<p>I'm an undegrad civil major graduating in May 2012. Right now I'm torn between concentrating in transportation engineering or structural engineering. Eventually I want to go to grad school studying either one of these two fields. I want to work for a while after undergrad to see which I like the most. So my question is in undergrad should I specialize in one concentration or try to rake up as many classes in both? Do graduate schools like you focusing on only one concentration or do they not mind seeing if you took classes in mutliple concentrations? What about employers? Do they want you only taking classes in one concentration or is it okay if you took some classes from each discipline?</p>
<p>Bump…</p>
<p>See this thread: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/engineering-majors/1128519-how-much-does-your-civil-engineering-specialization-matter.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/engineering-majors/1128519-how-much-does-your-civil-engineering-specialization-matter.html</a></p>
<p>In my opinion, you need to decide which field you want to go into. I’ve explained my thinking in the thread above. If I were hiring someone for our structural engineering company, I would want to see as many structural classes as possible. The transportation classes would be a negative for me.</p>
<p>A few years ago I asked former coworker of mine (who is a partner at an engineering consulting firm) a similar question. He told me that his company has a difficult time finding enough transportation engineers to keep up with the contracts they get, and that at times they have had to turn down work for lack of transportation engineers. Much of the infrastructure and light rail work that the Federal government is spending money for are for transportation projects.</p>
<p>I used to work for a traffic engineering firm in 2006-2007 when the economy was still good. After I left for a different job, the economy tanked and everyone suffered, or so it seemed. Since that time, the company has expanded from 3 offices to 9 offices across the country and appears to be doing quite well.</p>