College GPA doesn't matter?

<p>Lets not read too much into my comment. I wasn’t comparing the #12 school to the #15 school. </p>

<p>The fact of the matter is that there are some schools that just don’t pull in as many recruiters as other schools - think 3rd or 4th tier schools. If you go to one of those schools, you need to be one of the top students because there just won’t be that many options out there. Most students will need to look beyond campus recruiting to places like Monster.com and company websites. That’s an entirely different ballgame than campus recruiting and you have to be stellar to get noticed.</p>

<p>@Ari7: Being a female can sometimes help. Since there aren’t very many women in engineering some companies may seek you out in a quest to increase “diversity”. I’ve seen it happen. I don’t think it will hurt you, I think it can only help.</p>

<p>And I agree with all of the above, after your first job no one cares what your GPA was. I just interviewed a group of new college grads, or soon to be. I looked at their GPA’s as an afterthought. Much more important to me was their experience, attitude, and what they can do for me on the job. We don’t have an official cut-off, all happen to be above 3.0 so I didn’t have any concerns. If I liked someone, and their GPA was below 3.0 I’d want to find out why. If they had good reasons for bad/medicocre grades, and could show some good grades in some key classes, I probably would still consider them. A medicore GPA does not ensure they will be a bad engineer. Just the opposite could be true, they’d have to be able to prove it in the interview process somehow.</p>

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<p>Could you name some of those 3rd and 4th tier schools? We know about MIT, Stanford, and the like. What tier would you consider these popular engineering schools, and why:</p>

<p>Georgia Tech
Purdue
RPI
RIT
Lehigh
Bucknell
Carnegie Mellon
Northeastern
WPI
Stevens</p>

<p>I’m also intrigued by Yale. Not traditionally known for engineering, but they have been devoting major resources to bring that up. They have spent one billion dollars (!) on new facilities and faculty to bring their engineering up to their overall reputation. Engineering has a 1-1 student/faculty ratio. Between that and their massive resources, the learning is hands on and its very easy to get in on research. Overall recruiting and networking is stellar (you know, it’s Yale), but what is your opinion as far as engineering?</p>

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<p>Just off the top of my head</p>

<p>University of Idaho
Lamar
University of Detroit
UTEP
University of Alabama
Texas A&M Corpus Christi</p>

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<p>Seriously? You have to ask about Georgia Tech, Purdue, and CMU? They’re all very top schools. </p>

<p>All of those schools you listed are first or second tier.</p>

<p>Some of you guys who get so worked up over the “tier system” is just silly. If people would just stop worrying so much, I bet their lives would be much more enjoyable (says the guy beating himself up over impending qualifying exams, haha).</p>

<p>^it’s not so much a question of tiers. It’s more about knowing whether your safeties are worth it. If a kid is reaching for MIT, and is a match for Carnegie, will he be wasting his time and money if he goes to his safety (where he will be a top dog, honors, merit aid, etc.)?</p>

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<p>Heh heh. I think all the “tier talk” on this board is for some of the “early achievers” chance to honk their horn. In a way, I can understand it because outside of that very small set of folks who make it into high-finance or the so-called higher level consulting, some of the engineering areas, ESPECIALLY computer science really don’t reward the historically high academic achievers when you look at it relatively.</p>

<p>In the CS arena, a fresh grad still gets placed with other fresh grads from all schools of all types of reputations. Chances are your boss is from the Univ of Colorado and us older engineers (yeah, I am guilty) is still going to tell that fresh grad “to go sit down until I give you something to test”…as an initial assignment or something.</p>

<p>…could care less if she/he was honors at CMU.</p>

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<p>That is the other thing I never have understood. The veneration of management consulting and financial positions attained by engineers just astounds me at times. It seems more rampant here than in the general engineering population. Sure they make tons of money, but I guess maybe I am just one of the few who values other things. Honestly, I wouldn’t want that job.</p>

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<p>Even the asking of that questions is ridiculous given all the other answers you have been given of late. It has been said time and again that you can get a perfectly wonderful education at schools not named MIT.</p>

<p>The question of the interplay of prestige, GPA, honors, etc. is a complex one when it comes to jobs, but in almost every situation, somewhere like MIT will not give you as huge of an advantage as some might think. Just take a deep breath, relax, and go where you feel most comfortable, because in the end, you will perform better in a place you feel at home than at a higher ranked school where you struggle to find your comfort zone, and employers will be more impressed by a confident, competent, socially-adept candidate than a brilliant but reclusive and unconfident candidate at least 90% of the time.</p>

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<p>This is some of the best advice I’ve seen. All this talk of school rankings and tiers is just rediculous. Engineers are practicle people, it’s all about functionality. Can you do the job or not. We don’t care what brand or label is slapped on the outside of your product (you), we care what you are able to do. The school you attended has very little to do with the caliber of engineer you will become. Stop worrying about school rankings and go to a place that feels right for you.</p>

