My high school is very math, science, tech, and engineering based. I am doing very well in all my my classes, EXCEPT for the one class that really matters to me in the long run: engineering. My school basically has a accelerated version of engineering, and it’s really hard for me to keep up. We are doing CAD (SolidWorks) and other engineering based things. At my school, we continue engineering classes up until senior year. I am not very good with CAD, and no matter how hard I try, I’m always getting behind. Visual things are just really hard for me. The teachers know I am trying, and they try to guide me only a little bit so I can still learn it, but I keep falling behind and I’m getting very stressed out because I don’t want to get a bad grade. There’s no way I can work on it at home, because I don’t have the right computer for it. At this rate, I’ll pass by with a C. First semester I was barely able to get a A, and I only did because I got A LOT of help from people. Also, I guess I should mention that the engineering classes progress each year, getting more advanced, until you’re pretty much taking collage level engineering classes your junior/senior years. Will it look bad if I don’t get a good grade? What is your advice just in general?
Do you like the math and science classes? If you like mathematical analysis it may be fine.
For whatever it is worth, CAD is a very small part of engineering for the vast majority of engineers.
Will it look bad? Depends where you go. (b/c some schools will be glad to see you even attempted an engineering class at all since a lot of others haven’t) But I advise going to the teacher and ask her what you personally need to do to at least make a B.
Advice? If your school is going at a really fast pace right now, their is a CHANCE it may be just the way your schools curriculum is set up. A lot of colleges will teach you as if you’ve never seen CAD before. So even if your bad at it now, you may still do well taking it on a college level because you will at least be somewhat familiar with it. Try to survive it now so you can do great later.
My question for you-- Which engineering discipline(s) are you interested in?
Not all engineering majors use CAD a lot. It isn’t even in all engineering curricula. If you’re in civil or mechanical, I’m sure you’ll have to take a CAD class, but I think it’s far more important that you like the science and math classes at this point.
Lots of MEs do analysis and/or design work in CAD … it’s sort of the common thread between design, analysis, and manufacture (all CAM,CAE, etc). Similar for aerospace.
EE, ChemE, etc are much less based on 3D geometry, other than that the distillation tower or chip is at X-Y-Z …
If you are having trouble with the visualization of CAD, seeing 3D objects in space and then on your screen, I would avoid ME and CivE.
If you are having trouble with the specifics of Solidworks, there are lots of on-line resources or you could ask your teacher to re-explain options and then spend hours after school to master the click-specify-xyz-now translate option.
Figure out what is causing the issue … either by thinking about specific steps you get lost in or even by asking the teacher to work with you for a bit and see why everything is taking long and yielding C quality grades.
also most high school 4 year programs like Project Lead the Way are CAD in year 1, equations, etc in year 2, then some choices for year 3 and 4. I know because my son liked CAD way more than year 2 equation work and will likely stop PLTW and take AP classes instead. Daughter took lots of APs and did better in college admissions than her peers who stuck to PLTW 4 year plan, that includes CalcBC, etc.
I’m interested in a EE major with a possible minor of ME, or just doing EE. And it’s more the visualization of the parts/assembly, ECT. It’s a HUGE weakness of mine. I’m just a little bit worried because if I do end up getting a B-C and I want to go into engineering, I’m afraid collages will look at that (especially since it’s an engineering class) and think I won’t be able to do the work. But you’re saying that most collages teach SolidWorks from square one?
I’d say a lot of engineering students don’t learn SolidWorks until college. But not sure how much they “teach” it and how much is learned along the way. (Maybe younger posters can comment.)
Per “EE / minor ME” … read some of the other threads about minors. In engineering, typically students just pick one major and then take some extra courses as schedule allows.
EEs don’t typically visualize a lot of parts, unless you are doing chips or robotics or electromechanics where geometry is very important. MEs seem to visualize a lot more.
Minors can involve as few as 5 courses with some credit for say EE classes that are say electromechanical (not circuits which is just a standard eng course).
I would encourage you to carefully puruse some 4 year plans for EE and ME for various schools you are considering, including how minors work, etc.
Training your brain to understand 3D geometries is actually quite useful, my best advice is to think in terms of X-Y-Z coordinates in layouts at the part level, you can then move and rotate them into place. And nothing will break … if you move it to the wrong place, look at the results, undo, and move it again (translation, rotation, scaling, whatever). Are you female ? The conventional wisdom is that females have less ingrained aptitude for 3D than males due to using both sides of the brain … which might just be sexist drivel … but maybe give yourself a break and some credit for not playing enough video games or building with Legos …
effort will overcome this … it’s like missing the tennis ball all day on your first day … you can say, I stink at tennis, or you can teach yourself to hit a gentle lob and keep working at it … you may end up much better than your more talented peers who don’t play.
The grade will improve with effort too …
And if you get better and still don’t like it, maybe just skip deep ME coursework and concentrate on electrons …
I can’t speak for every school, but I know at Georgia Tech, we teach everything (CAD, physics, calculus) as though you’ve had no exposure to it before. Having a background in these allows you to test out/have a leg up in class, but you aren’t expected to know CAD by any means. I certainly didn’t. At GT at least, you can’t even place out of the CAD class (required for ME, CE, AE and no other engineering majors), except maybe by special request. It’s a very, very basic class.
Don’t worry about the CAD class! I don’t think getting a B or C will affect your chances of admission to schools, and it definitely isn’t a sign that engineering isn’t for you.
Thanks for the awesome advice everyone!!! I’m glad it’s not going to make or break me for engineering. 
3D visualization is an important skill that develops over time. Virtually everyone I know has really struggled with it at one point or another. CAD systems tend to be extremely particular where it can be hard to climb the software’s learning curve. Keep your head up. It’s a great skill to be exposed to in high school, but it’s certainly not the end all be all of engineering.