I’m thinking about majoring in IOE + minoring in CS, or maybe double majoring if I have enough room. I find the material in IOE to be pretty interesting. And I’ve heard the major is pretty easy compared to other engineering majors. If that’s true, what makes it so easy? Is the difficulty comparable to that of an LSA major such as Econ or Psych?
What kind of jobs do most IOE majors do after graduating? Is the work interesting/stressful/boring? Also, I felt that the IOE students on campus were more social compared to those in other engineering majors. Frankly, I don’t see myself as a very social, people-person, and would actually prefer to work with numbers, or be in front of a computer, over schmoozing with clients face-to-face. However, being social is not that big of a problem for me lol. Do the employers recruiting IOE majors take social skills a lot more seriously than technical/quantitative skills? Do you think an IOE major + CS minor would be a good choice for me?
IOE has the reputation “in and out easy”. It is true that it is easier compared to other engineering majors, but it is still more work than the typical LSA major. It’s not necessarily that the material is easier, but I do know a handful of IOE students who only care that they pass their classes, thus if you work hard, it shouldn’t be that difficult to get good grades. CS would be much more time demanding. Plus because everybody is so hard working and cares a lot about their grades, you can put in so much time and effort and still fail to get the A grade.
Job wise, if you are able to graduate with at least a 3.0, you will have good chances of landing at least one offer to somewhere.
Umcoe16 is spot on about everything. IOE is known as “in and out easy” or “i o easy”. Definitely the easiest engineering major, but still harder than most of the LSA majors (aside from say CS, Econ, Physics, Math).
CS is definitely a lot more time consuming and difficult than IOE. And again, with a 3.0 and some effort into landing internships I’m sure you’ll do fine with either.
@jake0810 what part of IOE do you find interesting? It’s certainly true that IOE is one of the easiest CoE majors for undergrad. In large part, this is because the department is a combination of a bunch of disciplines that are not necessarily related to one another. This allows students to take introductory level courses in several disciplines instead of forcing them to delve deeper in any particular one. At the same time, though, it is possible to take more advanced courses in topics like optimization methods, which will make the major substantially more difficult.
IOEs are able to find jobs in many different fields. The major will not generally limit you from any industries.
Many IOEs go into consulting, in which case social skills are very important.
It sounds like you first need to figure out what types of jobs you are interested in. Picking a major should come easily after thinking about that.