Engineering schools

College Majors Engineering Majors
1

<p>Still a mother on an ever constant quest for info here. :)</p>

<p>What are some of the best engineering schools in the East (northeast or southeast). We live in North Carolina and would more than likely like to have our daughter at least anywhere from Fl to Maine or anywhere in between. (that is if her desire to be an engineer continues in two years).</p>

<p>I've seen lists of the top engineering schools. I have the Fiske Guide to colleges (a wonderful book I might add), and those are helpful. But I want to know more.</p>

<p>It would be great to have her in a school with a somewhat even male/female ratio (instead of the more male dominated schools), but when I mentioned this to her, she said she would not mind even if it was male dominated, "all the better to prove myself mom" was her answer. :)</p>

<p>I've read about the schools that are ALL work with barely any social life. I don't want a party school for her, but by gosh, I still want her to be able to have some fun for heavens sake. She's still all girl and likes to socialize.</p>

<p>My daughter is a wonderful mix. Very intelligent. pretty, gifted in science and math, but she likes to be with her friends, she likes to shop, she can even sew, crochet, and is an artist. I'd love for her to be somewhere where she can grow and have fun, but also be in an excellent school....of engineering.....she wants biomedical engineering.</p>

<p>We are middle class....not rich, not poor so money IS an object. The highly unattainable MIT does not offer merit scholarships. Duke University has Pratt School of engineering, but is a very expensive private school. And just so on and so forth......</p>

<p>anyone have any suggestions on the BEST, but yet well rounded schools of engineering? Or am I just asking too much? Is there such a thing?</p>

2

<p>Eengineers will have more work than most other majors. Schools may seem to really vary on workload/social life, but I would guess that it correlates with % of engineering students. For example, MIT is known as a workaholic school because it has many science and engineering majors. At Cornell, engineering is only one part of the university, so the school lacks a reputation for lots of work, even though engineering students may similar loads to the MIT students. However, I have no idea. I've never been to school. I'm making most of this up.</p>

<p>Johns Hopkins is on the east coast and has great biomedical engineering. It's had problems in the past, but the school is making good progress.</p>

3

<p>I would recommend she try applying to Olin, which is in Mass. They try and get a near equal male/female ratio so there are a lot more women than an average school. Olin gives full scholarships to all students who are accepted. I would consider it amongst the best in the nation. There's also Smith college, which is the nations only all women's engineering school. I have to give a plug to Smith since I know one of the faculty members there.</p>

<p>I would also recommend Cooper Union, but only if she would like a city (NYC) experience. In general I recommend that students consider schools that will focus on teaching them, which schools like Olin and Smith (especially Olin) do quite well.</p>

4

<p>Bucknell (LAC)
PSU (State Uni, may be too many parties for your taste but good school nonetheless :))
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute(Uni)
Carnegie Mellon(Uni)
Princeton University(Uni)
Swarthmore College(LAC)
Lehigh University(May be too many parties for your taste)
Stevens Institute of Technology(Uni)
those r just a few</p>

5

<p><a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=138753%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=138753&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

6

<p>There are a variety of scholarships for women in engineering - friend's brilliant daughter had many offers - went to U. Maryland with $ to spare and got Masters in 5 years.</p>

7

<p>Georgia Tech, Virginia Tech, RPI, Cornell. </p>

<p>An aside: Virginia tech is located in the countryside unlike a lot of other tech schools. Blacksburg (the college town) also has the best weather east of the Rockies, in my opinion. It has a very large ROTC program, though with the way things are going in the world these days it may be a better idea to take on a lot of debt than commit to being a soldier.</p>

8

<p>If you want to have any sort of social life or retain any type of normal personality, do not apply to Olin. Look at their website and you'll agree.</p>

9

<p>I disagree with the above comment. I am an oliner, I have a life. (I can point you to a few others who have lives too. ) Becky, care to chime in. and I know there are Olin parents on here too. We work hard, but we play hard. </p>

<p>Olin is nearly 50/50 which makes it rock. Ive had a blast, there are parties every weekend (if thats your thing). There are malls and things near by, theres boston. Every one finds what they love and is free to do it. </p>

<p>as to other good schools since we clearly know which one I think is the best, RPI, WPI, UVa, Vanderbilt, all of these are ones I applied to. They are very supportive of females in engineering and I wouldnt have applied if they werent.( I had a bad time with Ga Tech oddly enough)</p>

