<p>This thread is awesome. Too bad it had to die out. </p>
<p>What kind of a GPA do students have to get in their undergrad. in order to realistically have a shot at MIT, Cal-tech, or Stanford's graduate programs? Of course, this is assuming that the students have a significant amount of internship and research experience on their resume.</p>
<p>um... what about the opposite... what happens if you don't have a significant amount (or any) of internship and research experience...? What top schools are out of the question?</p>
<p>how does WPI rank?? is it on the same level as RPI ( i.e. a little lower than that of cornell,etc ) ?</p>
<p>thanks</p>
<p>People seem to underestimate Georgia Tech's aerospace program</p>
<p>Caltech doesn't even have an aerospace department, for one. Heck, Cornell doesn't even have its own aerospace department, either. It shares it with mechanical.
GT's is higher ranked and larger than UMich's (as has been said before UMich's faculty/resource ratio is pretty low) and at least in undergrad is ranked #2 in the country, second only to MITs.
In my assessment, for aerospace undergrad --MIT followed by Georgia Tech are the best schools in the country.</p>
<p>For aerospace grad, it would be MIT , Stanford, then Georgia Tech. The job opportunities at Tech through its many labs, extensive Co-Op, Lockheed Martin etc. are unparalleled except for MIT.</p>
<p>No way UMich, Cornell or Caltech are better than GaTech in aerospace.</p>
<p>Lancer, to differentiate between any of the top 4 or 5 Aerospace programs (Caltech, GT, MIT, Michigan and Stanford) is futile. They are all excellent. Boeing, Northrup Grumman and Lockheed Martin are three of the 5 largest recruiters at Michigan's College of Engineering. Last year alone, out of 150 students who graduated with degrees in Aerospace Engineering, roughly 55 reported information on their employment status. Of those 55, 42 joined Boeing, Lockeed Martin and Northrop Grumman. NASA usually recruits another 5 or so Michigan Engineers.</p>
<p>That is not to say that over 80% of Michigan aerospace Engineers get jobs with those 4 elite aerospace firms, but it is safe to say that a program that places close to 50 students in those firms annually is very effective at educating and producing aerospace engineers.</p>
<p>
Three letters: J P L</p>
<p>there are many good engineering programs but you have to go look for yourself, the rankings don't always mean that the school is student focused, especially at the undergrad level prestige is not as important as a professor actually caring about teaching. The rankings are based on statistics not education quality.</p>
<p>Ill switch the focus and ask....is Penn State known internationally?</p>
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Three letters: J P L
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<p>I was just waiting for someone to bring this up. Having JPL across the street from you doesn't automatically give you an aerospace department. </p>
<p>Where are all the great Caltech AE professors and labs? Caltech's AE just doesn't stack up to the likes of MIT, Stanford, GT, or even UMich.</p>
<p>Caltech is a much better school to go to for the planetary sciences than for aerospace engineering.</p>
<p>For the record, GT has phenomenal job placement rate as well. From my own personal experience, recruiters from aerospace companies such as Lockheed Martin have told me that they specifically target GT grads for hiring. As far as industrial rep in aerospace, it is almost unparalleled and I don't think that there is a school that recruiters salivate more over than GT grads (except for maybe, MIT).</p>
<p>It is notable to add, that just in my spring semester graduating class (of 40 or so students) there were at least a couple of people (that I personally knew of, probably even more) that went straight to NASA Johnson Space Center.</p>
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I was just waiting for someone to bring this up. Having JPL across the street from you doesn't automatically give you an aerospace department. </p>
<p>Where are all the great Caltech AE professors and labs? Caltech's AE just doesn't stack up to the likes of MIT, Stanford, GT, or even UMich.
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<p>You don't seem to perceive the implication from what Cghen said. Many, too many JPL staff are from Caltech, too many Caltech TA's are JPL staff, JPL is run partially by Caltech, JPL's directors are Caltech profs. Caltech doesn't need to <em>create</em> a separate dept called aerospace engineering to be great in it. I don't think GAtech grads would ever beat Caltech grads for aerospace engrg fields/jobs in the eyes of employers or research institutes.</p>
<p>Oh really? Show me where it says that Caltech AE grads are more respected in the aerospace industry than GT grads. Show me where it says that Caltech AE grads leave a greater impact overall than GT grads? </p>
<p>This is silly.By that logic, GT AE students can easily have internships at Lockheed Martin (one of the two biggest aerospace companies in the nation besides Boeing) , the home of the F-22.</p>
<p>The entire world does not revolve around JPL. There is Boeing, Lockheed Martin, NASA Johnson Space Center, Northrup Grumman...etc. Last time I checked, I don't remember seeing many Caltech grads at Lockheed Martin. Heck, JPL is not even an aerospace company.. It is a laboratory! And they do many things many of which have nothing to do with aerospace.</p>
<p>And very little aerospace is actually "space." JPL is mostly for space anyways. Let's pretend that Caltech has an actual AE department for a second and let me give you this question:
How about an AE student that wanted to go to Caltech for aeronautics/airplanes? Then what? </p>
<p>And again where are the Caltech AE faculty? </p>
<p>Don't make the mistake in thinking that Caltech has a good AE program (what program?) just because it is Caltech. You need professors and faculty (more than one) to have a department.</p>
<p>Count the number of Caltech AEs in industry and then compare them to the number of GT AEs in industry. Get back to me when you are done.</p>
<p>There is a very good reason why GT is ranked higher than Caltech in Aerospace despite not having JPL.</p>
<p>Caltech just has JPL. Georgia Tech's aerospace department has 10 research labs all devoted to all aspects of aerospace research AND not to mention Lockheed Martin.</p>
<p>Oh, and they have a real department too..
