<p>I am 38 yrs old. Got my GED after foolishly dropping out of high school in 1990. Took the ACT right away, but did not attend college until nearly 13 years later. With the exception of math, I did pretty decent considering I never completed the 10th grade. My overall was 27, with a 16 in Math. I took two remedial math courses when I began my BSN major in the mid 2000's. My cumulative GPA during those two years is 3.6.</p>
<p>Two unfortunate things happened during my two years in school. First, I choose my major only because the nearest school didn't offer much that interested me. Second, I was sent to Afghanistan for 14 months. I had signed up for the Nat'l Guard to help with school expenses. Right after returning home, my wife became pregnant with our first child. My wife was in school as well. She also happens to be 10 yrs younger than me. I didn't want her to put off an education like I did, so rather than return to school, I took a full time job. Between my working and watching our son, she managed to get her BSN on time.</p>
<p>Now, 5 years later, we are in a financial position that will allow me to return to school. Of all of my options, EE is what interests me the most. I have been tinkering with electronics and circuitry as a hobby for several years, built a couple of robots and home brewed many guitar and recording effect circuits. I don't necessarily have a die hard need to design circuitry for a living, but I find it fascinating.</p>
<p>With my limited math education in mind (even though I made A's in all my remedial courses), is EE a long shot at my age? Am I being overly ambitious?</p>
<p>It would appear that this post should have been in the Chances section. I apologize for that, but rather than post the same question in two forums, I will leave this here unless a moderator wants to move it.</p>
<p>Nah, this is the right forum. The chances forum is for people to have their admission chances at various colleges assessed.</p>
<p>If you did well in your remedial classes and didn’t struggle to understand the concepts too badly, there is no reason you can’t do an engineering degree. If you stay on top of things in each class, further math classes won’t get harder as you go. They only get harder if you didn’t build a solid enough foundation. If you started in remedial classes, my guess is that you are building that foundation and will do fine. Nobody who is reasonably intelligent is bad at math, they just weren’t motivated to work hard in math at some point so they didn’t build a solid foundation. Honestly, I think you could teach calculus to a monkey if it was motivated to learn.</p>
<p>You won’t know unless you try. If you’re risk averse, the better question to ask yourself is if you’re in a position to fail should things not work out. As long as you’re realistic about your schedule and finances, the possible gains will likely far outweigh possible negatives.</p>
<p>OP: Go for it dude, it’s never too late (unless you’re like 73 and just bored). Don’t be afraid of the math, either. I too returned to school after a very long hiatus, having only completed elementary algebra in high school (dropped out of geometry lol), and calculus 1/2 scared the hell out of me… until I took them. </p>
<p>Anyway, you should be more afraid of physics. Haha</p>
<p>Absolutely go for it. 31 here and back in school. You will do well as you will have a lot more motivation and will not have as many of the “distractions” as the younger students, even with having a wife and a child. Also, keep the goal of being an engineer in mind. I started out as an EE major after being an electronics tech in the Navy. Shortly after I found that I really didn’t enjoy the subject matter as much as I thought I would and switched to a different engineering major that I really enjoyed. This may not be your case, but keeping the goal of being an engineer in mind over a specific type, I feel, has kept me down the right path. Good luck man.</p>
<p>Wow. I expected a few ‘be realistic’ posts. While I am a little nervous, I’m not too terribly worried about the math classes. Even though I am only at basic college level algebra, the university I will be enrolling in doesn’t include the basic college level classes in their EE program. So, I will be taking math classes from now until next fall in order to meet the minimum requirements for the program. A pain to be sure, but on the bright side all of this will be very fresh in my memory as opposed to something I took years ago. </p>
