Industrial Engineering: UW-Madison vs. Texas A&m vs. U of Illinois

<p>Hi I am an international student in US</p>

<p>I am graduating this year and I got accepted to UW, Texas A&M, and UI</p>

<p>I am going to study IE</p>

<p>I've visited UW, and I felt that it was too cold. Also, I thought that madison was kinda crowded</p>

<p>but everybody says that UW is a really great school</p>

<p>Since I hate winter and its tuition is cheaper, Texas A&M is attractive even though </p>

<p>its ranking is lower than that of UW and maybe less prestigious than UW</p>

<p>UI has one of the best engineering school in US, </p>

<p>but it is pretty expensive for outta-state students</p>

<p>So, tell me the best pick</p>

<p>Madison is a similar city to College Station (they’re both pretty much college towns). One is cold and the other hot. I would tell you to visit the campuses to get a feel of what you want. Urbana-Champagne is pretty cold too. That only leaves College Station, which has alright weather and is the cheapest option I guess? UI has a more prestigious engineering college than either UW or A&M. UW is about as nationally recognized as UI, both of which are over A&M. A&M does have the Aggie Network I guess… All three of the schools are great universities. You can’t go wrong with either of them.</p>

<p>Thanks for the answer! I think Texas A&M has raised out of state tuition greatly recently…
I was $18000 last year and this year it is $22000, so the difference from
Wisconsin is only $1000… I know the winter is brutal in wisconsin since I visited there,
but I think it is adaptable. I believe its prestige as the public ivy (according to people) and
prb I will go to wisconsin</p>

<p>TAMU is ranked ahead of both those schools in IE. I don’t see as much of a prestige difference as you would think.</p>

<p>Madison isn’t really a similar city at all to College Station. If you are going to pick any city in Texas to compare it to, it should be a smaller Austin (roughly 1/3 the size of the Austin metro area). Urbana-Champaign is a better comparison to Bryan-College Station than Madison is.</p>

<p>Both UIUC and Wisconsin are commonly referred to as “public ivies” along with a handful of other schools, so your overall academics at each school are about equal. As I mentioned in this thread you posted on the UIUC forum, UIUC has the best overall engineering department but “worst” industrial program, TAMU has the best industrial program but “worst” overall engineering department, and Wisconsin is in the middle for both of them.</p>

<p>by worst he means still very good though</p>

<p>Thus the quotes. I wouldn’t have come to TAMU for grad school if it really was the worst without quotes. =)</p>

<p>U of Illinois definitely!</p>

<p>The most prestigious, USNWR rankings ranked it 39th way better than the other 2</p>

<p>I’m going to UT, so i’m definitely not biased to U of I, just stating the truth.</p>

<p>Undergraduate engineering specialties: Industrial/Manufacturing
1 Georgia Institute of Technology Atlanta, GA
2 University of Michigan–Ann Arbor Ann Arbor, MI
3 Purdue University–West Lafayette West Lafayette, IN
4 Pennsylvania State University–University Park University Park, PA
5 University of California–Berkeley Berkeley, CA
5 Virginia Tech Blacksburg, VA
7 Texas A&M University–College Station College Station, TX
8 Stanford University Stanford, CA
9 Northwestern University Evanston, IL
10 Cornell University Ithaca, NY
10 University of Wisconsin–Madison Madison, WI
12 North Carolina State University–Raleigh Raleigh, NC
13 University of Illinois–Urbana-Champaign Champaign, IL
14 Ohio State University–Columbus Columbus, OH
14 University of Southern California Los Angeles, CA
16 Columbia University New York, NY
17 Lehigh University Bethlehem, PA
18 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Troy, NY
18 University of Florida Gainesville, FL</p>

<p>We are not concerned about the overall school ranking. He IS concerned about going to the school with both a good IE program and appealing environment. So as you can see on this list, all three schools are top programs, and it is all up to which campus feels right.</p>

<p>As far as I know Texas A&M is pretty conservative, while UW is very liberal, so that’s a pretty big factor. I have lived in Madison for 16 years, and I love it! There is so much to do, a beautiful lake, and the winters aren’t THAT bad. The education and the experiences you will have here will more than make up for the cold winter. Plus the craziest halloween party in the country!</p>