<p>I want to major in mechanical engineering and I was wondering how good harvard is for engineering. Also, between Harvard, Duke and Rice which school is the best for engineering and which school has the most employer recruitment?</p>
<p>Harvard is terrible for engineering. I thought they only offered a degree in "Engineering Sciences," not in a specific subfield (like mechanical engineering, for instance).</p>
<p>for engineering... i'm not sure about those 3... why not do like... MIT? Caltech? I honestly haven't heard much about engineering at any one of those you mentioned.</p>
<p>Rice and Duke both have pretty strong engineering departments. Obviously they're not as prestigious or competitive as Caltech or MIT.</p>
<p>Really? I'm from Houston. I really should have known that about at least Rice... I guess since it's not an area I'm not interested in, I never bothered.</p>
<p>You should have applied to Stanford, MIT, CalTech, Cornell, CMU, or Berkeley.</p>
<p>There is little prestige in Harvard engineering.</p>
<p>I heard Harvard biology and pre-med is top-notch tho</p>
<p>Harvard Engineering</p>
<p>If you are planning to graduate as an engineer, Harvard is the last place to be. For engineering, I would recommend MIT, Stanford or Princeton.
Harvard is great for philosophy, economics and liberal arts.</p>
<p>Well, how good is Harvard engineering compared to what? I'd say it's slightly behind Rice and roughly equal to Duke with this caveat: Harvard College is a liberal arts college, and the engineering concentration it is designed for those students who want to do an engineering degree as PART OF a broad liberal arts education. Engineers are not exempt form the substantial liberal arts requirements. If that is not something that you value -- if you are interested in engineering, period, and you just don't care much about things like English and history -- then you're going to feel like you're wasting a lot of your time at Harvard, and it doesn't make any sense to go there.</p>
<p>On the other hand, if that IS valuable to you, and you think it would be great to take challenging courses in all of those areas, then Harvard is a terrific choice (as is Duke; I don't think Rice has as much across-the-board strength). Note that Harvard students are eligible to enroll in any engineering course offered at MIT that isn't duplicated at Harvard, so you have access to essentially the entire range of courses at what is probably the best engineering program in the country.</p>
<p>It is quite difficult to schedule courses at MIT and harvard. One or two courses may be but to schedule a tonne of engg courses at MIT and then to take your liberal arts at harvard is a herculean task. If I had to do engg. I would have been better off at MIT</p>
<p>I've been told that very few Harvard engineering students take classes at MIT. In theory, it's possible. In practice, doesn't work. Too much of a pain to organize and schedule.</p>
<p>My question is...why go to a prestigious school and enroll in the program that has no prestige value?</p>
<p>Stanford, MIT, CalTech are "It" for engineering.</p>
<p>It's like going to CalTech for English Lit.</p>
<p>No question, MIT and Caltech are in a different realm when it comes to engineering. They're offering a totally different kind of product.</p>
<p>Virtually every engineering major I knew at Harvard took at least one course at MIT. It's very unusual to cross-enroll in more than one course per semester, but that much is quite doable. It just depends what your priorities are.</p>
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<p>why go to a prestigious school and enroll in the program that has no prestige value?</p>
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<p>Because there are considerations besides prestige. If a student is equally interested in engineering and liberal arts, it would be foolish to go to Caltech, no matter how great their engineering may be. Also, Harvard is #20 or thereabouts in engineering...no MIT to be sure, but not anywhere comparable to Caltech's English lit.</p>
<p>I thought Harvard undergrad engineering was ranked around 30 in US news.</p>
<p>Which is best out of Harvard, Duke and Rice? I have my reasons for not applying to MIT and Caltech. I don't want to be surronded by math and science majors all the time, but I want a fairly intellectual student body.</p>
<p>bump bump bump</p>
<p>You've got 3 schools, the best of which is in the low 20s, the worst of which, Harvard, is in the high 20s or low 30s.</p>
<p>Obviously, the schools in the low 20s are better (but that's probably what you don't want to hear).</p>
<p>I'm not really leaning toward anywhere at the moment so I'm open to suggestion.</p>
<p>anymore takers?</p>
<p>Its entering students rank #3 nationally in GRE score, it has the 4th lowest acceptance rate, and it faculty also rank #4 in percentage with NAE membership.</p>
<p>And Harvard, despite its tiny size, and necessarily limited program, ranks 20th nationally on a list that includes many specialized schools and giant programs</p>
<p>The USNews top 20:</p>
<ol>
<li>Massachusetts Institute of Technology</li>
<li>Stanford University</li>
<li>University of CaliforniaBerkeley</li>
<li>Georgia Institute of Technology</li>
<li>University of IllinoisUrbana-Champaign</li>
<li>University of MichiganAnn Arbor</li>
<li>University of Southern California</li>
<li>California Institute of Technology</li>
<li>Carnegie Mellon University
<ol>
<li>Purdue University</li>
<li>University of CaliforniaSan Diego</li>
<li>Cornell University</li>
<li>University of TexasAustin</li>
<li>Texas A&M UniversityCollege Station</li>
<li>University of CaliforniaLos Angeles</li>
<li>University of WisconsinMadison</li>
<li>Princeton University</li>
<li>University of Maryland</li>
<li>Pennsylvania State University</li>
<li>Harvard University</li>
</ol></li>
</ol>
<p>Here'a a story from the Indianapolis Star (April 9, 2005) about a local kid who is going to Harvard next fall to major in engineering and play football - with 50% financial aid.</p>