recently we are only hiring for internships and full time employment at schools such as Purdue, Wisconsin, Michigan, Rose Hulman, VA Tech and Cal. There are schools within an two hour drive of my company that we are not offering such opportunities. Some of my co-workers kids graduated from some of our local schools with engineering degrees (ME/EE) and have not found jobs even with solid GPAs.

Due in part to the above, our family decided to send our son to Cornell. Some of my co-workers thought we were crazy to send our son to Cornell because they thought the cost would be prohibitive. They also do not believe it matters what undergrad your degree is from. The COA in our case was less than most public schools (scholarships included) and he was able to graduate debt free. He received offers from several companies all of the country. Some of the companies that recruited him told him that they were only recruiting grads from top tier schools.

He still receives unsolicited job opportunities based on his Linken page.

14

Ohio State is by far the best school on your list for engineering. At $20K it is a great value. The 2nd tier Ohio schools and say Alabama should be seriously discounted to be considered, unless OSU is a poor fit for other reasons like size.

Your son is a smart kid, so depending on his interests and learning styles, he may or may not do well or enjoy going to a second tier school. Also opportunities for undergraduate research would be higher at a school like Ohio State or Case or Alabama than some of the smaller schools. Some of the decision could also be based on his particular field of engineering and how well the particular school matches his interest. Class sizes may be smaller at some schools, although most of your options did not have a low student to faculty ratio. Alabama or OSU may have honors programs that are appealing to him.

Also, some engineers are really focused on STEM in undergraduate and some look for broader liberal arts offerings. Since your son is smart, has AP credit, he should also consider whether he wants to do research, study business, or study liberal arts outside of his engineering requirements.

Case will realistically cost 32-37K depending on how good a scholarship he gets. 30K is pretty much the limit of merit scholarships.

Cost is always relative to what you can really afford, what you would like to spend, if you think your child has grad school or other expenses ahead of them and finally - if there is financial aid, how much (that tends to level the playing field and also make some high end schools more affordable without merit).

OSU for sure, with some other appealing backups as safety or as reaches, either by being cheaper or by being more appealing in some other way.

And yes, in fields or companies, with limited opportunities, high performers from higher ranked schools will be more likely to be selected for the better opportunities. why not ? Now in a boom field like EE or CS, there may be plenty of high paying and rewarding jobs with any ABET degree.

15

Proud, my daughter’s best friend in middle school went to Cornell and didn’t have many opportunities for internship nor job after college. She finally landed a job at a startup, it took her almost 8-9 months, put in two years of hard work at this startup and now, just now, finally landed a job at Google. She is also in Silicon Valley, where there are tons of hiring activities. So it depends on the company and the kid as always.

16

@50N40W it is my understanding that all Miami has is materials engineering specifically geared towards paper. Great school, just not really an engineering one.

17

DrGoogle, My son’s ChemE class had a total of 98 graduates. All of whom either went to grad school or went straight into industry. All of his classmates had opportunities before they graduated regardless of GPA.
From time to time, due to the economy some students will have issues seeking employment but not with my son’s class. His friends from other disciplines also had no issues seeking employment.

18

Thank you all for your comments. I’m trying to maximize his opportunities for scholarship money, while ensuring that he goes to a school that will prepare him well to be an engineer. At this point I’m terrified to make a huge mistake, so I appreciate everyone’s feedback.

19

I bet if you look, you’ll find 95-96% of engineering grads are employed or in grad school within 6 months of graduation. We visited a LAC that graduates a half dozen CS students every year. One of them went to Google, a bright data point on any school’s recruiting sheet.

Contact OSU, Toledo, UC, Miami. Visit a couple of them. Get real data on how their grads are doing. Use that rather than web noise to advise your son.

20

One thing to consider is co-oping. It can go a way in financing an education. With his stats you can consider applying to some OOS schools. University of Pittsburgh has been known for good scholarships for those with ACT scores over 33. They particularly are concerned with the math and English scores. Purdue has scholarships that are merit based. Instate U of Cincinnati and U of Toledo have mandatory co-op programs. If you are interested in ChemE U of Akron has an excellent program. Ohio U. now has an engineering program in their Honors Tutorial College which is a unique program. They also seem to be giving good scholarships for engineering. Others have mentioned Case. They do offer good merit scholarships and depending on your need they might be affordable. tOSU is a good school, however, anecdotally, I’ve heard that to co-op, do research or any other opportunities you must be seek them out. OSU does not proactively promote opportunities to their students. My D goes to Purdue and they have a very active office of professional practice and a very large engineering career fair both in the fall and spring. Her friends who attend OSU haven’t heard of anything similar. Good luck.