10

<p>I agree with the aforementioned comment...Virginia Tech has an amazing Engineering school. Ranked #14 overall for undergraduate Engineering studies, Virginia Tech has a wonderful mix of academic and social life. I am from out of state and I chose Virginia Tech Engineering over Penn State Engineering, NC State Engineering, and over University of Maryland Engineering. I honestly and truly believe that Virginia Tech has a much better Engineering program than the aforementioned. Just my take on some of the mid-atlantic state schools that were mentioned. Good luck to your daughter with her decision.</p>

11

<p>To the OP and advice for her D (daughter):</p>

<p>Note: I've researched on all the schools I talk about quite a bit. I've visited most of them and talked to alumni and current students from most of the schools. So even though I didn't attend every one of them, I'm confident in my assessment of the colleges in regards to your D's kind of personality or at least from what you've described it to be: hard-working,smart, not too cut-throat, chance to have fun and be social and well-rounded.</p>

<p>I'm not sure if the poster who criticized olin is speaking from experience. Looking at a website doesn't exactly justify a college's characteristics.</p>

<p>I myself am a Cooper Union student in chemical engineering so I don't have first hand experience on Olin either. From what I've been hearing from quite a few people and sources; however, is that Olin students tend to be very happy. If you look at the Princeton Review's most competitive/most desirable colleges, you'll Olin is top 5 (along with MIT/Pton/Yale/Stanford). Getting into a college tuition free with only 150 extremely talented, well rounded students is a unique, wonderful opportunity so I concur with PR's assessment. </p>

<p>However, I belive Bucknell Univ. is just as good as Olin even though it's not as "prestigious". </p>

<p>Bucknell students tend to love the college experience. I've written to and heard from recently graduating students in the chemE department and they said it was challenging but the best times of their life. The town of Lewisburg is beautiful and students love the environment. Bucknell's biomedical and chemical engineering programs are top ranked and receive top recruiters. Bucknell's profs are very friendly and receive excellent ratings. The community fosters a confident, friendly approach to education rather than a cut-throat, uber-competitive kind of a setting. This is a college where students work hard and help each other study and know how to relax. I would strongly sending your D to Bucknell.</p>

<p>Johns Hopkins/Cornell- I would strongly discourage your daughter from attending these colleges because her personality doesn't match the college's. I know a person back from high school who was gung about hopkins biomedical engineering. He was very bright and very hardworking. After two years of biomedical engineering at hopkins, he tranferred out to a lower ranked college and changed majors. From his point of view, the college is very cut-throat and competitive and he hated it. Baltimore isn't exactly the most interesting place in the world either; he and other complained of how incredibly boring the city was.</p>

<p>Hopkins is a great school and many like it but I don't think your D would enjoy it. </p>

<p>Cornell - many love it and many hate it. It's sort of like Michigan engineering with mixed views from across the campus. Again, very competitive and classes move very fast and I mean VERY. This college is the best known engineering college in the ivy league for a reason: it's rigor. Cornell provides a great education like Hopkins but it has a high stress environment and many are depressed in semi-isolated place like Ithaca. I've heard quite a few complaints about profs moving through a very large of material very quickly without getting in-depth into the specifics. This seems to be the case in many computer science/engineering related classes.</p>

<p>Again, Cornell is a wonderful college but is 4 years of extreme rigor/stress worth it? I know a person who transferred into Cornell and then wanted badly to transfer back out because he had no idea it would be so challenging. Your D's personality is one that isn't recommended for Cornell.</p>

<p>Michigan Engineering - same thing as Cornell. Great college with great recruits but very stressful/challenging/fast paced/more research less teaching oriented - not recommended for your D.</p>

<p>Cooper Union - The MOST challenging/cut-throat engineering institution in the world (maybe with the exception of MIT). Do be careful before you send your D here.</p>

