Hello. I am interesting in getting a degree in electrical engineering, and am beginning to look at my options for colleges. I noticed that certain colleges offer accredited engineering degrees, but they are not a degree in electrical engineering. They simply are a degree in engineering where you may specialize in electrical. An example of this is Swarthmore, where it appears they simply have specializations of engineering. So, is a program such as this equal to a degree specifically in electrical engineering? Or is the degree in general engineering not up to par? What are the exact differences in education, and does one provide more opportunity than the other?
If the general engineering major offers sufficient electives in your preferred type of engineering (electrical, mechanical, etc. – compare the offerings to those where there is a dedicated department and major for the type of engineering to see if this is the case), then you should be able to get the needed course work in it. However, since such schools tend to be smaller ones, they may not be as well recruited as bigger schools.
The smaller schools tend to offer far fewer engineering courses. Swarthmore is a great example, they do not offer many at all, less than 25 if I’m not mistaken. Compare that to a big department, Penn State for example. I think their engineering catalogue is something like 1000 courses. Also what tends to come along with that are the corresponding toys (or lack thereof). I can’t say I’d recommend a tiny program like Swarthmore to a person who actually wants to be an engineer. Swatty might be a great option though for someone who wants an engineering degree to step into the financial sector. Just my opinion.
So how do I know if a small school has a good engineering department and a well recruited program? I know that some smaller liberal arts type colleges are known to be very good for engineering. So what differentiates a school like Swarthmore from Harvey Mudd, for example?
Compare curricula, course catalogs and placement data. Then the very best tool is to visit. I know it can be expensive, but nothing illuminates like that.
My son initially was interested in liberal arts engineering and we found out something interesting. There really isn’t such a beast. All ABET accredited degrees have some liberal arts. Remember physics and math are liberal arts too, but I’m speaking arts and humanities when I say liberal arts. Because the ABET curriculum is so packed with engineering related classes, there isn’t a ton of room for other stuff no matter where you go.
Depending on where you live you can get a pretty quick idea of what you’ll be missing if you go to a smaller LA focussed school. On the east coast compare Lehigh and Lafayette. They’re close. On the west coast, Santa Clara and Cal Poly.
As for smaller liberal arts that are VERY good at engineering, the list is pretty short. Remember you used the modifier VERY. It really all comes down to definition, but I’d probably only have one school on my list, Harvey-Mudd. With that though you are then limited to general engineering. Only you know if it’s worth it for you.
Once you start to visit, it will become VERY clear who has what. We visited all the usual suspects and my son ended up bailing on the idea of “LA engineering” once he saw what he’d be giving up.
Some schools do have heavier H/SS requirements than others. For example, Harvey Mudd and MIT have relatively heavy H/SS requirements compared to schools like Brown. The CSUs in California also have a somewhat heavier general education (including H/SS) requirement than many other schools.
I realize that the engineering department in smaller schools often is not up to par with that of larger universities. However, I prefer schools with a smaller amount of students. So what is the best way to compromise on this? Which schools have smaller populations, or at least smaller class sizes, combined with a great engineering program?
You mean small schools which focus on engineering, such as South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, and Colorado School of Mines? Or, among private schools, Caltech, Harvey Mudd, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Worchester Polytechnic Institute, Stevens Institute of Technology, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, Illinois Institute of Technology, etc.?
No matter where you go you will get some art, history and humanities. For the most part, the outliers like Brown being the exception, you won’t get a ton more or less English, history and social sciences no matter where you go. Harvey Mudd is oft cited as a good option, even by me. They require 30 hours of their 128 hour degree. That’s 23%. Lehigh and Cal Poly, neither of which come to mind when one thinks of Liberal Arts and Engineering, but both of which have great engineering programs, require 25% and 20% E, H and SS respectively. It’s 32 out of 129 hours at Lehigh and 40 out of 200 hours at Poly (they are on quarters).
I wouldn’t write off schools by size either within reason. Some slightly larger schools do a great job at keeping their class sizes small and using only professors as instructors.
I’ll again use my son as an example. He was looking for small to medium sized schools with strong engineering, early exposure to project based learning, that met his non-academic and location requirements and that weren’t, at least according to his perception, all tech all the time grinds (read that no MIT, Caltech, Mines, etc). He chose WPI, RPI, Lehigh, Case Western, and Cal Poly along with a couple of larger state safety schools that he liked. He ended up choosing Cal Poly.
He visited many of the usual suspects that come to mind when one thinks of the stereotype of liberal arts and engineering (Bucknell, Lafayette, Dartmouth, and Santa Clara) except the ones automatically rejected because their course offering was just too small (Union and Swarthmore). Once he set foot into a program with lots of toys (Lehigh) he knew he wouldn’t be choosing a program with less “stuff” and class offerings.