No brainer.</p>
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Oh really? Show me where it says that Caltech AE grads are more respected in the aerospace industry than GT grads. Show me where it says that Caltech AE grads leave a greater impact overall than GT grads?
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<p>Heck, by numbers, Michigan EE grads would leave a greater impact than Caltech EE grads by a mile. But it doesn't indicate how prestigious the program is!!!</p>
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This is silly.By that logic, GT AE students can easily have internships at Lockheed Martin (one of the two biggest aerospace companies in the nation besides Boeing) , the home of the F-22.
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<p>By what logic?? It's a fact that many of my TA when I was studying there were JPL staff, and so many Caltech grads working in JPL</p>
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And very little aerospace is actually "space." JPL is mostly for space anyways. Let's pretend that Caltech has an actual AE department for a second and let me give you this question:
How about an AE student that wanted to go to Caltech for aeronautics/airplanes? Then what?
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<p>The essential point is that, the aero factor for 'space' requires much more sophisticated design than the design of most commercial jets. Put it bluntly, it might be easier for JPL staff to transfer to Lockheed/Boeing than vice versa.</p>
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And again where are the Caltech AE faculty?
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<p>Aerospace engineering is merely a combination of Physics, Physical science Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Electrical Engineering. Caltech has many strong faculty for each department. Take a look at the Gatech SAE faculty resumes, many of their thesis can even be placed solely under mechanical/fluid dynamic engineering.</p>
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Count the number of Caltech AEs in industry and then compare them to the number of GT AEs in industry
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<p>The number of UIUC EE grads surpasses that of MIT in the industry, does it mean better??</p>
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There is a very good reason why GT is ranked higher than Caltech in Aerospace despite not having JPL.</p>
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<p>Why Caltech AE program is ranked higher than Gatech according to the most respected NRC ranking?</p>
<p>Are you saying that Berkeley's computer engineering program is less stellar than Cornell's because Berkeley doesn't have a dedicated computer engineering department?? What an argument !!!</p>
<p>
<p>Stanford Aero Professors (~30 percent of faculty education found): Caltech: 1 GaTech: 0</p>
<p>Princeton Aero Professors (~40 percent of faculty education found): Caltech: 3 GaTech: 0</p>
<p>MIT Aero Professors (~30 percent of faculty education found): Caltech: 2 GaTech: 0</p>
<p>University of Michigan (Ann Arbor) Aero Professors (100 percent of faculty education found): Caltech: 4 GaTech: 1</p>
<p>Cornell Aero Professors (~95 percent of faculty education found): Caltech: 2 GaTech: 1</p>
<p>Purdue Aero Professors (~75 percent of faculty education found): Caltech: 3 GaTech: 1</p>
<p>University of Texas (Austin) Aero Professors (100 percent of faculty education found): Caltech: 6 GaTech: 0</p>
<p>Now Caltech gives about 10-15 aero PhDs each year. I'm pretty sure GaTech's aero department is about an order of magnitude larger in population, so even though these are very small numbers, they clearly illustrate how valued an aero degree from Caltech is.</p>
<p> [quote=Lancer78] Show me where it says that Caltech AE grads leave a greater impact overall than GT grads?
Done. Any questions?</p>
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It's a fact that many of my TA when I was studying there were JPL staff, and so many Caltech grads working in JPL
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<p>It is also a fact that Caltech's AE program is smaller, has a narrower focus (where's the aviation and the aerospace engineers?), and has fewer labs than Tech's AE program.
Caltech is virtually JPL.</p>
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Why Caltech AE program is ranked higher than Gatech according to the most respected NRC ranking?</p>
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<p>Nice try but no cigar.
These rankings are nothing more than "research" rankings. And for that matter, only for the doctorate level. Not only are these rankings completely oblivious of aerospace programs at the undegraduate level (where GT is #2) or at the graduate level (where GT is 3 or 4) , unlike USNews, these rankings don't factor in industry reputation. I think there is very little doubt that in industry, GT is more well-known for its engineers (for that matter so is UMich!) than Caltech.</p>
<p>Caltech is a research school. And actually, Caltech is much more well-known in the pure sciences rather than engineering. Undoubtedly it would be better for straight doctorate-level research than Tech or most any other school in the country would be.
But in terms of raw impact made in industry and employers , it lags behind Tech and other schools.</p>
<p>
Do you have any data at all to back up that claim?</p>
<p>Again, nice try and no cigar. How you two "conveniently" ignored my original post where I specifically referred to 'aerospace industry'.... </p>
<p>Cghen, you just proved my point even more. You guys keep wanting to throw in doctorate-research stats but choose to completely ignore the much larger industry component. </p>
<p>I specifically asked for INDUSTRY stats (most engineers go to work in industry, after all, not research) show me where in INDUSTRY Caltech AEs have left an overall larger impact than GT AE grads overall?</p>
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Aerospace engineering is merely a combination of Physics, Physical science Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Electrical Engineering. Caltech has many strong faculty for each department.
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<p>Oh really? Who on the Caltech faculty (from any of those departments you just mentioned) specializes on jet/rocket propulsion? n-body orbital mechanics? aircraft design? spacecraft design? high-speed aerodynamics? aeroelasticity?</p>