Engineering: Difficult Choice Between Two Schools (WVU and JMU)

Parents Forum
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<p>Okay, my son is in a somewhat quandry over this. He did not get accepted into his top choice, Virginia Tech. He is waitlisted.</p>

<p>He thinks he wants to be an engineer. Now, let me caveat by saying that he's really not sure. We've talked to many people, gone on tours, and he still can't picture in his mind what his job might end up being and he has a hard time really imagining what he might be doing with an engineering degree. But, he has always enjoyed math courses and when he looks at curriculum, this is what he is drawn to.</p>

<p>We live in Virginia. He applied to West Virginia University's Engineering College and was accepted into their Mechanical/Aerospace Engineering program. He was also accepted into their school's honor college. Because the Mechanical/Aerospace engineering degree (dual major) is not offered in Virginia, as part of the Academic Common Market he gets in-state tuition rates. They have also awarded him a small academic scholarship. So the cost to attend is very reasonable. My daughter also attends WVU, loves it, but it does have its drawbacks.</p>

<p>My son has also been accepted to James Madison University. This is a regional school with a fairly good reputation and we know several people who have gone and not a bad word has ever been said. We visited for the first time the other day and the campus was beautiful, the food was delicious, the students all seemed extremely upbeat and engaged. Here's the rub. Their engineering program is in its 5th year. It's new. It will be ABET certified this year. My son will be entering their 6th class. They seem to have good outcomes from what they showed us. I ran the program by my engineer friend and he seemed very supportive of what they are doing. It is a "generalist" engineering program and doesn't specialize. They are one of 35 colleges in the country that do this and they say they chose to do this because industry indicated that a generalist engineer was sort of the "wave of the future." My engineer friend did tell me that one of his best professors at Virginia Tech thought the best engineer was a general engineer. But sometimes when we talk about it with other people, I can see them make a puzzled face. </p>

<p>We're just not sure.</p>

<p>To top it off, my son isn't 100% sure he wants to be an engineer and this is where it gets tricky.</p>

<p>WVU: Engineering program has a good reputation. If my son can't keep a 3.0 GPA he will lose his merit aid (not a huge deal--it is small). If my son decides he doesn't like engineering or even doesn't like mechanical engineering and changes his major, his tuition will triple to out of state rates. He will be forced to change schools because we cannot pay those costs. School spirit there is excellent, staff is excellent, engineering support is excellent. Campus is kind of so-so, town is great but can be very run down looking. On-campus food is not very good. Overall reputation of the school is "party school"; however, engineering school seems to be respected. </p>

<p>JMU: Engineering program is still in its infancy stages (although the school feels very strongly about how good it is), in-state rates are reasonable. If my son drops out of engineering, he 200 majors to choose from and won't have to change schools. If he decides he truly loves engineering and wants to specialize, he could transfer over to VT in a year or so because he's on the right track for courses. The JMU campus was really nice, seems like he fits in there with the student body, campus is 2 hours from home which was a plus in all our books, surrounding town looks like a typical suburb and not "interesting" like Morgantown but absolutely fine. Taking a chance with general engineering.</p>

<p>If you have made it this far, thanks!! I would love your thoughts.</p>

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<p>It was a long time ago, but my brother said the smartest thing he did was go undergrad for math (within an engineering school) and do grad at GTECH. Grad school is generally subsidized (TAs, etc).</p>

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<p>Tough choices! I can see why he is having problems deciding. JMU sounds great but I guess I don’t think the best choice if he does decide to go into engineering. One of my kids really liked a school that was starting an engineering program and decided against it. One of the reasons was the reputation of the engineering school. The school was very well thought of but no one thought of it as an engineering school. We thought that it might be too hard to find co ops and internships. And jobs. So it was ultimately a no. </p>

<p>I think JMU is a great choice if he wants to think of it as you would a CC. Go for a year, and if he decides he is committed to engineering, transfer to VT. If he doesn’t like engineering, then it will be easy to switch to another major. I just don’t know how employers look at a general degree from a school they don’t know much about. Employers like to know how grads from a particular school are going to work in their setting. </p>

<p>WVU is a good school with a good reputation. It sounds fine if he wants to go there.</p>

<p>Good luck to your S!</p>

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<p>I don’t disagree with points being made here, and appreciate your dilemma. The only thing I would add is that transferring to VT’s e’school has becoming increasingly difficult, both academically and due to the very few spaces available. They are required each semester to take the guaranteed transfer applicants from Va’s CC’s first (which many, many students take advantage of either due to finances or being a late bloomer). Then they asses how much room they have for transfer students who are evaluative. This coming fall VT as a whole (not just the e’school) will not be accepting transfer applications for spring 2014 entrance.</p>

