Rose-Hulman
RPI
Case Western
Are all great and there is a NASA facility in Cleveland where Case Western is.
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That is great information about Michigan. And something to consider as you make final decisions in April or sooner. That 2.0 allows the true design process to happen and students will not be afraid to take tougher classes and not waste time trying to find easy classes to balance out their GPA.
Make sure to look at the fine print in merit aid. Many in-state tuition grants/scholarships are tied to maintaining a certain GPA with a certain number of credits. When state legislators have asked me over the years why kids at Clemson and USC drop out of STEM majors I point back to them and ask them why they are holding first year students to something that is clearly not sustainable with the GPA requirements. Going from weighted GPAs in high school to a land where a B+ or A- can be illusive is tough, add on advanced STEM classes first semester (most knocked out the basic 101 and 102 classes with AP and DE in HS) and they are looking at their roommate who is a communications major with envy.
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I think your nerves are getting the best of you and you’ve gone down the CC rabbit hole. Remember that the students you see on CC tend not to be “typical”. I think your chances at CU Boulder are great and you may even see some merit money.
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CU is a slam dunk and excellent in the area studied. Last year, most kids got $6,250 merit but a few (very few got more) - not sure how much.
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My nephew went to CU and majored in ME. Not sure he even took an AE class but has worked at Northrup Grumman since graduation on some moon project. Daughter went to Florida Tech (she’s civil, not into space) and many of her friends had the same experience, ME not AE but lots of internships and co-op program opportunities with space contractors or NASA. One of her friends was sitting in the control center for a launch last year wearing a Florida Tech sweatshirt - pretty cool.
CU is better than Mines for aero, Mines is better for the hard rock subjects.
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“Pathnottaken’s” advice is spot on. Our older daughter had her GPA drop below a 3.0 during her lower division classes and lost her Bright Futures scholarship. She complained about the very issue that her friends in communications, etc. had 3.5+ versus her taking Calc 3, Phy 2 and Chemistry in one particular semester. The good news is she finished up with a Civil Engineering degree Magna Cum Laude (GPA in her major) and is doing fantastic in her career. Point being, focus on the whole package in terms of college choice.
Colorado School of Mines minimum GPA for merit is 2.5, but the Merit is only for 4 years where their 4 year graduation is like 60%, Rose-Hulman has said that their merit aid minimum GPA is 2.0 and their 4 year graduation rate is extremely high. Yet, both of these guarantee your major. Not saying they are better, just that the Devil is in the details as has been put forth here by others.
Lastly, to the OP’s original question, we toured CU Boulder and their Aerospace program looked fantastic, especially the facilities and I feel confident with his creds he will be accepted. Yet, if he wants other options at this late date, he might look at places like Rose-Hulman, Mines, etc. and go Mech E then consider a MS in Aero.
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Thx soooo much for the advice and words of confidence!
An additional strategy to keep GPAs up so they can keep their scholarships and to keep them in STEM majors is to select Freshmen housing/dorms that have a theme or focus for engineering or STEM. It helps them work through tough classes together. Many times they are close to the side of campus where the bulk of their classes will be, too.
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Honestly, engineering is hard for the “best” Students. No one coming away saying it’s easy. My son at Michigan used to tell me they all,“Struggle together .”
Go to your breakout groups that have less students to go over the material usually with TAs. Go to your professor hours to ask questions. They wrote the test so might have hints if your on track. Go to your learning services center. Go to your science and math labs. Peer to peer tutors and join study groups.
Then take your first quiz /test. Lol… See how you do. This will guide you where you need help.
My son got his first “C” ever and I suggested seeing a tutor /professor and he laughed and said that was the “good” grade for the class… 
…
You might need to swallow some pride when seeing a “B” being something like 60…
The key is time management. As someone stated above perseverance is key. How bad do you want it or anything. Many interviews you have will also know the reputation of the school you go to… So just get in somewhere that good for you and do the best you can and also have some fun and get involved with campus activities /clubs etc. My son did some interviews this year for his company and was put off how many people didn’t get involved with their campus. He was extremely involved and still able to get his enginerring degree.
