<p>So this is my story, I graduated for high school in new hampshire, about a year ago. Thoughout all of my high school career i have been obssesed with cars, mostly engines and its mechanics. So i took all of the auto classes they offered and pretty much only did well in those classes(like a 2.3 GPA). I just scraped by to graduate and moved to arizona to pursue my education as an automotive technician at the universal technical institute. After about three weeks attending there i quickly realized that my true calling was in engine designing and manufacturing. So i dropped out of UTI and applied at the local community college and am now pursuing a degree in mechnical engineering. So after i get my associate's degree at the community college I want to transfer to MIT in cambridge, I feel they have to best mechanical engineering program in the country. I am willing to do whatever it takes to get accepted there but i am afraid my past has already created great conflict in getting accepted.
So what i am asking is if anyone reading this had any advice for me getting in this school??</p>
<p>you better rock that CC dude
im talking 4.0 GPA and EC’s like woah
MIT is harddddd to get into and without grades its only gonna be harder</p>
<p>You may have a nice obsession with cars, but are you aware of how extremely rigorous a mechanical engineering program is? Let alone, MIT engineering which is tops just about everywhere you see it.</p>
<p>I say you better ace all the hardest classes available at your CC and write some amazing essays and hope for the best.</p>
<p>Yeah, you may want to look at alternatives. Even for the kids with superhigh SATs, a 4.0, and awesome ECs and research, it’s still a crapshoot. They take an obscenely small amount of kids for transfer admissions, sometimes none at all. It’s definitely worth applying to if that’s your dream, but also look at other good engineering schools that may be a little more transfer friendly.</p>
<p>My advice:
Make a 4.0 (at least a 3.8… but that’s seriously pushing it). </p>
<p>What are your SATs? If they’re lower than a 2200, retake it. </p>
<p>Find some interesting ECs at your CC that you can really do well at. I’m not talking about your generic, I volunteered for the soup kitchen 2 hours a week and am in my school’s honor-society stuff. Find something you can excel at. Find research opportunities and internships… this is a must I think to be truly competitive. As a Yale transfer (a school with similarly low acceptance rates), all of my transfer peers had research experience of some sort. All of them. </p>
<p>Write a really kick butt essay (this is a given). Don’t whine in it. Don’t make it sound like it’s full of self-pity. Give thoughtful and well-written reasons for your desire to transfer to MIT. </p>
<p>Find good recs. And by good I mean by teachers that know you well, not by professors with big names who may only barely know you. My two recs were from TAs, not even people with PhDs, yet I was accepted at very good transfer schools.</p>
<p>Good luck</p>
<p>well looks like i got a whole hell of a next two years
thanks everybody who replied great advice, just what i needed.
and i have never took an sat before but am studying like crazy for it next year</p>
<p>should i go for an A.S or a A.A.S in industrial technology</p>
<p>Magi, (sorry for hijacking this thread), what would you suggest in terms of research for a student who goes to a school where opportunities for undergraduate research is very limited (especially for a non-hard science major)?</p>
<p>Jeydomz:</p>
<p>I can’t say for sure. I was fortunate enough to go to a huge research school, so the opportunities are plentiful enough to where you only have to reach out and grab them. My suggestion would be to find research or internships around your community. Maybe there is a larger university nearby. Talk to some of the professors there… you’d be surprised how willing many of them are to give you assistant positions (hey, it’s free work for them). Maybe there are some tech companies located in your city that would likewise be willing to extend that offer?</p>
<p>yeah, like what every one else said, a 4.0 almost seems like a given requirement to transfer to schools in the calibre of MIT. Being one of the best engineering programs in the WORLD, its not a coincidence. Your HS grades are too low im sorry to say. I dont know if MIT has an agreement like UMich does of not considering your HS grades after you attain a certain number of credits at another university or CC…you might want to check on that. Also, The fact that you didnt take any standardized tests during HS is going to hurt you, even if you do take them later on. And you have to realize, a 4.0 even at a community college is hard. Not only do you need a 4.0, you need ECs, AMAZING essays and of course, superb test scores as well. You have to take into consideration that transfer admission is wayyyy harder than freshman admissions at schools like MIT. Furthermore, since you are transferring after two years, you probably need to take all of the engineering pre reqs, like Calculus 3 and differential equations(which are SOMETIMES not offered at community colleges). But, why not, go for it. work your butt off for the next two years and apply. another alternative is to look at other schools with good engineering programs like Purdue university, Illinois-Urbana Champagne, UMich…But these schools are really high caliber too. But MIT is a long shot. : (</p>
<p>good luck.</p>