<p>I was wondering if anyone could speak to specific elements about the culture of some of the top mechanical engineering graduate programs, specifically: Stanford, MIT, Berkeley. For example, I know that Stanford as a whole is committed to promoting diversity and that MIT really values entrepreneurial spirit and creativity. I don't have the luxury of visiting all of my top choices pre-application, so I'd like to try and really get a feel for how good of a fit and how happy I would be before I get too far into the process.</p>
<p>Maybe different in engineering but it would be bizarre to have pre-applicants try to visit our grad program in advance. Given the low odds to acceptance, it is not a good use of anyone’s time. </p>
<p>So why not apply and if you get accepted, then worry about this? You can then either visit (in my field, well funded programs fly admitted or short listed students out), or at least talk one on one with current grad students and faculty, or more importantly, talk to faculty you are working with to get a word on the street account.</p>
<p>I agree with starbright [ who is a college prof] . Wait until you are invited to visit, which only happens after grad school admissions offices have reviewed your application and decide they want to meet you. You’ll have plenty of time to figure out where to go after receiving acceptances.</p>
<p>I’ve had reasons to be in the area at the times of my visits (relatives nearby, academic conferences, etc.) to the programs I was able. A thorough PhD application requires significant time investment (and $80-$125 per app is not light on the checkbook either), and the most successful applicants are, logically, those who know that they are applying to the right program for them culturally as well as academically. Given this, I am hoping to gain some insight from people who know more than I do so that I can commit my time wisely between PhD applications, fellowship applications, coursework, and thesis research.</p>
<p>When you applied to undergrad, there’s over 2000 colleges in the US to choose from. When you apply for PhD in MechE, there’s only about 100 programs. After you narrow down by ranking (with respect to your grades and experiences), compatible research interest, and location, you might find that you don’t have that many programs to choose from.</p>
<p>Culture is also dependent on your own perception, and what I see may not be the same thing you see. For example, having visited both MIT and Stanford, I didn’t get the impression that Stanford is particularly diverse, or that MIT is particularly creative (more so than its #1 rank would suggest). MIT does have a pretty good tech venture and startup culture, but not necessarily more so than Stanford, which can claim to have created silicon valley. When you ask about culture of colleges, you at least have a larger sample size of students/alumni, but graduate programs don’t have that luxury.</p>
<p>Cultural fit is important for your grad school experience, but you really have to go visit the schools during those admitted student weekends. You can see everything firsthand and then meet many of the faculty and current students, as well as your future classmates. As of now you should narrow down the schools by ranking, research fit, and location, which are much easier to find information about. If there’s still too many come back and ask about the culture of the specific schools on your list. After doing your first application and the NSF, completing another isn’t that time-intensive; every application is pretty much the same, and you’ll only have to slightly tailor the statement of purpose. Money, however, could be a consideration. Good luck.</p>
<p>Even within programs themselves you’ll see large differences with research groups. For example, about half of the groups in my program do group retreats, monthly bbqs, and things like that. My group has group meetings about once every three months and half the people in the lab don’t show up for lab cleanup.</p>
<p>For those who have mentioned it’s strange or flat out unwise to make visits to the campus/program before knowing if one has been accepted, this is straight from Berkeley’s graduate admissions suggestion guide (for all graduate admissions, not just mechanical engineering):</p>
<p>“If time permits, try to visit the campus before you apply in order to allow some of the faculty at that institution an opportunity to get to know you while also enabling you to learn more about that university.”</p>
<p>“If time permits, try to visit the campus before you apply in order to allow some of the faculty at that institution an opportunity to get to know you while also enabling you to learn more about that university.”
Dont assume that all grad programs/ professors operate the same way.
Berkeley is a public U. They may have different admissions protocols than private U’s.
Private U grad professors may not welcome a visit from someone who hasn’t even applied yet, so do some research and make inquiries before you go.</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s even a public v. private university difference. It varies from program to program, even within the same field. Some departments welcome pre-application contact, whether via email or in person, while others wish applicants would wait until after decisions have been made.</p>
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<p>There are many fields, particularly in humanities, where the number of applicants and the annual intake is tiny and this might be appropriate. This is NOT relevant to engineering. MIT and Berkeley EECS, for example, admit some 200 out of 3,000 applicants. They cannot possibly bother with such things.</p>
<p>In fact, you’ll have a tough time getting even email responses from Stanford/Berkeley/MIT engineering professors prior to admission. In EE, all three make decisions using committees that can and do reject applicants even if a particular professor there wants them and has notified the committee of this. I doubt ME is different so it’s not even useful to attempt to contact them. Mention profs you want to work with on the SoP. Anything more is useless.</p>
<p>Also, it seems you’ve already convinced yourself that you’re going to attend one of these three. I suggest that you don’t get attached to them. The most common outcome by far is to get rejected from all three. Their selectivity is well into the territory where admissions seem random because they’re saturated by highly qualified applicants.</p>
<p>There seem to be a lot of strong but misguided opinions floating around here. I’ve already gotten multiple responses from faculty at all three institutions who have expressed interest in my research background. I’m applying to at least 5 programs, and the reason I’m asking about these three in particular is that these are the ones I have not been able to visit during session. I was able to walk around the Stanford campus at one point, but it was during a break.</p>
<p>^^And that is why I said-
Dont assume that all grad programs/ professors operate the same way.
