<p>How good is engineering at Harvard? Any current engineering majors on here who can speak with personal experience? I'm interested in engineering as a possible career path in addition to business jobs like investment banking, private equity, hedge fund, or management consulting.</p>
<p>Harvard Engineering is small and very specialized. They have BS degrees in Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Engineering Science with Bioengineering Track, Engineering Science with Environmental Science Track. They also have BA degrees in Applied Math, Computer Science, and a liberal arts BA in Engineering Sciences.</p>
<p>Many of the students at Harvard who major in engineering usually do not pursue careers in engineering, but more so in business, consulting, banking etc, for which a technical background is highly valued. </p>
<p>That said, the faculty are very strong, your fellow students are very bright, and you will get a lot of individual attention because there are relatively few students. </p>
<p>In terms of strengths, bioengineering stands out because of the ties with the Harvard Medical School and joint programs with MIT. Also, engineering that is more closely aligned with applied physics and the physics of materials is strong. But in “conventional” engineering, Harvard is lacking in breadth.</p>
<p>Back in the early 1900’s, Harvard & MIT were planning to merge… and the plans were pretty far along in the process, but MIT alumni mounted a vigorous legal campaign to block the merger (because they feared MIT would lose its identity and become just another department at Harvard). MIT is only 10 minutes away, so I think Harvard has never felt the need to try to go head-to-head with MIT in engineering.</p>