<p>My DS and I visited with the rep at a college fair last week. Seems like a nice school. What does anyone know about their engineering program? We noticed that they are offering Tri State discounts for Petroleum and Engin Physics.</p>
<p>KU Engineering is pretty awesome. I’m not personally in the engineering program, but I know a lot of engineering majors since I take some similar classes (like physics for engineers and calc for engineers, etc). Engineering physics is a relatively small program, and I know the chemical engineering track seems to be a bit more popular than the petroleum engineering track. Engineering physics is actually a really interesting program, with the different concentrations, like electromechanical or chemical systems. Electromechanical systems concentration for engineering physics I think means a lot of MechE and EE classes, along with extra physics. Chemical systems concentration means ChemE classes with extra physics. KU Engineering actually gives their students a lot of resources, like extra tutor rooms for physics, chem, and calc, and a distinct career center from the rest of the university, and the professors are really easy to get to know. I also know a lot of the students on the Engineering Student Council, which works between the student body and the School of Engineering administration to put on outreach events and special events for engineering students, like Frosh Frenzy and the annual Engineering Expo. Any more specific questions? They might be easier to answer.</p>
<p>Wow, thanks for the reply extrasparklesplz. My son just applied as to get it all in before the deadline of 11/1. Really appreciate the insight from you!</p>
<p>No problemo! Hope your son gets the scholarships he’s aiming for! It’s a way easier process now, since you can know the scholarship offer (mostly) when you apply with the new scholarship system. Instead of crossing fingers that you’d be chose as a Watkins-Berger/Summerfield or Mount Oread Scholars, you can know right from your HS GPA & ACT score. So much easier, and much less stressful than when I applied. Also, if KU’s one of your son’s serious choices, he should look into housing options: off-campus apartments, dorms on-campus, Greek life (for males only as freshmen) and on-campus scholarship halls. The sooner you apply for scholarship halls, the sooner you’ll know whether you’ve been accepted or not, I believe.</p>
<p>We just got back from a Scholar’s Day on Tuesday at KU. Learned a great deal. That 11/1 deadline is key. We were very impressed with the engineering dept. Even more impressive was the honors program. The deadline for that is not 11/1, but I encourage anyone with a super bright kid to try to get into it. I drug my son to the visit [we live 40 min. away] as he has his heart set on the Ivy League. He concluded the day saying that if he got into the honors program at KU he would be very happy and would end up graduating debt free [unlike his brother who is at an Ivy]. Certainly something to add to the mix. We had lunch with a senior from the engineering dept. who already has a job lined up with Exxon in Houston and after 2 years with them has been accepted to Harvard Business School [on Exxon’s dime]. That is, if he doesn’t get the Rhodes Scholarship that he has applied for. As I said, who knew that such a jewel of a school was sitting right here…</p>
<p>Smithview, thanks for your post. Glad to hear you were impressed by the engineering dept. Also nice to hear about student job placements.</p>
<p>I could rave about the Honors Program all day. It’s one of the reasons that I chose KU, and one of the reasons why my time at KU has been AMAZING. I’m also one of the lucky kids who gets to graduate debt-free, and I was an attendee at Scholar Day two years ago. So glad you enjoyed your visit, Smithview! I know talking with current students made a huge difference to me two years ago, compared to my college visits elsewhere.</p>
<p>My son was asked to apply to the SELF leadership program at Kansas, it sounds like a perfect fit for him and he is planning on applying, anyone had any experience with this program? TIA!!</p>
<p>SELF is a fantastic program! I haven’t talked to anyone in it for a while, and I know it’s pretty competitive, since there’s <20-ish, I think, chosen from the freshman class of engineers. I know they have cool shirts though. I think this year’s senior class of SELF fellows/scholars went to Brazil to look at factories, globalization, and green industry. The year before, I believe they went to China for a similar trip. Good luck!</p>
<p>My son was asked to apply to the SELF program as well and am glad to hear something positive about it.</p>
<p>The SELF program is also a great way to get to know people in your area of interest. I know that they have some events, and the scholars really get to know each other, which is good for later on in your engineering curriculum where working together can be crucial, if you’re going to get your projects done in a realistic time frame. It’s definitely worth it to apply. Rock Chalk!</p>