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Great advice. My parents are both engineers and they said sometimes they would get a 40 on a test and feel horrible but after a curve, it ended up being a high B. Lol Engineering is about survival, apparently. My mom studied so much that she brought a coffee maker into a corner of the library. 
Yep, I upped the 40 to a 60 not to scare you … It’s crazy but it’s the way it is. After you finish your basics things can get easier to a point. With both parents engineers, they will be able to guide you. I talk to engineers daily (in non engineering roles) and not one said it was a cake walk. I know someone at University of Illinois that was getting like all C in CS. His father wanted him to change gears. He didn’t and now has 12 engineers in CS under him… Lol…
You will be fine…
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To the OP- relax! You look to be an outstanding student, and will excel at most programs. To state the obvious, if you choose to go to the most competitive schools, then you will face the most competition, but with your stats you should be fine, unless we are talking about the MIT’s and Stanfords, and even then you might be ok. UT is a great match, but Purdue would be a great, realistic, OOS option where you would likely be able qualify for their exceptional Aerospace program. Michigan is tough to get into, and expensive, but you would still be a competitive candidate.
S2 has similar stats to yours, and is looking at going into CompE. He is already accepted at his State flagship, like you, but has some reach/match schools that he is also applying to. Unlike you, cost is of some concern, so MI/Cal are out, but Purdue/WI, and a couple of others are doable. He is less concerned about the competition, but more about fit, and his unwillingness to go to a "grind" school that has a lot of "weed out" classes, but at some point you have to make your peace with the fact that the best schools are also the ones with the hardest classes and the most hoops to jump through. I think he has been a bit freaked out by hearing his older brother's "war story's" at McGill. His list;
U of MN- match. comfortable, affordable, still challenging. Crying optional.
Cal Poly- intriguing. Very small OOS cohort (15%). Rep as a “hands on”, practical school. Has Aerospace…have no idea how good it is- will be at least decent. I am sure it is tough, but you can test out of some courses with AP Calc BC, Physics, etc…
Iowa State- safety. VG, affordable ENG school. Could be a free ride/Honors for someone with your stats. Huge Aerospace program… a poor man’s Purdue.
Purdue- match. Tests out of some of the weed out classes. Friends seem to like it, and say it’s doable. Good school spirit, but dominated by the ENG faculty. Housing shortage. Exceptional Aerospace. Dad keeps telling him it’ll be hard to find a date due to the gender imbalance! A grind school, by rep, but I wonder if that is partly because they have lower admissions standards compared to most “elite” schools, and the complaining is done by those students. Great Co-op program.
WI- VG school, but probably not for him. Many love it as a quintessential college experience. No Aero.
Rice - a reach. Seems like a great school for teaching quality, without being a “grind” school, though the student body is exceptionally bright. No Aerospace there. Love the smaller numbers. Weather is scary to him, everything else looks good.
Cornell- outstanding school, and an obvious reach. No undergrad Aerospace, but they do offer a Masters…don’t know what that’s all about. Considered to be a grind. Crying, but they provide soft linen handkerchiefs to blow your nose into.
Duke- reach. I have no idea what is going on here. He hates basketball, and hot weather. No Aerospace.
Waterloo- Reach. The ultimate grind school. Exceptional students, lots and lots of crying into rough paper towels. Great Co-op program. No Aerospace.
UIUC - did not apply. Good Aerospace, and ENG in general. Not a fan of the school, but you can’t deny the quality. Have two BIL’s who are alums, and they somewhat in agreement.
Hope this helps. As I said above, S2’s stats are a tad lower than yours, but pretty similar. Once he got into MN, it allowed him to relax and enjoy the rest of his admissions ride, as he believes that he will be able to get into the major of his choice at MN. I think(?) it would be the same for you at UT.
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Purdue’s EA deadline has long passed. Purdue fills the vast majority of their class in EA.
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Agree with “Pathnottaken’s” advice. Adding my freshman EE major’s first semester experience. D21 36ACT, 1590 SAT tied #1 of 423. 14 APs. at Texas Tech: retook Chemistry even though she had AP credit for it to “pad” GPA needed for her stacked COA scholarships. Low and behold, she got a B in Chem lab 1 credit class because it has harder than anything she has encountered and did not think she needed to reach out to anyone.
