<p>My son is struggling as a sophomore in engineering program with 2.5. The school is very well regarded. I am torn between allowing him to continue in the current program or forcing him to transfer to another school to pursue another major. (His current school doesn't allow transfers within colleges with such a low GPA). He likes the current school very much, despite his academic issues.</p>
<p>I am sure this is not a unique situation but I am curious on the thoughts and feedback others may have. I know the engineering (civil) is a tough program so I expect that many people have faced similar situations.</p>
<p>2.5 is passing and at most schools high enough to graduate. So saying that he has a 2.5 isn’t enough information to say that he should go to a different school / major.</p>
<p>If you say he has attempted Calculus I three times and failed three times, that might be a different story.</p>
<p>And I think that the choice of majors should be up to your son, not up to you.</p>
<p>I feel like you shouldn’t force your son to do anything. It is his future, not yours. If you are footing the bill you could obviously exert more influence but ulimately it should be his choice. 2. Is low but not ridiculously low.</p>
<p>Has he been failing classes and retaking them with better grades, or is he getting mainly Cs? To be competitive in employment, I think a GPA of at least 3.0 should be his goal, which is doable if he’s a sophomore. What brought his GPA down? Was it the “boot camp” introductory engineering courses of calculus I, II, and III, calc-based physics, diffy q’s, etc?</p>
<p>I’ll disagree with TomServo. If he likes engineering but finds it hard, graduating with a 2.0 will be high enough to get hired as an engineer. It may take more work than someone with a 3.5 but there will be a job for him.</p>
<p>B- to D+ sounds ok. I’m guessing D+ is in Calculus / Statics & Dynamics. I got a C (nearly C-) in Calculus I and a straight C in Statics. Both are very hard classes. It gets easier as he goes on.</p>
<p>Main thing is does your son enjoy it? If so, that’s all that is necessary (and Cs). </p>
<p>He may have to retake the class that he got a D+ in depending on your school policies.</p>
<p>Do you know the average GPA at this school (and in the engineering program in particular)? For instance, if it’s in the 2.7 - 2.8 range, then obviously many students will have a 2.5 and still have satisfactory status within the program.
According to my husband (a professional engineer), it’s been his experience that the correlation between being a top student academically, and a successful engineer in practice, is not that high. Ability to relate well with clients, good common sense, etc. are often more vital at work, than pure technical skills.</p>
<p>Does your son’s engineering curriculum stress weed-out courses for the first two years? Many of the larger and older programs do. And, are these the classes he is having trouble with? If so, then it looks likely he will survive the weed-out process and may well find the core classes better to his liking and ability. (But that is assuming he actually likes CE)</p>
<p>riparian - I don’t knw the avg GPA for engineers at his school (something to look into). </p>
<p>toblin - I would say that his program follows the ‘weed-out course’ model for the 1st two years. I guess my concern is that ‘will it really get easier for him?’. It seems most people seem to believe so.</p>
<p>I believe he does like CE - in general. Like anything, there are some things he doesn’t care for, and others he really enjoys. </p>
<p>Thanks for all your comments. Your feedback has been helpful.</p>
<p>Solid experience with co-ops and internships are pretty much a must anyway, but they can definitely help make his GPA look less important to future employers.</p>
<p>What stuff doesn’t he care for? Stuff he’d have to do at a job, or tedious crap he’ll never have to do again once he leaves school? (hand-drawing-of-function-graphs, I’m looking in your direction!)</p>
<p>I’m going to be blunt, median is usually around 3.0, there is a big difference between a 2.5 and a 3.0. If people on this forum disagree, that’s fine I’m not even going to argue it; it is what it is. </p>
<p>I don’t think there are excuses either, again just being blunt, there’s always people with their excuses, but in the end 50% of the people at that school will get above 3.0 and your son needs to make some changes and start doing whatever those students are doing. </p>
<p>why am I being so negative, because I’ve seen people graduate with sub 3.0, it sucks…they all got jobs (eventually) but man there was a lot of stress there. Many Job qualifications and grad school are 3.0 and above. Very difficult getting any Co-op or internship. just not a good situation</p>
