<p>Could you please help compare engineering schools in the Midwest:
Carnegie Mellon
University of Michigan
Purdue
University of Illinois</p>
<p>Thanks in advance!</p>
<p>Can you afford them? Try their net price calculators.</p>
<p>Can you get admitted to them?</p>
<p>In general they are all very good. As important for future engineers they are all highly regarded by international companies recruiting for interns and for entry-level positions.</p>
<p>There may be gradations in rankings based on engineering disciplines – e.g. computer science, chemical, etc. You may want to let the forum know which engineering field interests you.</p>
<p>I am interested in Mechanical / Aerospace Engineering. Out of these 4, CMU does not offer Aerospace.</p>
<p>I guess my question is to help compare “look and feel”, not just rankings. I can look up rankings by myself.</p>
<p>University of Michigan
Purdue
University of Illinois</p>
<p>these are big state schools. All these types of schools typically have good eng’g. Are you instate for any of them? If not, will your parents pay the OOS costs? If not, choose an affordable school.</p>
<p>On affordability of an Out-of-State school.</p>
<p>The difference between in- and out-of-state tuition is typically about $10-12K / year (U Mich is notable exception). That gives me $40-50K difference over 4 year undergrad. </p>
<p>Given that my homestate school has a dismal ranking of about 90, paying $40-50K extra for a school that ranks below 20 or even 10 seems like a decent tardeoff. I hope to recover this difference within 2-3 years of graduation in salary difference.</p>
<p>Am I right in these calculations?</p>
<p>Forget rankings!!!</p>
<p>Your first criteria should be ABET accredidation. Secondly, you need to find out what employers think of your state flagship engineering college. See who comes to campus to recruit; small local companies and regional government agencies…or large and midsize firms with national operations? How many alumni of your state flagship pursue advanced degrees in engineering? All that is good information to know.</p>
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<p>What is your homestate school?</p>
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<p>Depends on location. Here in California, the in-state/out-of-state difference is generally around 20-25k/yr (or ~100k over 4 years). That’s a big difference.</p>
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<p>Assuming the engineering program is accredited by ABET, and is relatively strong in mechanical/aerospace engineering, it might not be worth the extra cost to go to a higher nationally ranked school. National rankings correlate poorly with engineering strength, especially when looking in to the sub-disciplines. (e.g. a school strong in Civil Engineering may have a terrible Aerospace program, etc., even though the school may have a high national ranking).</p>
<p>Ignore the national rankings. As far as engineering is concerned, it is important to go to a school that has strengths in your field of interest. Once you’ve come up with a list of schools meeting that requirement, you then select based on personal preferences (i.e. location, weather, campus aesthetics/vibe, city/rural, etc.), and affordability.</p>
<p>Here are 3 different schools with good engineering programs… </p>
<p>U Illinois, Purdue, and Iowa State. Iowa State would likely be the cheapest (by far) for an OOS student.</p>
<p>Here are the average starting salaries for Mech Eng grads (as per each school’s website)…
U Illinois: $64,500
Purdue: $59.000
Iowa State: $59,200</p>
<p>Will you make up that $40-$50,000 difference in 2-3 years? Probably not. Oh, and Iowa State is ranked in the 100’s.</p>
<p>The starting salary difference may also be a function of where the graduates find work and not a premium that’s paid for the school they graduated from.</p>
<p>What is your home state school?</p>
<p>Cheaper out-of-state schools with good reputation include Virginia Tech, North Carolina State, Stony Brook, Iowa State, and Cal Poly SLO. Among smaller schools, there are also South Dakota Mines and New Mexico Tech.</p>
<p>Regarding rankings, remember that ABET accreditation sets a relatively high minimum standard for engineering major degree programs, so that the difference in quality between schools is much narrower than for some other majors.</p>
<p>*
Given that my homestate school has a dismal ranking of about 90, paying $40-50K extra for a school that ranks below 20 or even 10 seems like a decent tardeoff. I hope to recover this difference within 2-3 years of graduation in salary difference.</p>
