I am interested in hearing the experience of recent engineering majors. How many classes outside of the engineering sequence does the common curriculum require? Based on what I can gather, it appears that it is 8 classes (the two English classes, 5 breadth classes, and writing in the major). Is this correct? Do you find this limiting?
For my daughter, one of the appealing aspects of a university was the option to explore other interests outside of engineering. However, the common curriculum appears to limit how much exploration she will be able to do outside of her major. Rather than being able to pursue her interests, it appears that most of her classes will be restricted to the classes that are part of the common curriculum. Has this been your experience?
Engineering is a difficult major. There is so much to learn! Even though I placed out of a few classes and took a few more during summers, I was lucky to graduate in 4 years. My electives were two semesters of astronomy and a semester each of tennis and racquetball. That was it! Since ABET accredited schools have to require a rigorous curriculum, there’s not much room for exploration. I went to UT but this applies elsewhere.
I understand that there are a lot of required classes for engineering. How are SMU engineering majors expected to fit in an additional 10 classes (I did not include the foreign language requirement above since my daughter will place out of it)? At every other school where my daughter is looking, she will have room in her schedule for a humanities-based second major/minor. I am hoping to hear from current engineering students (It appears the move to the common curriculum was instituted in 2020). As I mentioned in my OP, she is drawn to a university over a tech school because she has the freedom to pursue her interest in humanities (but not loving the SMU core requirements that are anthropology and sociology driven).
One of my daughter’s good friends is an engineering and music performance double major. She says he has close to a 4.0 GPA.
The University is very keen on accommodating students who want outside majors or minors but of course, engineering has ABET requirements. Does your daughter have many AP credits to apply?
Thank you. What year is your daughter’s good friend? I think that the requirements changed in 2020 (not sure what they were before then, but the new set of common curriculum classes looks crushing for engineers, who have so few electives as it is).
Yes, my daughter will have many AP credits. She will have taken 13 AP exams by the time she graduates in May (although Calc AB and BC are redundant so it’s really only 12 exams). She has scored 5s on 7 exams so far. It looks as though all her AP exams will be accepted for credit, but in terms of her breadth requirements, only her quantitative analysis category will be satisfied. That’s ironic because that is the one course she would have satisfied through her normal course of study. That would leave her with an additional 8 classes that she would need to take to satisfy all university requirements.
If I am reading the requirements correctly, I think it may eliminate SMU from consideration. One of the huge appeals of a university versus a tech school is that it would allow my daughter to pursue her non-STEM passions, but if I am reading the common curriculum requirements correctly, that’s not the case. All of her non-STEM passions would effectively be replaced with core curriculum requirements, mostly from the Anthropology and Sociology departments. And the common curriculum requirements are only problematic at SMU because of the way they structure the requirements. My daughter is not running into this at any of her other schools, even ones who accept far less AP credit.
Her friend is a sophomore who entered in fall 2020. I’ll check into it. My son may go engineering route as well and loves history. What other major or minor is attractive to your daughter?
I have a current freshman CS major. I don’t know much about the curriculum but I do think that some of the classes can count for several requirements - I.e. his Intro to Engineering class last semester gave credit for the Technological Advances and Society Breadth requirement and the Oral Communication graduation requirement. All that to say, some classes can probably serve double duty on requirements!
I got some feedback. First, AP credit counts towards the common curriculum requirements. As @KEHTX1 said, some classes also count for several requirements. I know a professor who is currently advising an undergrad to triple major in two Dedman College majors plus Dance. They key is starting early with a plan and working with an advisor.
The University is very keen on students exploring courses outside their major and even requires all students to have a minor. My DD is a bio major and is deciding between psychology and Spanish for minors. She only had one AP credit that she took. She’s also taking a smattering of other courses plus study abroad.