<p>We took my son to a college counselor and it was totally ineffective. He didn't click with the man, my son wants engineering and the first schools he told him to look at had no engineering program and when I asked the counselor about WPI and Rose-Hulman, he didn't even know what those were. My son has above a 4.0 weighted from a difficult school, taking the AP classes successfully but probably won't score more than 1300 on his SAT's, if the PSAT's are good indicators.
We visited RPI and Syracuse when we were on a recent trip to NY. The classes at RPI thrilled him though he liked the idea of great sports and concerts at Syracuse. When we talked to the engineering dept at Syracuse, the kids said it was more lecture based for the first two years. He definitely liked the hands on approach from the beginning at RPI.
He is not a social animal- he likes hanging out with his friends watching movies and playing video games, which sounds like these techie schools. If he never writes another paper analyzing a book for an English class or takes another day of a foreign language, he'll be very happy. We both think he would blossom more in a small class environment, as opposed to the 1000 people lecture hall.
I want him to check out more than one or two schools and I'd love some ideas. What other ideas and places can this amazing web of people come up with for us to check out?</p>
<p>.......................maybe take a look at these..............</p>
<p>univ. of missouri rolla, colorado school of mines, south dakota school of mines and technology</p>
<p>...............and also.........rice univ., univ. of tulsa</p>
<p>Are you thinking small college, or a school of any size with small class sizes? And that 1300 is math+CR, right? So, really good grades, taking difficult courses, and just a little weak (in CC terms) on the SAT. Prefer small class sizes, and, presumably, smaller schools, too? That's pretty much exactly my son's criteria. The only difference is that WashDad Jr's grades aren't as good and his SATs are higher. Does your son have some typical tech-nerd ECs, like math team or FIRST Robotics?</p>
<p>Pretty much, here is Junior's list, and remember we live in Washington, so this is west coast skewed:</p>
<p>U Washington (just about every good student in the state applies to the Dub)
Harvey Mudd
Caltech (dream school)
MIT (we were talked into this by the CC crowd after junior had given up)
Olin College
Rose-Hulman
Case Western
Washington State
Whitworth College (3-2 Physics/Engineering program)
Arizona (NMF Scholarship potential)
Arizona State (NMF Scholarship potential)
University of Portland (smallish regional university with nice engineering dept.)
New Mexico Tech (small, science nerdy, easy app process)</p>
<p>Still thinking about</p>
<p>RPI
Worcester Polytechnic</p>
<p>What sort of stats does your son have? If he is the sort who can enjoy hanging around serious students, techy type students, than any of those tech schools is a good choice. RPI, RIT, CMU, CWU, are all some techy type engineerings schools. If his stats are way up there, MIT, Duke , alot of those sort of schools are an option for a reach. If he wants a good general college setting, some of the schools with large Arts &Sciences but a small engineering dept is a good choice-Bucknell, Wesleyan, Swarthmore. Location can be important if an issue. Cooper UNion, Manhattan are in NYC which can be a boon for that type of kid.</p>
<p>Case Western in Ohio...near the city, somewhat "geeky" or RIT in Rochester, NY...Both excellent engineering schools that he could get into. RIT is more self contained and is a co-op school on quarters. Great way to get experience and make money while you go to school.