<p>Most, if not all Cooper students have been accepted to ivy league/other top colleges but with absolutely no financial aid hence they turn them down. Half the Cooper Union students have been accepted into MIT but still can't afford it so they turn it down. Life at Cooper is very hard (later on you get used to it:-) so it's not so bad) but it sharpens and disciplines a student into shape. We've had students transfer out to Cornell/ Michigan and they said it was cakewalk compared to Cooper Union. Cooper is a commuter college so it seems that there isn't a college experience but a lot students still have a social life and enjoy the NYC. Academics are fantastically challenging. The profs are relentless and teach with passion. The tests are very challenging and often times, you have to be very intuitive and not just knowledge based to do well. Pure science classes are taught and focused on concepts and theory to an extreme extent. The calculus and physics classes here extraordinarily difficult. They test for very in-depth proofs/theorems/explanations which can be brutally difficult. Many students can't take it and get kicked out of Cooper Union. The typical student here is required to 6 classes a semester (mostly engineering/pure science courses). You truly have to give your toil, tears, and blood to succeed in this college. In the end though, it pays off. Cooper Alumni are extremely successful and are found in executive positions in top companies across the globe. Also, cooper union has very large percentage of the student body persue P.H.D's - fourth largest infact (beaten only by Harvey Mudd/ Cal-tech / MIT). </p>

<p>In the world of engineering Cooper Union has a wonderful reputation both with graduate schools and job market. If your D can survive here, life will be a cakewalk after graduation - I guarantee it. -</p>

12

<p>Since your daughter is interested in biomedical engineering, the only ranking that is of significance should be following...</p>

<p>Undergraduate engineering specialties:
Biomedical / Biomedical Engineering
(At schools whose highest degree is a doctorate)</p>

<ol>
<li> Johns Hopkins University (MD)</li>
<li> Duke University (NC)</li>
<li> Univ. of California–San Diego *</li>
</ol>

<p><a href="http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/brief/engineering/phd/enps02_brief.php%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/brief/engineering/phd/enps02_brief.php&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Unfortunately due to capitalism, U.S. News no longer lists a full listing. However, U.S. News provides the most accurate listing. Also, most prospective employers go by U.S. News Rankings. Anyhow, the other listings are insignificant because those schools aren't necessarily good in biomedical engineering but other disciplines of engineer like Electrical in which case MIT is #1 (my dream school - hope I get in).</p>

<p>As a Maryland resident, I've been to Johns Hopkins on numerous occasions for high school (IB) research papers, classes, etc... The campus is absolutely gorgeous and Hopkins provides a pass/fail system for incoming freshmen to allow them to adjust to the academic rigor of college. Unfortunately a lot of prestigious universities do not offer this system causing a lot of good students to funk out. </p>

<p>In my experience, girls intending to major in engineering tend to have an advantage over boys especially at Johns Hopkins, MIT, Standford, etc. </p>

<p>Please note that all schools offer financial aid. For example 93% of MIT students are on financial aid. Also note that many schools offer scholarships. For example, one can apply for a scholarship at Hopkins simply by writing another essay - btw very intriguing topic.</p>

<p>Good luck to you and your daughter. I wish for the best.</p>

13

<p>
[quote]
Since your daughter is interested in biomedical engineering, the only ranking that is of significance should be following...</p>

<p>Undergraduate engineering specialties:
Biomedical / Biomedical Engineering
(At schools whose highest degree is a doctorate)</p>

<ol>
<li>Johns Hopkins University (MD)</li>
<li>Duke University (NC)</li>
<li>Univ. of California–San Diego *

[/quote]
</li>
</ol>

<p>Rankings aren't everything. The OP already said she wants a collaborative environment, and I've heard from several people who go there about how cut throat JHU is (correct me if I'm wrong). Also, CA is outside the geographical area the OP is interested in. </p>

<p>Fit matters. Really. 2 years ago I applied to 7 schools, got into 6, was waitlisted for 1, and spent a couple weeks sweating because I realized that the only school that actually fit me was the one that waitlisted me. I got in off the waitlist but I would have had a very tough choice to make otherwise. Figuring out fit before you apply can save you a lot of that angst.</p>

14

<p>
[quote]
If you want to have any sort of social life or retain any type of normal personality, do not apply to Olin. Look at their website and you'll agree.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>As an Olin sophomore, I don't believe your statements are true, but I realize that Olin is not a fit for everyone. For me, Olin is a very good fit and (as I posted above) the only good fit that I managed to find. I am extremely glad that I am able to attend Olin because I still firmly believe that there is not other school at which I could be as happy as I am at Olin. </p>

<p>In the future, please back up your criticisms with facts so we can have honest discussions of the quirks, flaws etc. of the school instead of vague accusations of having no life.</p>