<p>on a positive note, if he has a 2.5 sophmore year it’s just a turning point, lots of students are in that position at some point, some end up graduating with well above 3.0 and some well below 3.0, which one it’s going to be is up to your son. I personally received a lot of support and concern from my family, constantly putting the pressure on and showing concern, providing confidence but also never allowing me to make any excuses to get below 3.0.</p>
<p>P.S. With all respect, I would never suggest for you to say to your son ‘maybe you should drop out’ that’s the worst thing I think you could possibly do. It’s needs to be more like, you will graduate and you will be above 3.0 because I know what your capable of and that’s whats going to happen.</p>
<p>Does the engineering college require 3.0-3.325 to gain admission to the last 2 years? If that is the case, I can see your concern. Yes, you can graduate with a 2.5 but some colleges want a 3.0+ just to complete the last two years.</p>
<p>On top of that, I think it absurd for the university to not allow transfers to other colleges. You need the Physics, Math and Chemistry departments to take in the engineering majors who did not get into the final 2 years.</p>
<p>I fully agree that above a 3.0 is better than below a 3.0. But I have always said that any GPA is better than no gpa or a high GPA in many other majors.</p>
<p>You say that 50% graduate with above a 3.0. That means 50% also graduate with below a 3.0. Do they find jobs? Yes. Do their jobs pay less than the above 3.0 crowd? No, long term salary is based on work performance. </p>
<p>Do they care about their college GPA 3 years out of college? No.</p>
<p>At my company, we have many people who got crummy GPAs in college that are highly successful at what they do and top performing employees.</p>
<p>Another way of putting it: Have you ever tried to actually hire an engineer? I worked closely with the hiring department of a company in Phoenix. We’d run an ad in the paper and get 0 resumes after 1 week! I couldn’t believe it. The few we got were usually from people with degrees from foreign countries, which we didn’t accept. There were not very many fish to choose from in the pool.</p>
<p>Other majors, it’s a different story. Take liberal arts (philosophy, sociology, criminal justice, social science, etc). Typically 100’s of people apply for each position that is available. There GPA may weigh a lot more.</p>
<p>I hope that your right, really I do but here is my experiences with friends of mine graduating/graduated with sub 3.0</p>
<p>“Do they care about their college GPA 3 years out of college? No.”
True</p>
<p>Do they find jobs? Yes.
No, actually they were unable to find any internships over the summer’s and were unemployed upon graduation. eventually they got jobs but nothing like the kinds that the above 3.0 crowd got.</p>
<p>Do their jobs pay less than the above 3.0 crowd?
much lower salaries yes, after 2 yrs. they’re still around 40k, about 25k less than average after 2 yrs…although money isn’t the main issue, it’s that their jobs are crummy, </p>
<p>“At my company, we have many people who got crummy GPAs in college that are highly successful at what they do and top performing employees”</p>
<p>my friend right now has a 2.5 in Aero E…smart as they come (aero E is ****ing hard) but it is what it is…no prior internship, zero interviews, can’t even apply to 99% of the jobs on my schools career services site, graduating senior. what is this company your referring to because I can tell him to apply. bigtrees I hope your right but I’ve seen and heard much worse than your saying. though I absolutely agree, no GPA in engineering (or a high one outside of engineering) is much worse than a low one.</p>
<p>One issue is where your son stands relative to his classmates. Is he often in the very tail of the grade distribution, or just in the lower half? To me, the former is a serious concern, while the latter much less so. Due to differing degrees of grade inflation between programs, the GPA alone may not tell you what you need to know. His class ranking in each course would tell you a lot more. </p>
<p>Second, why is he in this position? I see two types of students in the low end of my grade rankings: those who work hard, attend every lecture, ask for help at office hours and discussions, yet still have difficulty (relatively uncommon); and those who prepare inadequately for exams, slap together assignments at the last minute, miss due dates…(relatively more common)</p>
<p>Third, is there a different subject area your son is really interested in/has a passion for?</p>