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<p>It makes sense to me. After 10 years in engineering, you’ll probably be at just over $100,000. At 10 years in consulting or banking, you’ll probably be a partner at $500,000 and your job is guaranteed with a high six or seven figure buyout. In addition, management consultants and bankers work with bigger “levers” so they can make (and lose) very large sums of money for companies. As a production engineer, a $1 million cost saving process is a big deal even in a Fortune 100 manufacturer. As a management consultant, you routinely work on $30 to $100 million projects every week. Also there’s faster mobility. If you go into finance, you can sit on a board of directors before age 30. You’ll routinely rub elbows with and present to c-level executives. As an engineer, you’ll probably never get to that level.</p>

<p>That said, it’s a totally different life style, much more cut throat, and not for everyone. But I certainly see the appeal.</p>

<p>I guess I just don’t see why many people on these boards feel like that should be the ultimate goal of any engineering student. For me and many, many people I know, that kind of job and life have no appeal to us. In fact, in my eyes, the only positive to that is the money, because I certainly wouldn’t want to deal with the associated ramifications on my personal life.</p>

<p>There are people who thrive in those jobs and with those lives, and that is all well and good. However, it just annoys me that there are people on these boards who act like that should be the goal of the every engineering student. It is clearly a job that is only for a select few, and I don’t mean only the select few with the elite stats, but the select few with the personality and goals to match what is required of those jobs. For the rest of us, I bet we could by quite comfortably with $100k plus a spouse’s salary and would be much more free to have a family life that isn’t dictated 150% by work.</p>

<p>In short, management consulting and investment banking are by no means bad careers, and a great choice for some. However, they are by no means at the apex of engineering careers in a general sense. There are many people who A) want to actually be engineers and/or B) have other priorities that would actually make those jobs less desirable than others.</p>

<p>I agree.</p>

<p>There are things that I like about my job and one thing my job is done once I leave work. It’s even better since doing INTEL/cleared work because you cannot take work home. I know very business-minded folks who make more money than me but good grief, they are basically networking than thinking business 24/7. Me?..I want to be able to lounge around all of a fall Saturday and watch college football games…even watch Lee Corso put on the mascot suit until post-post-post-game show.</p>

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<p>You could turn it around and ask the opposite: why do people feel that plant engineering or software design or defense, etc. should be the ultimate goal? Banking and consulting are just two options for careers that are very, very in demand (less than 1% hire rate) and that only accept the best students. So it makes sense that some people would consider them to be highly desirable goals. </p>

<p>Of course, it’s an individual decision and every person’s opinion will differ. But that doesn’t mean that one position (either pro-banking or pro-traditional engineering) is better than another.</p>

<p>But that is exactly my point. It is highly personal, yet personally I feel like there are a disproportionate number of people on here with the view that traditional engineering jobs are practically deplorable compared to ibanking or consulting.</p>

<p>IB and related careers have a very high competition, very high turnover and burnout, and there is a low probability of ever making 500K or more. The opportunity costs are extraordinary and the choice to go into this career field is a high risk-high reward one. You must have a strong salesman personality and have a natural penchant for communication, PR, and human interaction.</p>

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<p>I don’t see that. There are some people that hold it up as their ultimately goal and there are others that hold up traditional engineering as their goal. Insisting that one (traditional engineering) is better than the other (banking) is just as logically flawed as the opposite.</p>

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<p>Actually the odds are pretty good. Typically around 25% or so. And those that burn out aren’t homeless - they re-enter industry at very high levels.</p>

<p>One could make logically consistent arguments for either one, engineering or banking. In reality, it should come down to personal values, personality, natural interests, and personal ethics. I don’t really plan on pursuing a career in either one, so I am not really biased in that regard. However, I have a general dislike for professional bankers and those who make the creation, transfer, and distribution of wealth their sole priority in life. The only banking field I would consider would probably be venture capital because you can actually make some significant contributions to society through that channel.</p>

<p>Question, guys:
When we talk about GPA and when employers talk about wanting a 3.0+ GPA, do they usually mean engineering major GPA, or the overall GPA of everything you’ve taken?</p>

<p>Usually people ask about overall GPA, since that’s what goes on the transcript and is verifiable. At the end of the day, it’s about having some criteria that an HR rep who knows nothing about engineering can check. Most colleges do not post your major GPA on your transcript (though a few do).</p>

<p>edit: also Major GPA isn’t so cut and dry. Does Chemistry count for a Chemical Engineering major? What about Math and Physics? Do engineering electives count? What about a technical writing class or an engineering economics class taught by a major school but not strictly related to the major? How about independent study or a research course? Overall GPA is much more absolute. It’s the number on the transcript.</p>

<p>My transcript showed overall and engineering GPA. I think I listed both on my first resume.</p>