Good luck.
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I was referring to any smaller school with a good engineering department
How exactly did your son see which schools had more toys and more “stuff”?
Also, what do you mean that the course offering at Union and Swarthmore was too small?
Thanks a lot for all the help. I really appreciate it.
@Cryom5, it’s pretty clear once you start visiting what the facilities are like.
Here’s an interesting comparison though that will give you some insight.
http://www.swarthmore.edu/engineering/project-facilities
https://ceng.calpoly.edu/about/facilities/
Swarthmore has 5 lab facilities. Cal Poly has more than 80.
Yes I meant Swatty and Union were eliminated because their catalogue of engineering options were too thin. In any given semester there are 12 engineering classes at Swarthmore to choose from. At major programs there will be hundreds.
What’s the largest school you’d consider?
@eyemgh, I’m not quite certain exactly how large of a school I’d be willing to go to. I suppose if the class sizes were small enough and there were enough opportunities, I’d be willing to go a larger school. However, I would prefer not to go to one of the biggest institutions such as Penn State, where there is just a massive amount of students.
@Cryom5, what else do you want out of a school? Location? Non-academic things like hiking, skiing, surfing, city life, etc?
Have you visited schools yet? Find the right size and geographic location first - then you can expand based on that
Go visit a large state school and small LAC with engineering then work from there
and what else do you want out of college?
Right now you are going a lot of “they say”
I can’t emphasize enough the importance of @swampdraggin’s advice. The best way to know for sure how big is too big is to set foot on different campuses, ideally when classes are in session. My son expanded his scope quite a bit, even applying to a school with 30,000 students, because he liked the program and the campus feel. A cheap version of that, and certainly not a substitute, it to Google the school and select 'images." You’ll learn a lot. Good luck.
Huge class sizes generally only happen for the introductory classes (freshman, maybe sophomore year). Junior and senior year, your classes get a lot smaller.
The max size of my classes/lectures went 300 (freshman) - 120 (sophomore) - 80 (junior)- <60 (senior). Also, a lot of kids skip classes (one of my classes ended up being ~30 people every day). This is at a college of ~40,000 students. It really doesn’t seem that big.
@eyemgh, @swampdraggin I am mostly looking at schools in the northeast in terms of location, and I would love a school with good study abroad programs. Being in or near a fairly large city would be nice, and I consider any good sports teams to be a decent bonus. Those are some of the other things I look for in a college. Other than that, I like colleges with prettier, cleaner campuses.
@Cryom5, unfortunately big time sports and small school size don’t usually go hand in hand. That doesn’t mean they can’t be passionate about their teams and that you can’t have a good time at games.
Given your thread thus far, there are two schools that I’d highly recommend you look at. Certainly others will chime in too.
Lehigh has a well respected engineering program. The campus is pretty. The curriculum has a significant amount of English, arts, history and social sciences. The students seem happy and they are really into their sports teams even though they are DIII.
WPI is a great little school. Again their engineering is well respected. Students all seemed happy. The campus is pretty, in a neat little town and easily accessible to Boston. Sports aren’t as big a deal at WPI because it’s very small (3500 students), but they have several VERY intriguing features. Their curriculum is project based. Cal Poly’s motto has always been Discere Faciendo, Learn by Doing. In the 1970s WPI adopted that philosophy and took it one step further. In addition to what might be called a Senior Design Project or Capstone at other schools, there’s a major Junior project and there can even be a big Freshman project. They also operate on 7 week terms. It’s like a hybrid of blocks and quarters. You only take 3 classes, usually two technical classes, one of which might be your project, and a non-science liberal arts course. Lastly, there’s no school that does study abroad for engineers better than WPI. They have actual, hands on engineering projects all over the world that you just transport right into for 7 weeks.
I like both of those schools a lot, especially WPI. My son was very much on the fence between Cal Poly and WPI and certainly would have been happy there too.
Lastly, Olin. It’s like no other school. There are no sports to speak of. It’s pretty because it’s basically carved out of Babson. It’s tiny. Almost certainly smaller than your high school. The curriculum is very innovative. They are a tight knit bunch. It really is a love hate thing with no other school remotely like it. Students either think “no way in hell” or “I can’t imagine going anywhere else.” You owe it to yourself to look.
Good luck!
However, athletes may be a larger percentage of the students at a small school. I.e. intercollegiate sports may be more visible from a participation standpoint, even if they are less visible from a spectator standpoint.