Private U grad professors MAY not welcome a visit from someone who hasn’t even applied yet, so do some research and make inquiries before you go.
That doesn’t mean the same as WILL not.
You want a one size fit all answer? there is none. It totally depends on the program, your qualifications, who may have made a call to a colleague at another university about you, etc, etc. …</p>
<p>Let’s reset the conversation here. These are the facts:
- I am currently a graduate student in a top-10 ME program
- I have entrance statistics in the range of admissible students to top programs
- I am not naive and am well aware of the difficulty of getting in to these schools
- I did not ask for anything related to my chances of getting in, the willingness of professors to correspond with me, or the usefulness of visiting a campus pre-application
- I DID ask for people’s impressions of the general culture and attitude present at these schools, and if possible, in their graduate ME programs</p>
<p>Now it appears that no one responding here has seen a question like the one I asked, but that does not mean that I want an answer to a different question that HAS been asked before. Regardless of whether or not anyone else feels that the reasons for my asking of this question are important, I feel that they are, and I am only looking for answers to that question here. If you feel that it is a waste of your time to answer it, then please don’t answer it.</p>
<p>I’d like to try and really get a feel for how good of a fit and how happy I would be </p>
<p>that is TOTALLY a function of who you would be working for and what kind of an advisor/ ass hole he/she is [ no one here knows that] what your personality is like[ no one here knows that] what the other grad students are like [ no one here knows that]</p>
<p>get the picture? When YOU have choices to make, that is the best time to get a feel for all of the subtle factors that will determine whether YOU would be happy there. </p>
<p>a grad school program can be a miserable experience or a terrific one, depending on the PEOPLE involved.</p>
<p>I did not ask for anyone to formulate a response to my question based on a psychiatric evaluation of my personality, nor of a potential adviser. I would suggest answering someone’s question as it is asked instead of reading too far into it and making judgments about the person’s intentions. Get the picture?</p>
<p>I suggest you visit the grad school forums
[Graduate</a> School Admission, Advice, Discussions, Help and Information - The GradCafe Forums](<a href=“http://forum.thegradcafe.com/]Graduate”>http://forum.thegradcafe.com/)</p>
<p>Thank you!</p>
<p>Your question has already been answered:</p>
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<p>Perhaps not “totally”, but this factor overwhelms any contribution from the “general culture”. As menloparkmom said, you need to be in a situation in which you actually know what your choices actually are so that you can visit the profs. Visit days for admitted students (usually with transportation costs subsidized) exist for a reason. What good does a random visit do? Google can show you what the campus looks like just fine.</p>
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That’s often a good indication that your question was garbage. Don’t get butt-hurt over it.</p>
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They’re extra harsh on people who are already in a high-ranked program and want to “move up”. 
There’s always a lot of those every year. Of course, everyone always claims it’s for research-related reasons but the true motivations are transparent.</p>
<p>No, my question has not been answered. I asked for people’s impressions of the different communities and attitudes present at these campuses. The issues in the thread were two-fold: 1) I said that I was looking to determine how good a fit they may be for me and made the mistake of assuming that people would notice that this was a statement and an indication of how I would interpret the responses (my actual request was clearly stated in the first sentence), and 2) that I asked an atypical question that required some more thought than just returning at face value.</p>
<p>I’ve had this problem before when I ask atypical questions on forums, and before you go back to the question=garbage deduction, at some point several people have always responded with something akin to: “Oh my god, I can’t believe these [people] can’t figure out what you’re asking. Here is my answer to what you’re looking for: …”</p>
<p>I find that posters with the most seniority (most posts) often provide the least useful answers on forums, because typically they amount to serial forum trawlers, and don’t take the time to actually read the request as it’s originally written since they’re accustomed to darting back and forth between threads putting in their two cents.</p>
<p>Interesting suggestion about the “moving up” approach. While it’s true that I would like to “move up,” there are a lot of other factors involved, including research (as you said), industry connections (my current school is very good in the field but there is no industry to support it within 1000 miles, so I will need to move eventually), and the fact that I will have completed my undergrad and Master’s degrees at the same institution (inbreeding discouraged in research and academic roles), among others. I’ll need to make sure that those things ring out in my personal statement.</p>
<p>You didn’t really define what you mean by “culture,” so it’s hard for us to answer the question when we don’t know what you’re looking for. Are you looking for which schools have the most friendly people? Good interaction between faculty and students? Whether program is more focused on academics vs. industry? Whether research is more basic or applied? How rigid is department bureaucracy? Interesting ethnic/cultural events in and around campus? Whether grad students and undergrads hang out? These could all be categorized under “culture,” but we don’t really know what you want us to talk about. We also don’t know if our replies will be helpful to you; thus, we are less likely to answer your question properly.</p>
<p>In the absence of specific questions about culture, the other posters have targeted the one specific aspect of your original post (visiting schools before applying). That’s a very specific point in your original post and something they could comment on, even if it wasn’t your primary concern.</p>
<p>Something else you can do is start emailing some of the grad students at the schools. Again, you should have some specific questions, but include something along the lines of “please let me know if there’s anything else interesting about the culture at your school.” I emailed a student at Berkeley prior to applying who was super helpful. I started the conversation about interdepartmental collaboration on my research topic, specifically about whether students from different departments are allowed to work in the same lab and if there’s any student organizations that promote collaboration and outreach of that research.</p>