<p>Someone pointed out that I maybe shouldn’t do it if I were very risk averse. I’m not so much the risk taker, but for years I’ve worked hard at my job and consistently got promoted. I actually make more than many college graduates (not engineering graduates, however). However, my company is throwing in the towel it appears. Because I have no formal education, my salary is going to take a huge hit no matter where I go. Because my wife’s income will now cover us (thanks Dave Ramsey), she suggested I go back to school. I though it was crazy at first, but she made a convincing argument.</p>
<p>You guys have made it even more convincing. I’m going to give it a shot!</p>
<p>I dropped out of high school during my junior year. In high school, I got a B in algebra 1 and a B in geometry. I failed physical science my 9th grade year and had to retake it my 10th grade year. When I dropped out, I was taking algebra 2, and I don’t recall doing very well at all.</p>
<p>It took me a couple of years of being out of school to find motivation to do anything. Now I’m on track for the first time in my life, and my GPA at the CC is 4.0. I just got an A in Applications in Algebra, I’m taking Intro Physics and General Chemistry next semester, and I’m transferring to the University next Fall.</p>
<p>My dad is 38 (38 isn’t old; I’m 20, my dad was 18 when I was born. lol) and he’s in college right now, and he’s doing great. He’s working on some technical degree, though I don’t know the specifics.</p>
<p>My uncle is 36, and he’s working on his second masters, this time in physics.</p>
<p>If it’s what you want to do, I see no reason not to do it.</p>
<p>Also, here’s a tip. Don’t let the fact that most high schoolers are taking calculus as a junior or senior put you down. I let that happen to me for about 3 seconds once, and realized that it truly doesn’t matter. As long as you put the effort in, you’ll do fine.</p>
<p>I’ve never had any exposure to calculus or trig. I did great in geometry in HS, but keep in mind this was 22 (gasp!) years ago. I’ve picked up a couple of HS level algebra workbooks and have been working through them to try and brush up a bit. I would like to go ahead and work through some college level books as soon as I finish the one I am on. My school doesn’t have semesters, only quarters, so I won’t actually begin classes until next March. I want to give myself every advantage possible.</p>
<p>We should be careful about understating how hard/pervasive the high-level math gets. Unless you are excited about doing pages and pages of integrals/transforms and computing physical characteristics of transistors for two semesters while only actually building a few circuits in lab twice a month, maybe look into EE Tech degrees? I assume they deal a lot more with the actual circuit building aspects of EE. </p>
<p>tldr: EE is 70% math, 30% circuits. Look into EE Tech degrees if circuits are all you want to learn.</p>
<p>If it is what you want, go for it. My dad is in his fifties and becoming a nurse. This is about improving yourself and doing something you love and making a steady income.</p>
<p>My only warning is that EE is a darn hard major and if you aren’t truly DRIVEN then you won’t finish. I’m not saying it can’t be done, I’m just saying it takes active effort, lots of studying and doing problems and stuff. It’s not like majoring in business or something where you passively sit through lecture, write some papers, etc. It requires work.</p>
<p>The best thing you can do is prepare yourself mathematically. Search these forums for past posts of mine where I’ve talked about teaching yourself math. The advice I give comes directly from my experience and I’m very strong on math, so you should do what I did. :)</p>
<p>Most high school students do not take calculus in high school (and most who do take it as seniors, not juniors).</p>
<p>Also, engineering degree programs generally do not assume calculus in high school; they start off in first semester calculus (so they generally do assume that the student is ready for calculus, having completed algebra, geometry, and trigonometry).</p>
<p>It is the case that EE majors will take four semesters of math starting with calculus, going on to multivariable calculus, linear algebra, and differential equations. Many of the physics and EE courses taken later in the degree program will make extensive use of math.</p>
<p>It’s important to read the requirements to figure out what you’re supposed to have completed before you can apply for engineering. At S’s engineering program, even though they made nearly all students re-take calculus, most HAD taken it in HS. EE is heavily math & physics for the first two years or so, or at least our S’s required courses were.</p>
<p>My engineering technology instructor got his first bachelors in zoology, then later, in his 30s, he went back to school to get his electrical engineering ** and Masters. I highly recommend that you go for it, then tell people about your journey so that they can feel encouraged and do the same.</p>