<p>Am I right in these calculations?*</p>
<p>lol…no, you’re not right.</p>
<p>A 90ish ranking is NOT bad for eng’g. There are over 25 good eng’g programs in Calif alone, so guess how many good programs there are in the entire USA? A very large number!!! Probably well over 200.</p>
<p>Forget rankings. Look for ABET accreditation. </p>
<p>You’re not going to get paid more after graduating from those schools.</p>
<p>What are YOUR PARENTS saying about paying? IF they won’t pay, what will you do?</p>
<p>YOU can only borrow $5500 towards college.</p>
<p>What are your stats?</p>
<p>How much will your parents pay each year?</p>
<p>LakeWashington, all of the schools I’m considering are ABET-accredited. It is not an issue. Second, is there any objective statistics on “what employers think about a specific school”? I believe that’s what rankings are for.</p>
<p>fractalmstr, my homestate school is U Kentucky, Lexington. Overal ranking of 119, Mech E ranking 77, EE ranking 89. And, yes, it’s also ABET-accredited. Accreditation is supposed to show minimally accepted standard. How far will you get on a job interview if you only show minimally accepted competency? </p>
<p>Haystack, you seem familiar with these schools. Can you please elaborate what makes them different? Also, Iowa State has Mech E ranking of 44 - on par with University of Pittsburgh, Case Western, Rutgers. U Mich and Purdue are clearly in a different league with the rankings below 10. Yet you think they are similar. What makes you think so?</p>
<p>*How far will you get on a job interview if you only show minimally accepted competency? *</p>
<p>lol…an employer interviewing an eng’g student from UKentucky isn’t thinking that the school’s graduates are only minimally competant. </p>
<p>During an interview, you’re NOT JUST showing that your school is ABET accredited. If that’s the only thing on your resume, then no one will hire you no matter WHERE you went to school. </p>
<p>I don’t think you’re understanding.</p>
<p>Virtually EVERY flagship that has engineering is going to have very good engineering because that school’s mission is to supply the state with QUALIFIED eng’rs.</p>
<p>NO company is going to pay a Purdue grad more money than a Kentucky grad. They all will get paid the SAME.</p>
<p>HOW MUCH will your parents pay?</p>
<p>What are your stats?</p>
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<p>The minimum standard for ABET accreditation in engineering is a fairly high standard (that is also why engineering majors at less selective schools tend to have a high rate of transferring out of the major, since students with lower ability and motivation find an ABET accredited engineering major to be too difficult).</p>
<p>The minimum standard for ABET accreditation in engineering is a fairly high standard</p>
<p>Exactly. </p>
<p>But again, the fact that your school is ABET accredited is NOT the only thing that an applicant demonstrates during an interview. It won’t even come up. the employer already knows that. The resume/interview will deal with classes, internships, grades, research, etc.</p>
<p>mom2collegekids, I don’t mean to be disrespectful, but I do not feel comfortable sharing with the whole world my personal stats or my parents’ personal finances. Let’s just assume the both are adequate for the task at hand.</p>
<p>If you want to get a very rough idea of what corporate recruiters think of various engineering programs, look at this…</p>
<p>[School</a> Rankings by College Major ? Job Recruiter Top Picks - WSJ.com](<a href=“http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052748703376504575491704156387646]School”>School Rankings by College Major – Job Recruiter Top Picks - WSJ)</p>
<p>Realistically, all you need is an ABET accredited program and you will be fine.</p>
<p>As a parent funding the college choice, there is no way that I would pay $55,000 for a U Mich engineering degree when I could pay $15,000 instate.</p>
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<p>How far you get on an interview will depend on a variety of things, not the least of which is academic competency. </p>
<p>It’s important to rememebr that engineering can potentially affect public safety. If a design fails due to engineering incompetence, there can be serious consequences and people can get hurt or killed. It’s for this very reason that ABET exists. Employers want to know that there aren’t going to be significant differences in competency levels between candidates with identical degrees, but from different schools.</p>