<p>what other thread?</p>
<p>@broken_symlink&FallMonkey, I have a general question about this program right now. Hope you can help me. As you see, we need to submit the application before March. Therefore, the admission office cannot see your grade letters for the last semester courses. How about if there are still some required courses I need to finish during the last semester. Will they consider this situation as you have not finish the required courses? Thank you so much!</p>
<p>Like broken_symlink I was recently accepted into Columbia, so I can’t talk about my experiences at Columbia.</p>
<p>@SEASvsTRADITION
It seems you have absolutely no interest in a liberal arts school (going off the “will be STUCK AT A SMALL LIBERAL ARTS SCHOOL,” bit here). If you’re ABSOLUTELY certain you want to do engineering, you might want to consider NEU, RPI, or Drexel over a LAC, especially if you don’t feel Arcadia is a solid school. If you don’t see yourself fitting into Arcadia don’t bother wasting three years there. I believe those engineering schools have a 5th year Master program. When you consider that - your prospects are probably better over a person who grabbed two bachelors degree in 5 years. It’ll also save you the pain of moving from one school to the other. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, there are some advantages to the 3-2 program:
- If you’re unsure about engineering, the 3-2 program will give you some time to decide. A good chunk of people who want to be engineers end up wanting to switch into something else, which may not be possible. When I was deciding which school to pick I had a choice of RPI, WPI, NEU, Clark, or Brandeis… Even with merit aid, I would be shelling out $120,000-$160,000 just to go to engineering school - for a major that I may or may not like.
- Small schools generally give more attention to their students, which is good if you need extra help, advice on career options, recommendations, etc. If Arcadia does research, it should be relatively easy to get into the group of your choice and get experience under your belt.
- Most (all?) of the schools SEAS affiliates itself to are pretty solid schools. Maybe not in engineering (which is exactly why they have this partnership), but the courses should be challenging enough.
- Schools want to see their student succeed. They generally don’t hand them terrible grades simply to mess them up and keep them trapped. If you stay on top of your work, getting a > 3.0 GPA should be very manageable.</p>
<p>tl:dr - Figure out if you want to do engineering. If you’re certain, just go to the engineering school and use your 5th year to grab your masters, which should be comparable if not better than two bachelors when it comes to PhD programs/employment prospects. If not, go with the 3-2 program. The LACs aren’t as awful as you think they are, you might actual like it and ditch engineering all together. </p>
<p>@Jasica
Your acceptance is contingent on passing your last semester at your respective LAC. If you are accepted, they will ask you to submit a copy of your transcript once the grades as you can.</p>
<p>… Yes, it is still possible to be admitted to the program even if you do not finish all the course requirements (though it might hurt your chances); however, you might be required to take summer courses and/or take extra courses in the following two years.</p>
<p>I am not going to Arcadia, I am going to Hofstra university.</p>
<p>RPI and drexel are good for engineering but i think </p>
<p>B.A from hofstra in computer science, and B.S from columbia is better</p>
<p>i am also going to try to apply for the masters program at columbia after to get a masters in mechanical engineering.</p>
<p>if i do not get in to columbias masters program i will apply to other tier 1 institutions.</p>
<p>hofstra is a very easy school to get in to, however it is still a reasonably respected school. </p>
<p>idk if i can upgrade the B.A from hofstra in computer science to B.S at columbia by taking a few classes</p>
<p>what affiliated liberal arts college did you go to?</p>
<p>how do you approach the administration of the school to tell them about the program?
at hofstra i asked them about it and no one there has even heard of the program. i guess there is like a combined plan coordinator at each school.</p>
<p>also did you have to do a special curriculum in order to get the required courses?</p>
<p>did you get recs early in the year like freshman year, or did you do all of that later?</p>
<p>could i get a recommendation from a calc-1 professor to get it out of the way or do all the recommendations need to be from the last year you are there?</p>
<p>they administration at hofstra had no idea what i was talking about, and just told me about double major programs at their school. its almost as if the affiliated schools have never heard of the program?</p>
<p>that is probably fairly common. it was at my school. the only one who knew anything was the professor who originally got my school affiliated with columbia and on the list.</p>
<p>i don’t think there is any point in getting recommendations freshmen year. you should wait until you actually apply to columbia, because if for some reason you end up not applying you will have wasted your professors’ time by asking them to write you recommendations that won’t use. </p>
<p>you shouldn’t expect any special help trying to get all the required courses in. i know i didn’t get any. fitting them in seems to be more a matter of luck than anything else. for example, if my school hadn’t offered differential equations this semester i wouldn’t have taken it. i’m pretty sure its on the required list of classes for my major. the last they offered it was when my friend who is a senior was a freshmen. he is the only upperclassmen around that i know who has already taken it.</p>
<p>also, i don’t know if you know this, but a majority of the people who start out on the 3-2 path never finish. i met at least 3 other kids freshmen year who said they were going to do it. none of them even applied to columbia. this year also seems to be a record year for my school in terms of the 3-2 program. we had 3 kids apply. normally only one or two even apply, and only one goes if any at all.</p>
<p>why would they not do the program??
if they only went to a school to go to the columbia 3-2 plan you would think they would have wasted a lot of time and money by not going.</p>
<p>what are some reasons they do not complete the program?
wouldnt they take classes during the summer if they need to get all of the required courses?</p>
<p>what school do you go to? if you go to a large school you should have no problem getting all of the required courses, but i can see if you went to a small school like arcadia there might be issues with getting all the required courses.</p>
<p>i think it would be a waste of time to go to a LAC for engineering, you come out from a school with little reputation in engineering, only one major as opposed to two, and no preference for columbias grad school.</p>
<p>not completing the program would be the worst thing that you can do.</p>
<p>I talked to a mechanical engineer who did the program and he said it was easy to complete the courses with a 3.0 or better. </p>
<p>i dont know where you are getting this information from.</p>
<p>and as far as making friends goes, i think it would be hard to not make friends at columbia, there are millions of people in Manhattan. </p>
<p>of course there are CC students who look down upon 3-2 students and SEAS in general but they wont be as competitive in internships because of their lack of a B.A degree by their junior year, unless they are an internal 3-2 student with CC and SEAS.</p>
<p>overall i encourage everyone to do this program, if you are a driven individual who is passionate for excellence and wants to do research at a university that is outstanding. </p>
<p>remember to be meticulous, make sure everything is completed perfectly, you wouldnt want to be stuck at a LAC.</p>
<p>engineering is the best major, everything is being outsourced to other countries, but the ideas are still built in america.</p>