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<p>So…what if he chooses WVU,loves it once he’s there but then decides engineering is not for him?
Would he be heartbroken to leave WVU or would he force himself to stick w/ engineering just to stay there?<br>
Is he pragmatic enough to take it all in stride amd walk away/start over if it comes to that? </p>

<p>On the other hand, everyone seems to love JMU and he had a great visit there. If he feels more at home at JMU and it’s engineering program is about to be accredited, it would seem to be the safer bet. However, my DH, a MechE alum of NCSU who’s been working in the nuclear power generation business for 31 years, says he’s never heard of a generalist eng. degree.</p>

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<p>Is your son going to take the advantages and opportunities that WVU offer?
School might offer coops and internships and such but those will not be handed to a plate and given to the students. Students will have to “work” for them (apply, show strong interest, have good gpa etc).
I do not know but for a student that is kind of undecided going to a school that he can not even change among engineering majors sounds kind of risky.</p>

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<p>Blueiguana, you say that Virginia Tech is not accepting transfers for spring 2014, do you know if that excludes those CC students who’s transfer is guaranteed. What a dilemma. </p>

<p>ChrisVA, would your S think about community college for a year to see if he did want to go into engineering. It seems like that is the best path to VaTech if that is what he really wants. I know a few kids who did not get into our state flagship and used this path. I think they were really happy.</p>

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<p>PackMom–This the problem regarding leaving WVU if necessary. This has happened to my daughter. LOVES, LOVES, LOVES the school. She has changed her major in the last year (and fortunately it didn’t slow her time down) but it tripled our tuition. I am having a very hard time with it financially and this is with her helping. Unfortunately for my son, who is child #2, I won’t do that. Leaving a college mid-way through is very hard once you’ve established a community/connection in that college and you happen to love the university. My daughter had very poor grades in high school so she had no other options other than WVU, but I knew that getting her to move out after some better grades would be difficult. Not impossible, but it’s not easy. </p>

<p>This is my worst fear. That he dislikes or underperforms in mechanical/aerospace and then wants to change. I can almost bet that he will LOVE WVU and will be stuck with a lot of whining and angst!</p>

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<p>am9799-- My hopes would be that he takes part in everything they have to offer. I won’t be there to force him, so that’s an unknown. I agree that going to WVU is a risk which is why we are so torn.</p>

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<p>deb922–We live about 5 minutes away from one of the NVCC campuses. My daughter also attended there for a year. I think the pathway into the other Virignia schools is a phenomenol program, but he is really not interested. There’s probably not a nice way of saying it but I can’t say the crowd there is stellar. It’s like high school extended and not in a good way. I think NVCC is a great community college but certainly not what he wants at this point. It is something we are discussing though.</p>

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<p>blueiguana-thank you for the information on transferring into VT. I didn’t realize the transfer issue was that difficult. Certainly makes us reevaluate the JMU path.</p>

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<p>Our S2 will graduate from WVU in engineering next month. He toured JMU and hated the feel of the school. In contrast, he fell head over heels in love with WVU, with the result that WVU was his only application. I think social fit matters and cannot imagine a student liking the feel of both WVU and JMU equally but it sounds like your S feels like he would be comfortable at either school. </p>

<p>Although JMU does have a better overall academic reputation, engineering at WVU will be challenging. Our WVU engineering student spent more time studying than our UVA engineering grad and far more time than his non-engineering buddies at JMU. The need to study when friends are playing takes a lot of self-discipline. If he decides he doesn’t like engineering, I also agree with the caution on assuming he can transfer. I know a straight-A student from Tech who couldn’t transfer into UVA and a straight-A WVU student who couldn’t transfer into Tech. Those going to community college under articulation agreements are taking a lot of those slots. The WVU option therefore sounds very risky. I would want to have a better feel for his in-state transfer options, perhaps trying to find out how many transfers various Virginia schools accept from WVU each year. I think he might have to look at a school like VCU as a transfer student.</p>

<p>As for a generic engineering degree, most job openings I have seen specify exactly which engineering degree they will accept. If the opening specifies mechanical, civil, and electrical as an example, the career services site at WVU won’t let the student apply if their degree is in chemical, petroleum, or aeronautical. The computer has a message saying “You are not qualified to apply for this job” or something to that effect. Only a handful of openings allow any engineering major to apply. If a firm is recruiting at JMU, I assume that would not be an issue since there is only one choice and career services at JMU would be set up accordingly, but how many firms would recruit at JMU for engineering? It could also be an issue for off campus recruiting. </p>