Also look for schools that will accept his AP scores for the humanities...</p>
<p>Good Luck!</p>
<p>Did not see the 1300 guess at scores. Until he gets the actual scores along with achievement in the upper level math/science course and maybe some SAT2s, it is not easy to pick a school for him. FOR the more general colleges, that have an engineering dept, make sure you get a breakdown of the engineering stats. Engineering is a difficult major and if he should eke into a competitive program, it is not to his benefit if he is not as well prepared as his peers. Most of such programs are self selecting, so the acceptance of the college of a kid can happen even though it is not a good choice for him. Clarkson , Worcester Polytech, and Clark are good to check out. But also check out smaller dept within non techhy schools. They måy give more attention and be less intense.</p>
<p>If he likes RPI and he's currently a junior, make sure his high school knows about the RPI Medal. It would mean a huge merit scholarship and it's awarded at the end of junior year. <a href="http://admissions.rpi.edu/update.do?artcenterkey=1%5B/url%5D">http://admissions.rpi.edu/update.do?artcenterkey=1</a></p>
<p>Take a look at Ga Tech, I think they have some bigger classes, but the SATs will hurt him less there - has he tried the ACT?</p>
<p>My son is in the midst of applying to engineering schools this year, and I'd agree with cptofthehouse that until your son has his actual SAT scores it's pretty hard to judge where he'll fit.</p>
<p>My son is also very techie - but if you look closely you'll see that IN GENERAL kids are happier at universities than the techy schools. The boy/girl thing kills them after a while, the social scene can be a little weird (consisting of many video game shut-ins), and some of these schools can feel like real pressure cookers. Additionally, so many kids drop out of engineering that you want to make sure there are other choices available.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, my son prefers a techie place like RPI, WPI, RIT or Rose Hulman. The problem is - those schools are very expensive (RIT is more reasonable), and we probably won't qualify for aid. Some give out good merit money; we'll see what happens, it's a crapshoot for my kid.</p>
<p>Most of the highest ranked engineering programs (pay the $15 now for the US News Premium College site - it's well worth it, especially for info on scholarship money) are at larger, often public, universities. Many people are of the opinion that engineering programs at "bachelor degree only" schools are inferior to the big players (MIT, U Michigan, Georgia Tech, Purdue, etc) - the exception is for the top 5 or so schools, Harvey Mudd, Rose Hulman, Cooper Union, US Naval/Military, and Cal Poly–San Luis Obispo. I'm not sure I agree with that, but that's the "word on the street."</p>
<p>So, while our kids may perform better in a smaller school, that may not be an option. </p>
<p>His college search as boiled down to a mix of schools. Some are strong engineering schools (RPI, WPI, Rose Hulman, RIT), some have small, cozy engineering departments within large schools (Univ Pittsburgh, Ohio University, Northeastern) some are just big (Purdue). I still want him to apply to Georgia Tech, but so far he hasn't. I will add that while Syracuse and Univ of Rochester have engineering departments, and kids seem generally happy at those schools, my son preferred RIT - which is actually higher ranked for engineering than either of those other upstate NY schools.</p>
<p>RIT offers a brief summer session for kids to look at different engineering options. They go the summer between junior and senior year, and it's just one overnight. You might consider that, if you can swing it. Here is the link, but it's not updated for 2007 yet.</p>
<p>For us, a lot depends on the money. Even the out of state publics can run over $30,000/year. (We're in New York state and he has not applied to any SUNYs.) </p>
<p>Of note - Worcester is the one "techie" school that still has a very strong humanities core. He will not avoiding writing papers there. I think that is a good thing - but I know some kids hate that.</p>
<p>What about Lehigh? I know of someone who seems a lot like your son and truely flourished in their engineering program there.</p>
<p>He has test anxiety issues, anxiety generally as well. He likes the small atmosphere of the classes and hands on classes, the size of the school around him isn't as big of an issue. Luckily for all of us, the cost of the school isn't an issue, finding the right fit is. He's scored high A's in his science, math, drafting, computer and animation classes- it's the history and english with the wirting intensive issues that bring him to the high B's. I am hoping his test scores improve- his sister's ACT was much higher and his PLAN test was as well. He doesn't have a strong interest in any area of the country- having a Jewish community is important.
Even if he doesn't end up pursuing engineering, I know it will be in the math, science, computer fields so I don't have an issue with the techie schools.
He isn't into the EC's as much as his own computer. He has made videos for people as a small business, he has worked at an overnight camp for eight weeks. He is involved in SMART team and doing the tech crews through the school productions.
His friends are all the top students with the techie background. Most of them are from his drafting or computer classes.
I feel that he is they stereotypical boy - using the analogy of shopping- girls like to search the mall for the perfect outfit, boys go in and pick out the pants and shirt and leave the mall. My D started sophmore year and wanted to thoroughly investigate many different schools. My S would be happy to find a school he likes (one...) apply, get in and be done. Of course that's totally unrealistic with the way admissions go these days.
