<p>i'm in a gridlock here, between ucla, northwestern, upenn, and cornell. i got into berkeley, but i dont really like the town surrounding it, so i'm ruling that one out, in spite of the fact of its engineering strength. cornell is probably the best engineering school of all four of the schools that i've mentioned, but i dont know if its rigor is for me. a little snippet from the princeton review said that a cornell engineering student is likely to go to the library after class and not leave until 2 AM. now, i know that is exaggerated, but is it really that rigorous? give me an example of a really tough week, that would be great</p>
<p>on top of that, ithaca is a far different location from philadelphia or los angeles. i know there are job fairs and internships that are abundant at those schools for prospective engineers, but what are those opportunities like for cornellians? it'd great to hear back about that</p>
<p>i dont want only a good education, but a great undergrad experience. i'm sure cornell can give me that, with all the cool things they have on campus, but if i have such a demanding workload from my engineering classes, maybe it's not right for me. i'm really looking forward to intramural sports and things of that sort; is intramural basketball and tennis really strong on campus?</p>
<p>ehhhhh i live 40 minutes from LA, the move would be a good idea for me, a move out to the west coast. i like how ithaca's all isolated from the rest of the world, it seems nice. i just want to make sure i dont get myself into an engineering program that's so rigorous that it ruins my social life.</p>
<p>My uncle went to Cornell as an engineer. Sure it was tough but he said tons of companies come on campus to interview Cornell engineer students. The positions that Cornell engineers fill are often high positions in these companies as well. Thats how he got his first job. Its completely up to you though. Cornell has a great engineering school and so does Berkeley. Northwestern and Penn I'm not too sure about. I haven't heard anything about UCLA's either. Between UCLA and Berkeley though, if you are really serious about engineering, I would take a long look at why you chose UCLA over Berk considering the prestige of Berk's engineering school. Hope that helped a bit!</p>
<p>Northwestern's engineering school is close to Cornell's, but a little lower ranked (both by USNWR and word of mouth on these boards). Northwestern is better for certain subsets of engineering, I forget which. Cornell has much better computer science though.</p>
<p>When you are deciding among schools with highly regarded engineering programs, you would be wise to consider campus life as you will be living there four years. Also, when my son had to choose between Cornell engineering and Penn engineering, he visited each engineering dept. His visits led him to choose Cornell over Penn. It is larger with more opportunities if he decides to change his major. He thought the facilities at Cornell were much nicer -- I think he said that Penn undergraduate labs or other engineering facilities were partially in the dreary basement of the engineering buildings (as the graduates have the nicer facilities). And at Cornell, they encourage undergraduate research, which is, as I understand it, an important factor if one were to go on to graduate school. </p>
<p>With that all said, if he had liked the campus feel of Penn better than Cornell, perhaps he would have decided differently. I encourage anyone deciding among different programs to visit the schools and try to talk to lots of kids about what they like and don't like. Just because one kid may dislike something about a school, doesn't mean anything. That aspect may not be important to you, so if possibly, it is best to talk to a lot of different kids when you visit. Also, you can look at the old CC threads of the schools and look at discussions where current students answer questions or talk about different experiences they have had. If you read enough, you can get some idea of the kids that attend and the lifestye of the schools. </p>
<p>Bottom line: You will be working hard at any engineering program, so consider where you would meet like minded peers and have a well rounded college experience.</p>
<p>I would choose Cornell if you intend to get out of west coast. Northwestern and Cornell are quite good for engineering I believe, and UPenn engineering is not as good as Cornell or NW (I am not quite sure about this tho. I am just saying this based on the ranking). I suggest you to visit the schools and go to the place where your heart is leading you.</p>
<p>I'm an engineering major at Cornell and I'm going back to Cali for grad school next year :). So, you can still go back after your stint with the east coast (which is very nice and valuable). I'm a west-coaster for life, but I wouldn't trade my experience here for anything!</p>
<p>Penn is NOT in the same tier of engineering schools as N'Westerns & Cornell. As for working hard at Cornell, engineering is a rigorous program no matter where you are. The good thing about Cornell is that engineers aren't the only ones working hard. When we visited other schools, the tour guides would say that the workload wasn't too bad, except for the engineering students. </p>
<p>Penn engineering isn't that great. Northwestern and Cornell are in the same tier and are fantastic schools. I really don't know much about UCLA. Engineering is tough and you'll be miserable for 4 years, regardless of which school you go to.</p>
<p>i think you're making a mistake in simply ruling out berkeley for it's surrounding city. some parts of the surrounding city may be shoddy but overall, berkeley is a great college town with lots of good food to eat for cheap. lots of cafe's, asian ghetto gourmet food, etc...</p>