<p>It sounds like a tough decision. I think I would lean toward JMU, but not for engineering or community college and then a transfer to Tech or some other in-state school for engineering.</p>

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<p>Sometimes what is the “safer” or “better” thing to do does not agree well with our kid’s personality. </p>

<p>My kid for example does well only when he is strongly motivated. He would never stick and self discipline himself to do well in a program that although brings more jobs it does not interest him. On the other hand if my kid “clicked” with the general engineering program he would go above and beyond what expected and get a better job as a result.</p>

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<p>My son is graduating from Virginia Tech next month in engineering. However,he almost went to JMU before he got off VT’s waitlist. He loved JMU and every kid and parent I know with JMU connections has loved it. Engineering at JMU was in its infancy when son was applying and he actually would have been in their Integrated Science and Technology program there(as we thought engineering was too new then-but sounds like they are close to ABET accreditation now so that really makes a difference). Have you looked at George Mason for engineering? The WVU option sounds pretty risky. Many kids transfer out of engineering and you have already realized you cannot handle the tuition at WVU if he has to leave the engineering department. Concentrating on Virginia options sounds good in this situation-JMU, community college, maybe GMU or VCU. Good luck!</p>

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<p>Probably most such come from small schools or small engineering departments like Harvard, Dartmouth, Harvey Mudd, Smith, Sweet Briar, etc. that do not have the size to offer a full course selection in each engineering major.</p>

<p>Some large schools also offer a generalist engineering physics major alongside the usual engineering majors (civil, electrical, mechanical, etc.).</p>

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<p>The CCs in VA don’t have students like these in the transfer-prep courses?</p>

<p>[At</a> just 14, UCLA math student Moshe Kai Cavalin has written his first book, ‘We Can Do’ / UCLA Newsroom](<a href=“http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/at-just-14-ucla-math-student-moshe-229359.aspx]At”>Newsroom | UCLA)
[Top</a> graduating senior a rags-to-academic-riches story](<a href=“Berkeley News | Berkeley”>Berkeley News | Berkeley)
[Aaron</a> Benavidez | Department of Sociology](<a href=“http://sociology.fas.harvard.edu/people/aaron-benavidez]Aaron”>Aaron Benavidez | Department of Sociology)</p>

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<p>I can’t imagine that there are not strong students in the Virginia community colleges that are taking the things they need to transfer for engineering-like calculus,physics,etc. A few years ago, I met a couple of students from our local Virginia cc who were in the engineering club there( they were wrapping presents at a Barnes and Noble to raise money for their club). I was very impressed by both of them.-smart,articulate, goal oriented .</p>

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<p>I am an engineer that was like your son…liked math and science and picked engineering because that seemed to fit and since my dad was an electrical engineer, I chose that. I quickly saw that I didn’t like all the hands on stuff. But no problem, I got through it and graduated as an EE. I took a job that was more high level…no hands on but still technical.</p>

<p>So your son could end up finding out what an engineer does and love mechanical/aerospace so then he should do WVU.
But if he wants to train to basically have a technical degree but not design airplanes, then the more general way to go would be JMU. I think I would have liked JMU.</p>

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<p>The cc in our area has separate classes for engineering. Since students who get the required grades in those courses are an auto-admit to schools like UVA and Virginia Tech I am quite sure the syllabus has been thoroughly vetted and the classes are rigorous. If your S attended WVU, he would find a mix of students who weren’t very strong academically, along with those who are extremely bright. The biggest difference to cc would be in scale. For JMU, there would be less of a range.</p>

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<p>The CCs in VA don’t have students like these in the transfer-prep courses?</p>

<p>At just 14, UCLA math student Moshe Kai Cavalin has written his first book, ‘We Can Do’ / UCLA Newsroom
Top graduating senior a rags-to-academic-riches story
Aaron Benavidez | Department of Sociology </p>

<hr>

<p>Of course they do!!</p>

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<p>I’m not 100% sure, however I believe the students who have fulfilled articulation agreements and are not subject to evaluative acceptance for VT transfer are okay for spring 2014. I’d have to go back and look at the website. (iPhone makes this difficult as I don’t remember where it was posted.) What this tells me is enrollment is tight, you can’t count on transfer availability each semester, and no matter what your credentials are those students who have completed the articulation agreement at VaCC will always take priority. </p>

<p>I can appreciate the stereotype of a student at CC. It’s really not the case anymore. With the economic downturn many families can no longer afford, or are unwilling to incur debt, for a four year residential college experience. Many students that may have gone to privates are now choosing our top publics making competition even greater. Students getting turned down to their top choice see the articulation agreement as a viable alternative to still go to their school of choice. These kids are bright, motivated, and work hard.</p>