<p>Also, engineering programs are typically harder to get into than science, so if he’s worried that his 3.8 GPA is sub-par, applying as a science major might give him easier access to the very best tech schools, if that’s important to him.</p>
<p>^^^ That’s a good point, ucb, but for me it comes down to where you’re more likely to find that “love of learning”. Engineering is more of a grind. Physics students are more likely to be interested in open-ended, less practical questions. Sure, they may talk about jobs just as much, but the academic content is focused differently.</p>
<p>Building the next generation particle collider, or building the biggest telescope and launching it into space, would be an engineering problem that pushes the boundaries of knowledge in engineering. Of course, the result would help the physicists push the boundaries of knowledge in physics. Would that be “intellectual” enough?</p>
<p>It would be more intellectual if the engineers actually discussed pushing the boundaries of knowledge, but they tend to be more concerned with the design and build problem-at-hand. So I’d say the physicists, whose work the engineers use to get their designs off the ground, are by and large more intellectual (i.e. concerned with the bigger picture). But it depends how you define “intellectual”. The OP could be more clear about that.</p>
<p>I appreciate that ucb is trying to disavow us of our stereotypes, but I wish he’d tell us about experiences he’s had where engineering undergrads were encouraged in their courses to speculate rather than, or at least while they, solve.</p>
<p>There’s a related thread about finding satisfying liberal arts courses while engaged in a STEM major. Take a look. Also, I think the criticism of Case Western is off the mark. Why is it a flaw for an undergraduate in a very competitive field to think about the career implications of paying off her costly college debts? Co-ops and internships are keys to the kingdom in a young engineer’s career.</p>
<p>My own experience is that it is true that most undergraduate course work did not push the frontiers of knowledge – but that applied to non-engineering subjects as well. So to say that engineering is “less intellectual” on that basis does not make much sense. At the graduate / research level, faculty and PhD students of all subjects are trying to push the frontiers of knowledge.</p>
<p>Of course, individual undergraduate students may have different levels of “intellectualism”, in terms of curiousity about learning for its own sake – a frosh/soph student may be motivated to think about things that, while considered “solved” or “known” in the body of knowledge of the subject, may not be known to him/her (e.g. because they are normally discussed in junior/senior level course work). But it would be a mistake to say that engineering majors automatically have less “intellectualism”. For example, some engineering students may be fascinated by trying to figure out why something is designed a particular way, compared to alternative designs. In contrast, plenty of students in other majors seem to care more about when the next party was than anything “intellectual”.</p>
<p>I’m going more by Sartre’s definition of “intellectual”: someone who meddles in what does not concern him. That’s what I gathered from the OP’s post, with her son wanting to mingle with liberal arts types and perhaps engage more in the life of the mind. I believe that’s easier to accomplish within science. One could argue that engineering, for the most part, produces thinkers who are almost the opposite of Sartre’s definition of intellectual. The most brilliant engineers probably move more toward what Sartre had in mind – problem solvers who can “think outside the box” – but I wouldn’t say that mindset is the norm within engineering. </p>
<p>“Thinking outside the box” is probably not the norm in any field. After all, doesn’t “box” in this use mean that which encloses, contains, and/or includes the ordinary and common, so that those who “think outside the box” are, by definition, the more unusual ones?</p>
<p>That’s true, but it comes down to what “thinking outside the box” means, and whether an engineer versus a scientist is more likely to be able to think like that. Thinking outside the box, to me, is being able to deal with the abstract and theoretical, and that comes closer to what Sartre meant by “intellectual”. That’s more the domain of the scientist. Engineers are excellent at dealing with the concrete and practical, which for me is inside the box and not as intellectual. But again, it depends how you define things. </p>
<p>For what it’s worth, the smartest guy I know was trained as an electrical engineer. He’s had a hard time fitting in in engineering over the years because he’s more of what I would call an “intellectual”. He’s concerned with fields outside of his own, and by his own estimate he thinks differently and more abstractly than his colleagues.</p>
<p>Thank you all for your opinions and insights! </p>
<p>My son doesn’t need to be writing epistemological critiques of engineering; but he does want to learn things just because they’re cool (and maybe someday relevant) not just stuff useful right now. I’ll go with ucbalumnus’s description:</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>I don’t mean to criticize any concern for job prospects–he just doesn’t want that to be the only focus, and that was how the presentation at CRWU came across. The other places he’s looked are CU Boulder and WUSTL–their engineering tours focused more on things like “here’s a great project we did last year” and “check out this awesome piece of equipment” and “look at our lab spaces.” </p>
<p>My son certainly has a practical side–his goal for his major “is to have a job after graduation.” If he had to choose a major right now it would be EE or EP (the downside to EP being more need for a master’s too?). As for the sciences, from my experiences in bio, some premeds were there just to check boxes and some loved the learning. </p>
<p>Specific questions: why is Rice LAC-like? Why is Lafayette “less on the list”–an issue with their engineering program, or other issues? As for 3/2’s my son knows already once he settled into a school he’d be unlikely to leave for another.</p>
<p>So perhaps I mistitled this thread–intellectual is not quite the right word for it. Curious?</p>
<p>Rice has a residential college system similar to Yale and Harvard. (and Hogwarts)</p>
<p>They also deliberately maintain a lower graduate student population and a strong faculty-student ratio to ensure that undergraduate teaching will remain a primary focus of the university. Consequently, you get Nobel Prize winners actually teaching first year science courses.</p>
<p>It’s still a major research university, but they really work harder than most to ensure that undergrads get an experience that compares favorably to the best LACs.</p>
<p>It’s also a place that celebrates individualism. Everyone is just a little bit quirky. Not weird for weird’s sake (usually - the Rice MOB “marching” band is a notable exception), just weird for the sake of being themselves. </p>
