<p>What are some schools with a strong engineering program, particularly mechanical engineering?</p>
<p>How much does school rank matter when it comes to finding employment? Is there a large disparity from the schools ranked from 5-20?</p>
<p>Some people will say “it doesn’t matter”, but it does. Ignoring non-traditional positions (those are a different issue altogether), employers choose where to recruit and where to target based on certain criteria: </p>
<p>1) where did the executives go to school (executives love to force the recruiters to go to their alma maters)?
2) what are the nearby flagships (if a company is in Ohio, it will recruit at Ohio State, if it’s in Louisiana, it will recruit at LSU)? And
3) what are the top ranked schools? </p>
<p>Companies then use these criteria to select a number of schools (the number at which they recruit depends on the size of their company), and they go to those schools and hire. After they hire, they track the graduates from those schools through the company to see if they need to stop recruiting at a school and move on to another.</p>
<p>So if you’re at a school that’s in the Top 5, for example, you’re going to have a ton of employers coming to your campus because even if your school doesn’t fit criteria 1 or 2, you’ll be selected because you’re a top school (criterion 3).</p>
<p>On the other hand, if you’re the #25 school, most of your employers will come because of criteria 1 or 2. The only people that come because of criterion 3 are the massive employers that need to hire a lot of people.</p>
<p>The result is that there are more national and international positions available at the top ranked schools, and more local positions at the lower ranked schools. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, depending on the location. Texas A&M, for example, primarily has local employers visit. However, there are a ton of engineering positions in Texas, so this isn’t necessarily a problem for students. On the other hand if you’re in a place like Wyoming, this could be a bigger issue.</p>
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<p>Finding INITIAL employment is where school rank may come into place. After about 5 years of experience, it becomes more about experience than school rank. Just think of the structure of a resume of an experienced engineer…the education is at the bottom of the resume because it matters less.</p>
<p>Also, supply-demand factors in. If a company needs software engineers, it cannot afford to wait and hire every Carnegie Mellon grad. The govt will snatch that contract away so they need bodies and that means taking from middle-ranked schools.</p>
<p>It depends on if you want to work as an engineer or if you want to do something engineering-related. If you want to work for an engineering firm or work as an engineer for the government, where you go to school really doesn’t matter. The above poster points out that the engineering firms prefer to recruit at state flagships, which is true. However, the engineering firms tend to not be particularly snobby or competitive, so a resume from a lesser known school with good internships and coursework will get due consideration. </p>
<p>If one intends to go into finance/consulting or something related to that it is essential to go to a top school overall, not a top school on the engineering rankings. For example, Harvard/Yale are good choices for an engineering major with these interests even though they don’t top the engineering rankings.</p>
<p>The issue is that initial placement impacts future placements. A ChemE with initial placement at Exxon as a Process Engineer will have more opportunities at 5 years than a ChemE with initial placement at WinderChem, a small local company in rural Alabama. The two engineers won’t have the same experiences, won’t have the same contacts, and won’t have the same perception of former performance. Similarly, a ChemE that starts at $70,000/year will have a higher salary after 10 years than a ChemE that starts at $40,000. That $30,000 gap will decrease over that time, but there will still be a gap. </p>
<p>Also, your college does impact how you move in a company. An MIT engineer will be more likely to be fast tracked initially than a McNeese State graduate, all else being equal. Having “MIT” on the resume creates a certain expectation about your intelligence level. </p>
<p>This is the way I visualize it (and this is probably pretty specific to me, but maybe it will make sense to someone else): Let’s say that all engineers have a “quality level” that’s between 0 and 10, with 10 being the best. Now, take two engineers that are both truly 7’s. Engineer MIT graduated from MIT. As a new hire, because of the MIT background, you’ll probably assume he’s a 9 to start. Engineer NMT graduated from New Mexico Tech. Because of his school, you probably assume he’s a 4 to start. </p>
<p>Over time, people’s performance impacts their quality ranking, and over 10-15 years, Engineer MIT will drop from a 9 to a 7, while Engineer NMT will increase from a 4 to a 7. So after 10-15 years, they reach a point where they’re equal. The difference is that Engineer MIT was better off getting to 7 because the area under his curve (his collective quality perception) was higher than that of Engineer NMT. So by the time they’re considered equal, engineer MIT is probably higher in the company and has a higher salary because he started off at a higher level because of his school. </p>
<p>I’ve seen it dozens, if not hundreds of times. People are fast tracked early because they went to a prestigious school, and this fast tracking creates a reputation by itself. By the time the person’s under performance is evident, they’re already fairly high in the company then they move into management (where it’s easy to hide your performance).</p>
<p>BanjoHitter…</p>
<p>That is because there is more competition for ChemE positions than there are for Software Engineering positions. Also, you are looking at it as someone making a career at one company. Us software engineers jump around from firm to firm and the biggest increases in pay usually come from a new employer.</p>
<p>One more thing that skews this with software engineering is “he who is fastest to the newest trend gets the money then”. If that MIT software developer does not learn say Java version #333 and Wyoming State grad does and some company X needs an engineer with Java #333, guess who that company is hiring.</p>
<p>I do see your point when it comes to highly competitive job areas, but when firms “need bodies” and need bodies quick, those firms can only be so choosy.</p>
<p>Banjo, you’re assuming that the MIT guy underperforms to a 7. Is it possible that most MIT engineers live up to their higher expectations? Does the MIT (or other elite) education improve ones chances of actually being a top performer afterward?</p>
<p>My example above was the case where you have 2 individuals that are exactly identical except for the school they attended. My argument is that the school impacts the engineer’s standing and salary even after 10 years - basically that the old wives tail of “your school determines your first job then your performance is all that matters” does not hold.</p>
<p>GLOBALTRAVELER - Obviously in the case of a required specialty, understanding that specialty is very important. But I don’t think that’s the case for many engineers. I can see it for software engineering, but in mature fields like CE, ChemE, EE, ME, etc. I don’t think that argument holds as well. </p>
<p>I think the argument still holds for someone changing careers frequently - in fact it probably holds stronger. When you change careers, your performance doesn’t necessarily follow you. Your former employer and your college are what establishes an initial expectation level.</p>
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<p>Idk about this. An employee who is perceived as being good will be given better things to work on that will make him look better. Likewise an employee who is perceived as poor will get low quality tasks that will make him look mediocre, even if he performs them very well.</p>