What sort of coursework or other credit requirements go into an engineering degree that makes it different from a science degree like a physics degree? I know that engineering degrees are supposed to be suited for future engineers but what exactly differentiates the two?
I also heard the Elon Musk received a physics degree and not an engineering degree from UPenn…can a lot of science/physics majors become engineers without a specific physics degree?
Well, Elon Musk isn’t an engineer so bad example.
^^^ Agreed. Any one person’s example is not useful guidance. Steve Jobs and Bill Gates both dropped out of their undergraduate programs, after all. If your goal is to start a new, ground-breaking, world-changing company, then you probably don’t need a college degree either–you just need capital, a tenacious work ethic, and a truckload of good fortune.
To your question: Pick your favorite school, then go online and compare the requirements for a physics major vs. an engineering major. I think you’ll find that, while they will share some classes in common (basic physics, calculus through DiffEQ, etc.) there is a lot of specialized learning that goes into any engineering curriculum.
Keep in mind that, in order to become an engineer, you have to convince some company to hire you into an engineering position–this is the biggest hurdle. Think of it from the company’s standpoint: The hiring process is largely about risk management, because a bad hire is a costly mistake and a drain on the resources of a department. If they are hiring MEs now, they probably have hired MEs in the past and have a good idea of the academic background of a new ME hire. A physics major could probably make a good case that he could do the job, but he’ll just have to overcome the hurdle that the company may not have hired physics majors in the past, and won’t know how readily a physics major’s background will fit.
Broadly, science is the study of the natural universe, while engineering is the process of solving design problems using the principles of science.
Broadly speaking, science programs teach a lot of theory and a little application, while engineering programs teach a lot of application and a little theory. There are jobs that fall enough in the middle that either degree would work, and of these jobs some are called “scientist” while others are called “engineer”, and these are the engineering jobs you can generally get with a science degree. If you want a straight application job then you need the engineering coursework or commensurate experience.
And FYI, Elon Musk is and always has been more of a manager than anything else.