15

<p>Your situation mirrors what our family went through when D (current freshman) was trying to find the right fit. Washington University in St. Louis turned out to be the ultimate in "fit". They not only opened a 55000 sq.' state of the art building in 2004 for the biomed program on their BEAUTIFUL campus, they have been adding new staff from top schools (including JHU) to augment their growing program. WashU's med. school is #2-3 in the country and during Ds first semester in the biomed. program many of the staff and instructors from the med. school were involved in her lectures. Research opportunities are plentiful both at the school and the medical center for undergrads and seminars have been held during the first semester to inform freshman as to how to obtain internships and research opportunities.</p>

<p>The head of the department took over the Intro to Biomed class 2 years ago and has turned it into a washout class. D spent more homework time on this class than physics, chem and calc! On the up side - she is known by the head of the dept. on a first name basis. Very supportive staff of professors and advisors. Kids are supportive of each other. They are competitive, but not in the cut throat manner we've heard about at other schools.</p>

<p>While the cost of tuition is certainly a challenge, (we are also middle class) WashU does give merit scholarships in the form of Dean's Honorary Scholarships and of course the more competitive half and full tuition ones listed on their website.</p>

<p>There are so many opportunities for community service and social functions (both school wide and Eng. School specific). A dance the Eng. school sponsored last fall had a LED, computer controlled dance floor featured on the CNN news website! There is a campus shuttle giving easy access to classes and local shopping centers. </p>

<p>Even though D explored JHU, Northwestern and similar schools and was accepted, she knew immediately that WashU was her first choice. It's was more about the overall experience available than just the academic experience.</p>

16

<p>Nothing can substitute for a campus visit.</p>

<p>Even though it's a while till your daughter will actually have to make application decisions, I'd suggest that you try to do some visits. With our kids, I found that even short visits to some nearby schools that they would never want to apply to did help in creating focus: whether they like an urban or rural school setting, large or small school, etc. So when we did visit schools they were seriously interested in, they had some ideas and grounds for comparison in their minds.</p>

<p>In spite of all the lists, rankings, and some contentious posters on these discussion boards, the best school for your daughter is the one SHE feels a fit with, not necessarily the one with somebody's highest statistical numbers.</p>

17

<p>Thanks to all for your helpful replies! Really great info.</p>

<p>Wow, that Olin REALLY looks hard to get into! For some reason I had been having trouble accessing their website. The only way I was finally able to go to it is by sending the link from my work computer to home. Who knows what more accomplishments my dgter will make by the time she's ready to apply for college, but right now she has a 2160 on the SAT, GPA 4.0 and is ranked 2nd in her HS sophomore class. But gosh, you sure have to be accomplished to get into Olin according to the bios I read on the site. Wow!</p>

18

<p>Olin is not impossible to get into. I for one, was not the best person with testing and grades. ( I still wonder how I got in... ) My advice for all college admissions is to show a passion. I had mine in robotics and horses. They were my thing. Olin wants people of all backgrouns, and with passions. They want you to add to the school.</p>

19

<p>Talking east coast I think that MIT, Cornell and RPI are at the top. CMU and Gatech are also excellent. If you want biomed, you should look at what RPI is doing with it's new $100M Biotech research center:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.rpi.edu/research/biotech/index.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.rpi.edu/research/biotech/index.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Engineering at any of these schools will be demanding. I'm an RPI grad and can tell you first hand it is a draining experience that I would not want to go through again. Cornell may have the best balance of engineering with social and cultural offerings.</p>

20

<p>To the OP:</p>

<p>If you just want to save money and can't get financial aid, then go to a public school. NCState is a perfectly fine engineering school that is cheap for instaters. So is UNC. Heck, I'd probably choose UNC because a lot of people who think they want to do engineering end up switching out. </p>

<p>Also, I see that a lot of people are talking only about research universities. I have to agree with some of the choices posited by dr_reynolds. If you want to save money, look at Cooper Union - free tuition for every student (still have to pay room/board though). Or if male/female balance is an issue, then how about a LAC like Swarthmore? Or even a women's-only LAC like Smith? And then you can look at the traditional Ivies like Princeton and Harvard. Don't laugh at Harvard engineering - while Harvard engineering isn't the equal of MIT engineering, it is still one of the top engineering programs in the country. And you don't have to worry that much about male/female balance and a social life there. </p>

<p>I personally think that the most well-balanced engineering school out there is Stanford. Unfortunately looks like you've ruled out California.</p>