thanks for the suggestions so far, any other ideas are terrific too!</p>
<p>Look at Purdue. mootmom and S recently returned from a visit there and found the techie program he explored to be very "project based" (I'm equating that to hands-on). While a large school, her report and other info I've heard is that it has a small school ethos, at least wrt Engineering.</p>
<p>He may have to suffer through "somewhat large" classes in the first few Eng. courses even at a fairly small school. EG, DS' classes at JHU in the early going can be in the 60-100 range. If he doesn't want to hack that type of size, I think you really will have to dig deeply in your research on schools to avoid it.</p>
<p>I second the recommendation of Lehigh, although I can't swear that they have no large-ish classes. </p>
<p>Does he know what type of Engineering he wants? If it is ChemE or BiomedE, Tulane might fit well. Unfortunately, they have eliminated other Engineering majors, so if he's unsure or wants Elec/Comp/Mech/Civil, it's not an option. He might snag decent merit $$ at Tulane - in the $15-22K/year range.</p>
<p>Although he'd have to take a freshman English/writing seminar (which I don't think has to analyze a book), he might want to look at Union College. It has an excellent, albeit small, Engineering program, and it's SAT optional, so his scores will not be an issue.</p>
<p>I would look for a smaller school with a small enginereering department. THat would maximize success chances.</p>
<p>You already got good suggestions. Mine pretty much overlap others:</p>
<p>Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Clarkson
Rochester Institute of Technology
Rose-Hulman
Carnegie Mellon
Penn State
Case Western
Union College
University of Michigan
Bucknell
Lehigh
Lafayette
University of Vermont
Purdue
Trinity College
Olin College of Engineering</p>
<p>If his test scores are 1300ish without a big plus on the math side, and he is not way up there in terms of being advanced in math/sciences in terms of advanced courses and high SAT2s and APs, I would not recommend most of those schools, because of the competitiveness and difficulty of those programs. Getting into UMICH with those stats, for instance, along with the majority of those schools may be a reach. I would truly look at less competitive options, smaller programs such as possibly Manhattan College or Stevens Institute. There are LACs and like colleges that also offer engineering programs, and those would be a good bet to investigate. I don't know specifics, perhaps in a few months I shall, since my son is strong in math/science and engineering is a potential area of interest. But like the OP's son, he is not aa top math type guy, and to stick him into the CMU, Lehigh, CWU or large university engineering program would not be wise and diminish chances of success. These programs are pretty tough and have a high attrition rate even with kids who are ideal for the challenge.</p>
<p>My S is currently a freshman at Northeastern; we specifically chose it because of its strong co-op program and emphasis on experiential learning. They have a core freshmen curriculum so all freshmen take basically the same classes during the first year (calculus, chemistry, physics, basic engineering design courses) as well as 1 (of 2 or 3 depending on major) social/history/humanities electives and a required college writing course. Aside from some technical writing courses in later years I believe these are the only non-major electives required. </p>
<p>They also have what they call a Gateway program in which a small number of faculty teach all the required freshmen courses and they divide/assign students into sections that are typically less than 30 students (honors sections are even smaller). This means that students do not get much choice on what hours their classes are but the benefit is that they are in many of the same classes with the same students and can form study groups and friendships more easily (they also have an engineering floor in one of the dorms). It's very likely that many larger schools do something similar so this is certainly worth asking about when you look at schools; I know that our large state flagship (Univ MN TC) also divides freshmen engineering students into groups of about 60 for similar reasons.</p>
<p>They also offer many merit scholarships up to around $16,000 as well as a limited number of full-tuition scholarships; another perk is the suite-style housing for freshmen honors students.</p>
<p>I have to agree with cptofthehouse that, with SAT 1300 without near 800 Math and college level/advanced math/science, most of the schools listed (including U of Michigan) are out of reach. There are some fabulous tech schools that could fit your son's personality and wishes, though. One that a friend (a girl) of my D attends and loves is Michigan Tech. It's fairly small, intimate, personalized learning, strong engineering in a beautiful small town...since your son was thinking of Syracuse it sounds like he wouldn't mind the cold and the snow up there.</p>
<p>Where I live, there are less "uber" students and kids have gone to Clarkson, for example, for engineering. </p>
<p>I also counseled a student interested in engineering from another state who had SAT's lower than the OP's son and he got into Union and Trinity.</p>
<p>I agree that Northeastern is another possibility and my student also got in there.</p>
<p>Anther good co-op idea:
U Cincinnati</p>
<p>A few other smallish engineering schools:
Alfred University
Wentworth Institute
Kettering</p>