Thankfully it was only a 1 credit class but this just shows that high school is not college.
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S2 EA’ed. I would imagine that the OP would still get in, with his stats, if you are referring to him.
That hasn’t historically happened for OOS engineering applicants. And there is zero opportunity for merit or honors college after 11/1.
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Ah, ok, didn’t know that.
Since cost isn’t a factor for him, then merit isn’t a big deal. Purdue is quite reasonable in OOS cost compared to it’s ENG peers, in any event.
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I’m curious what “true design process” Freshmen engineer candidates go through, and what freedom students actually have as the Freshman coursework is pretty well proscribed at most schools, prior to a 3rd semester transfer.
I only looked at the schedules for four engineering majors, but first year was identical for all, with the same “Intellectual breadth” as the only options. Sample Schedules – Engineering Advising Center (interesting URL)
Hi @RichInPitt, My reference to the engineering design process was about removing the stress of maintaining a certain GPA initially. Students at some colleges are held to an impossible GPA to maintain scholarships or to be able to move forward in their desired major. Engineering students should be allowed time to learn from failures in engineering and they also have very tough courses compared to other majors.
Look for engineering programs that get you into hands-on problem solving early on. For someone transferring that may be when they get there that second year, but there are also engineering courses at community colleges that are building these same skills.
Look at the fine print of merit offers - Engineering students struggle to maintain a 3.5 or 3.2, or even a 3.0 that first year. I hate to hear that scholarships were dropped when students are genuinely giving it there all. I also hate to see students look for easy classes to rebalance their GPA or when they drop STEM interests completely.
For reference, there are various versions of the steps in Engineering Design Process, but they all allow for learning from failures and trying again with the newly constructed knowledge:
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Tufts - Engineering Method | Electrical and Computer Engineering Design Handbook
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At MIT - Ramirez’s team met failure a few times throughout the design process. “We definitely failed a lot, but I think that there is a lot of learning in that,” he says.
First-years learn fundamental principles by creating | MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology -
Adapted for K-12 STEM schools by the Fort Worth Museum - Engineers always expect to fail during the Design Process; they see failure and mistakes as steps that lead them to a good solution to the problem. The engineering Design Process give engineers a framework to help them solve problems.
- ASK: identify the problem; before building, engineers define the problem they want to solve and come up with a variety of solutions—the more, the better.
- IMAGINE: brainstorm the possibilities of the challenge; Engineers share their ideas about solutions with team members this is called collaboration.
- PLAN: think, sketch the design, label the working drawings; Engineers write and sketch their ideas and solutions. Their drawings are detailed and labeled.
- CREATE: make the prototype following your plan; Engineers gather materials and build.
- TEST: test the prototype to see what parts work well and what parts don’t; Engineers run tests on their prototype.
- IMPROVE: what needs to change to improve it; Engineers learn how to find what specific parts work well and what parts do not work well, then they work on fixing just those parts rather than beginning the whole project over which can waste valuable time.
- REFLECTION: give careful thought to the solution; Engineers present their work to colleagues to show how they solved a problem. They learn new ideas and approaches from each other.
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As others have pointed out, engineering is flat out hard. My kid was a top hs performer,when they ranked through sophomore year he was top 2%. 34 ACT. Had to drop a class freshman and junior year. While he has a 3.6 and 3.2 in major, we’ve had many stressed phone calls, many I’m going to fail out messages and as parents, concern that the 3.0 needed for his 90% scholarship would be gone. And all are right…a 3.0 in engineering vs say Sociology is likely much much harder. It’s too bad majors aren’t indexed for difficulty. Then again an engineer might struggle in sociology.
What’s important is that, at Bama for example, you go on advisory / probation and get another year to catch up.
My point isn’t to push Bama (although it’s underrated in engineering). My point is to check the merit policies at each school that may award merit to see if they give you some breathing room.
My daughter is in a special program at her school. She needs a 3.5 to stay in. She has to carry that stress from day one. It’s immediate and unnecessary but that was the school she wanted and hopefully if she misses she’ll take the loss in stride. Of course hopefully she doesn’t miss.
But kids just know if you do your best, your parents will love you even if you lose a scholarship.
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