<p>It’s certainly not the only university that deliberately structures itself around the undergraduate experience (see also Princeton, Dartmouth, Miami-Oxford, Stanford, etc.) but it’s a member of a rare breed.</p>
<p>p.s. In my opinion, no need for you to apologize. The ensuing discussion seems to have focused at times on your use of the word intellectual without fully taking into account your explanation of what that meant to you. “[A] place that focuses on love of learning, not just what job you can get after graduation” is plenty clear to me, and does not imply that engineers are non-intellectual. </p>
<p>@jkeil911: @ucbalumnus:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>jkeil - </p>
<p>I hope you have a sense of humor, because I have some potentially bad news for you. You appear to be exhibiting the classic symptoms of EDD, or Engineering Deficit Disorder. This learning disability was discovered by cognitive scientists at Tufts decades ago. The root cause is a lack of exposure to engineers during one’s formative years. It is seen most frequently in liberal arts majors who attended either liberal arts colleges with no engineering programs or research universities with an academic firewall between the college of engineering and the college of liberal arts. Originally, it was thought to be both rare and benign, but recent improvements in diagnostic techniques are resulting in a dramatic increase in positive diagnoses, and the advent of the innovation economy has raised it to the level of national concern. </p>
<p>The good news is that the brain is relatively plastic and with the proper treatment, the symptoms can be reduced to the point where an afflicted individual can not only subsist, but actually thrive in the coming innovation economy. The treatment (spend more time with engineers) can initially be painful, but it has been proven to be very effective.</p>
<p>Columbia’s Engineering School requires its students to take Columbia College’s “Core Curriculum” in liberal arts, and students can minor in liberal arts subjects. Engineering students live in dorms with other Columbia or Barnard students, and can absorb as much NYC culture as their schedules and wallets allow. I don’t have personal familiarity with Penn’s Engineering School, but I imagine it’s comparable. </p>
<p>Agree with woogzmama about Columbia SEAS. While the engineering core isn’t as extensive as the college core, it still includes civilization studies, music or art studies etc. Since all engineers take these classes, it attracts a certain type of student–one who is interested in studying non-engineering subjects as well.</p>
<p>Whoever said engineers at MIT and Caltech are not intellectual is just plain wrong or never worked with them. Who the heck cares what Satre’s definition. Pompous comment at best.</p>
<p>CS and physics are more intellectual. Oh please I studied all three subjects and found engineering the most intellectual of all. That’s the problem when you get an English major to decide whats intellectual.</p>
<p>Not meaning to be pedantic, maybe intellectual is the wrong word to be using here.</p>
<p>I can relate to OP’s son a lot - Engineering is on the table for me but I hate how it is considered “pre-professional”. I’d be considering chemical engineering because it’s applying science to solve problems and new technologies… if that’s not “intellectual” I don’t know what is. Engineering is treated differently at many institutions though. Maybe it’s not just the subject itself - engineering will be very similar wherever you go. I think a school where engineering students are NOT the majority would be the best fit for him. RIT, RPI, Case Western, Carnegie Mellon are schools full of very bright kids but engineering, job placement, co-ops, internships is their priority. </p>
<p>I want to do engineering because I’m science and mathy, but I spend my free time reading history books, teaching myself piano; I want to learn Russian or Chinese or something goofy like that. So I am also turned off when universities advertise engineering as “career training”. Reminds me of tech schools, which aren’t necessarily bad in their own right, but that’s not the environment I’d really love.</p>
<p>On my safety’s website, MST, they advertise engineering by average salaries of graduates, # of engineering majors at school, companies that hired their graduates, etc. The case is much different at other universities I’ve seen - WashU, Tufts, Lafayette, Rice, etc. </p>
<p>Especially when I visited WashU, they make it very easy to double major for engineers and the girl I was interviewed by told me it is certainly very doable, and they make it easy for engineers to study abroad their junior/senior year.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I can’t say for 100%. Lafayette is Division I sports, it has a pretty active greek life (although in previous years it’s been dying down), and it didn’t have that “intellectual” vibe I had imagined it would after an interviewer sort of explained the school more to me. It’s definitely on the table, but I haven’t been able to form a concrete opinion on it. I am certainly applying there. Suggest you visit it! Your son would almost be very likely to get in there, so it can function as a lowish-match.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Rice is fairly small. They don’t have many graduate students, undergrads are really the focus. They do, however, get the advantage of lots of research in science/engg fields because they’re a research university. They’re in the top 10 I think for the percent of their students going on to earn PhDs in science fields. Take that as you will, but I’d imagine engineering is less “vocational” there.</p>
<p>Hi! I am a HS Senior looking for a more intellectual atmosphere while studying engineering. I want to study EECS but also continue studying Latin, literature, and fashion. I have found that most engineers don’t have a ton of free electives, so I will end up pursuing many of these interests outside of the classroom (in clubs and whatnot).</p>
<p>I really liked Case Western. My tour guide was a ChemE and talked a lot about the Summer research he was doing alongside his professor (and seemed genuinely excited even though it didn’t completely coincide with his major).</p>
<p>I loved Northwestern’s whole brain engineering approach.</p>
<p>I am currently looking into Rochester and so far it seems like a good option. The representative I talked to said it isn’t too hard to double major even for engineers, which is a good sign.</p>
<p>I am also applying to UIUC and UW-Madison because I loved the campuses, and they are strong in engineering. The engineering programs themselves are rather standard, but I would be able to get a lot of AP credit (and use that free time for electives in the humanities and classics).</p>
<p>CWRU seems to have a dual focus…very practical in that you can do co-ops, but also the chance to do research if that is what you prefer.</p>