My daughter “likes STEM”. Specifically physics and chemistry and math. When I ask her about applying for engineering she kind of draws a blank. How do people know they want to pursue engineering? Did they take specific courses that informed that decision? Or have specific experiences?
How old is your daughter?
I’ve worked with a lot of Grade 9-11 students who are in the same boat: they like STEM subjects in general, but have little in the way of understanding the different paths they can take with this skill set. Many don’t understand the distinction between pursuing research or theory within the natural sciences vs. pursuing engineering. For the former, students tend to be most satisfied and successful if they learn through inquiry, dialogue, and experimentation. For the latter, students find best alignment if they love building and making, solving problems with their hands, and applying theories adaptively to suit different contexts.
Depending on the teenager’s personality, it can be useful to ask questions like: “do you prefer to contemplate big questions about the natural world, or make devices with your own hands that solve the problems around you?”. Often, a career path or goal can be distilled by coming up with a single question the student wants to answer or a single problem they want to solve.
Also, suggest to your daughter that she begin reading publications like Scientific American and poking around resource websites like Golden. Articles on such platforms will often inspire new fascinations within STEM, and can potentially lead her down the “rabbit hole” of Googling that is an early indicator she has really found her niche.
Once she has a somewhat more refined sense of questions and problems that interest her, she can do summer camps, after school programs, internships, online or supplementary courses and more in order to “test” her guesses about what she’ll enjoy and excel at most.
More than anything, she should stick to what gets her excited! Whether that’s sampling plant species in the field, analyzing chemical structures of high-impact pharmaceuticals, developing nanogels or biomimetic robots, or applying math to data science and machine learning… it’s all about the spark that gets her fascinated.
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In HS my D was able to take pre-engineering courses, participate in engineering camps, and shadow engineers. She was also did sci oly and robotics stuff.
SWE (Society of Women Engineers) does a ton of programming geared to high school students. https://swe.org/k-12-outreach/swenext/swenext-clubs/high-school-club-resources/
What year is your daughter? Does she have time to do more exploration or is she a rising senior?
If it’s the later, I will caution that if engineering is on the radar, have your D apply for engineering. At most schools it’s much easier to transfer out of engineering than to transfer in. That will also impact her college list. She may also be interested in looking at colleges that have some kind of engineering design course for freshman that explores different disciplines. Engineers will also take math, physics, and chemistry freshman year so she won’t be behind if she opts to switch out.
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D20 was huge into robotics club; it just clicked with her. She explored various engineering aspects through classes and clubs: concept & design (she took DE engineering/CAD classes), programming (she took CS/programming classes like Python, Java,C++, Matlab) and building (robotics class and club). She knew she wanted a tactile/hands on job; the experiences helped solidify her choice of major.
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Most kids and those advising in high school don’t really know what engineers do. Many students in college in engineering programs don’t have a great grasp until Junior year. If you told my son he would build things there is no way he would go into engineering that he just graduated from. He did do several engineering camps. Many are at colleges for like a week. He learned that he liked collaborating with others to solve a problem. He liked to solve problems not build stuff. He liked the idea of business. He loved math. He didn’t love Physics… Hmm… Engineers take lots of physics… So Industrial Engineering is like business engineering per se. His minors were sustainability and entrepreneurship.
A great local program to do in high school is… https://acementorchicago.org/
These are in most cities. It’s not the engineering he wanted but learning to work on a project in teams is fun. Lots of the things they did here he actually also did in some engineering camps and this is free and fun…
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Second the idea of summer camps. Smith College for example has had one for years. I agree that many engineers tend to be tinkerers and prefer working on things that have definite right or wrong answers, but engineering comes in many flavors. Mostly I think you need a problem solving mindset. I loved my engineering classes in architecture school.
Both my kids were very involved in Science Olympiad and learned a lot from it. My older son really firmed up that what he liked best was computer programming and physics. He gave up doing events like bridge building and robotics early on!
Second the observation that it is much easier to switch out of engineering than into it at most schools.
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this. D20 thrives on thinking several steps ahead to anticipate possible problems. She did a couple university summer programs as well; it killed 2 birds with one stone. She could check out the college’s vibe AND get exposure to various STEM fields.
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My D was in 8th grade when she first thought about engineering as a pursuit. She attended a summer camp for middle school youths called “Green Camp” designed to introduce students to STEM fields. She like the problem solving aspect of it and it furthered her resolve that engineering might be something to pursue. She was good at math and sciences at a young age being moved to Algebra 1 in 7th grade. She took Chemistry the summer after her freshman year of HS and AP Chemistry her sophomore year. She had an excellent AP Chem teacher and began thinking that Chemical Engineering was the direction she was interested in. I had a HS friend who was a Chemical Engineer so we visited him the summer before her junior year and began looking at colleges. He took her on a tour of the plant he worked at and discussed the various jobs she saw people doing and the projects they were working on. He had co-oped as a student so that was something she was very interested in. The summer before her senior year she attended Purdue University’s STEP program (Seminar for Top Engineering Prospects). It confirmed that Chemical Engineering was the major she would pursue and that she loved Purdue University. In the end she attended Purdue as a Chemical Engineering student, did a 5 term co-op with a major chemical company, graduated and has been working for a different top Chemical company for the past 3 years.
