I really couldn’t disagree with you more. Tinkering can be fun and nice but it is also wholly irrelevant to most engineering tracks.
I agree that the tinkering factor can be helpful… IF it is addition to all the required academic accomplishments. There are all sorts of engineering jobs out there, but getting the degree requires surviving the coursework.
@FarmerMom I would encourage your daughter to look at some of the Jesuit school options as well as other schools with a strong liberal arts focus but with credibly good engineering programs. These could give her time to figure out what she wants without narrowing her options which would occur if she goes to an engineering school. Jesuit schools, in particular, have a strong reputation for teaching to the whole person, many of which have very reputable technical programs as well. Santa Clara, Marquette, LMU come to mind. Purdue could also be a good option. Agree with others that Technical programs require a huge commitment straight out of the gate. S is in his first year at WPI and what @retiredfarmer says is quite true. He is absolutely drinking from the firehose, and the level of the classes is quite different from the AP classes from high school, although this may have more to do with fitting a full semester of capability into a 7 week term.
@boneh3ad ,@ KLSD:
It is possible that we do not have a common use of the term “tinkering” here.
Were Einstein’s thought experiments tinkering? If I take appart my broken wall clock to see if I can determine what is wrong, is that tinkering?
Would an automotive engineer’s college project experiments to design a more efficient combustion engine qualify as “tinkering?” It was “hands on.” See story @ https://www.wpi.edu/news/turbocharged-one-mans-mission-save-mustang.
Many decades ago there was a hard discussion about the pros and cons of mechanical aptitude and its role in engineering education. The geometric growth of theory and its application to industry had forced a competition for instuction time between theory, drafting, and shop. We could not do it all in four years. MIT dropped drafting and others followed. WPI got out of the business (a profitable one) of students building hydraulic elevators (the company evolved into Otis Elevator). Faculty and students needed more time for theory.
Many people still imagine that mechanical aptitude is at the heart of engineering, e.g., fixing the clock.
Much discussion on project application centers on the real world process of defining carefully a stated problem so that relevant information may be sorted out, possible approaches identified, defined and tested by a reliable procedure to reach an applicable solution. There may be more than one solution to the problem. What now?
Project education is not defined solely by the use of machinery to make something. Projects are a vehicle to put the student through the practical exercise of finding out what the entire design exercise is really about. Repetition of classroom problems and solutions are not the same as actually riding your own horse. Believe me, I’ve tried it and have fallen off a sixteen-hand jumper after having completed all the verbal instruction. My US Army “airborne” Ranger neighbor has assured me he had a similar experience learning how to jump!
I apologize for my verbosity!
:bz
Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX has an engineering program but plenty of great opportunities to explore other careers if she decides to take a different path. The required university curriculum allows them to explore with classes outside of the engineering school. The engineering program is large enough to have nice new facilities but classes are small and students have lots of resources. Guessing you might be Catholic (we are) and there are more Catholics than Methodists at SMU and an active campus ministry for those looking for that. Gorgeous campus near downtown Dallas (but safely insulated by Highland and University Parks), plenty of opportunity for internships, etc. in Dallas. If my daughter didn’t end up at SMU, she would have attended University of Dayton for engineering.