Does your D like math and physics? Do you know any engineers she could talk to? College and career fairs could be a good place to find people to speak with. Check with colleges in your area to see if they have pre engineering programs. Engineering is challenging but for those with a passion for it it’s work with a purpose. Good luck.
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You just described my D except she is doing a 3 term co-op instead of a 5 ; )
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S22 did the PLTW track in high school. The first 2 classes, Intro to Eng and Principles of Eng, provided a nice hands-on overview. Scioly, robotics, and summer programs also helped general understanding.
He came out of the womb building legos and continues the obsession to this day. Loves science and math, but really enjoys the complexity of how parts come together.
Going into eng in college is still a gamble, but as others advised, it’s better to try it out than to decide later!
My son’s freshman high school starts with Java. My son didn’t like the class due to the crappy teacher. He liked Java. But didn’t do the school’s CS program so we thought he was doomed… But the engineering camps at Michigan State, Milwaukee school of engineering and Berkeley (different summers), really got him excited. One was robotics, one was software and one was a combination program… He also liked to solve problems and being on the chess team helped lead to find answers when one didn’t seem to be right in front of him… Again engineering is so vast and these kids can go into just about anything.
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Our son went from Astrophysics to Aviation (pilot) to Atmospheric Sciences to Mechanical Engineering which is what he’s majoring in.
He refused to go to a camp. We sent him to a one week one at Purdue which he LOVED. We wanted to send him to a 3 week rollercoaster camp at Michigan…was related to the engineering and science of a coaster.
When we were at Rose Hulman visiting they had their Operation Catapult and the kids we talked to seemed to enjoy it.
I think though clubs at school or Summer activities - brief or long - you can get them a little exposed.
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High school robotics; plus, an alumnus of my son’s high school is currently an engineering professor at Purdue, and he came and lectured to my son’s high school physics class.
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Well, he loved Legos, and always knew which screwdriver to fetch for me when he was very young. Started coding when he was around 12-13. I also gave him access to a workbench, screwdrivers, wire strippers/cutters, other tools, and my Hakko soldering iron about then. He just pulls apart stuff, saving some components, and then constructs circuits from the parts.
Originally he thought CS would be his path, and it still might be, but lately he has been leaning towards CompE, as he thinks it will allow him to be a bit more versatile and hands on. He would like to be able to actually build something, and experience the pride that comes along with that.
He did do Robotics in HS for a while, but found that the Varsity level team too competitive, to be overrun with well meaning parents, and over organized, which got in the way of him actually being able to build things.
I think is another era he would be happy doing EE or MechE, but Computers are cool, and have captured his imagination.
I actually think it isn’t that hard to determine if a kid is more suited for engineering than sciences or math, or vice versa. Sciences and math are primarily about making new discoveries that may have more profound impact and wide-ranging applications. Engineering is more about making things that work in a more specific area. What takes to be a good scientist or mathematician is very different than what it takes to be a good engineer. A kid’s personaity, interest and talent are highly determinative of what path s/he should follow.
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Every kid is different and there are sooooo many engineering major. My son is thinking about engineering. He loved legos as a kid and loved taking things apart. He did some middle school camps and enjoyed building models of bridges and houses using everyday objects like popsicle sticks as well as rocketry. Took PLTW as a freshman and loved drafting. He loves computers but not coding. I suppose this was a good compromise 
. Believe me when I say this, he is no STEM superstar.
Now he is thinking about civil engineering and construction engineering. Before that, it was chemical engineering. I guess for him the last straw was learning about sustainable small/tiny homes.
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The first two years of an Engineering degree at most schools provide a solid STEM foundation with a good mixture of math, physics and chemistry classes. If on the fence about Engineering, I would agree with the other posters to give it a try and then transfer out if the glove doesn’t fit. There are a number of Intro to Engineering and design courses that are offered by different colleges over the summer and I also agree that this is a good place to start. I also went into Engineering because I loved math, physics and chemistry and found the education to be broad enough to satisfy both the theoretical and practical types. Good luck to your kid!
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As an alternative story, D19 also liked STEM, participated in math and robotics clubs (including awards, etc) throughout K-8, took the CTD physics and programing summer courses, etc.
She got to high school, took a summer course in neuroscience. Really liked it, did a summer internship at a neuroscience lab at UIUC, applied as a neuroscience major, and is now planning on doing a PhD on the topic. Her fellow math and robotics club geeks are going multiple ways, though there are a very large number of engineering and math majors among them.
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My son says engineering and I came to this site wondering if engineering fits him. The thread makes me wonder even more (so many want to do CS : )
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@1NJParent @MWolf @teleia @tsbna44
Thank you all, very helpful. D is 17 and looking at colleges now. She did a little math club in middle school and then coding camps, but didn’t like Comp sci. No interest in robotics or tinkering with things… Did enjoy building things in physics labs. Math comes pretty easy so far — heading into Calc B/C.
Sounding less and less like engineers are her people — maybe I was just hoping!