According to the US News ranking of undergraduate engineering programs, based solely on peer assessment by engineers, Princeton and Cornell make the top 10, and Harvard, Columbia, and Penn usually crack the top 20-30. While they may not be exceptional engineering schools, they are very far from weak. Even Brown, Yale, and Dartmouth make the top 40 or so (about the same as UF, by far the highest ranked engineering program in Florida).</p>
<p>FSU-FAMU lags quite a bit behind, usually ranked in the 120s. FSU would honestly be much better off if it severed the tie with FAMU and invested in its own engineering school. Even UCF outpaces FSU in engineering. </p>
<p>As for the age comment, FAMU-FSU itself isn’t that old (~30 years old), and age is rarely an indicator of much anyway. The article implies that finances were a huge consideration. That’s perfectly reasonable. I wouldn’t imply that weak academics were the real reason, though!</p>
<p>As for the OP, you can study engineering at Harvard or San Jose State and get the same job and make the same salary. What you’ll get at Harvard but not SJSU is networking and access to other fields, especially highly selective ones. Finance and consulting are extremely popular with engineering students at universities like MIT and Berkeley, for example, because they tend to be more lucrative than engineering – from what I understand, there’s much less access to those fields at less selective universities, engineering powerhouses though they may be. If you’re set on engineering, you’re safe anywhere. If you’re not, choose more carefully.</p>
<p>Probably the only thing worth remembering in that silly Root article. Where were the adults who could have guided this poor soul instead of let him applying to four dozen colleges and TALKING to the media vultures? Among the dumbest things a student could do.</p>
<p>His other criteria included money (Florida A&M gave him a full ride, and his parents apparently made enough money that Harvard was not a full ride on its generous need-based aid for him) and closeness to home (since he was 16).</p>
<p>The really odd part was applying to 45 schools, when Florida A&M was his initial fourth choice (given that it was safety-level for him, with at least automatic full tuition scholarship, it seems odd to apply to so many other schools that were less desirable).</p>
<p>The Harvard student would definitely have better access to finance and consulting jobs. But SJSU’s location likely gives its students better access to Silicon Valley computer company jobs.</p>
<p>Thanks Osaka dad for the offer. Correct, CA family. Congrats on Cal Poly, I have never met a kid that didn’t just love it there. Applied there too and certainly on the short list but he just has news from the EAs he applied to, didn’t want to apply ED to anywhere. Having been through it, I would guess you know this song… Concern at CP and UCs is flexibility in major and access to classes and getting lost in the crowd. He is 100% sure engineering (and it fits him), likes CS (in dreams would love a double major) and selected EE over mechanical, more out of feedback than really knowing which one he likes (who does at 17?) Would like flexibility to at least be able to move within engineering and not sure one can do that at CP or the UCs (we get answers like “it might be possible, but unlikely” from admissions, not reassuring). In my dreams I’d like there to be flexibility cause I like a kid to find their passion in college not define it at 17. Great student 4.5, all the APs you would expect, SAT 2200. Good fit for really good school and we will see what comes in the mail, but I know who has money to offer and who doesn’t plus being an academic stud somewhere (that sounds weird) but you know what I mean… So…a school like LMU while certainly not Harvey Mudd in engineering reputation, offers a lot of other things. Ignoring the environmental issues for now (big enough, spirit or not, etc) and just focusing on the engineering, do you have any thoughts on LMU? Thanks for your time in advance!</p>
<p>CADREAMIN – It sounds like you are in the same situation as we were in 2011. Your kid’s stats are pretty much an exact mirror image of my kid’s. 4.5 GPA; 34 ACT and similar SAT. I can help you demystify the process. Ironically, Cal Poly SLO was actually near the bottom of our list due to the misperception regarding changing majors. In reality, it is very easy to change majors within a college at Cal Poly. My kid entered the school as a General Engineering major and changed over to Mechanical Engineering after his first quarter. It took only one meeting with the ME department and it was approved electronically after grades were reported. Where it gets tricky is when you want to change colleges. For example from Business to Engineering. It can be done, but there is a process. It also gets harder the longer you wait. If you are going to change majors, do it within the first couple of years or you may not be able to graduate on time. Anything else you hear about it being impossible to change majors at Cal Poly SLO is either outdated or just plain inaccurate. Our kid was also very concerned about getting lost at a big school. However, Cal Poly SLO ended up being small town in feel and the classes are relatively small and you can get all kinds of special attention from faculty and counselors. To be honest, it feels like a medium sized private school and we have had some unexpected issues come up and the school bent over backwards to help. In one instance, my kid’s roommate had to do a full medical withdrawal last quarter due to a nasty case of pneumonia. Every teacher and administrator cooperated and my kid was able to walk his roommate through the entire process in half a day. The kid went home and recovered and is back at school now. With regards to the UC’s, these were a total mismatch for our kid. He ended up turning down UCLA, UCSD and several other offers from the UC’s. The reasons why the UC’s were not a fit for our kid comes down to teaching methodology. He knew he wanted engineering and did not want to wait two years to start classes in his major. He also wanted a “hands on learn by doing” approach as opposed to the research and lecture based orientation of the UC’s. As much as I admire the school, UCLA in particular was quite a turn off. The vast majority of my son’s education would have been managed and taught by TA’s. At the admitted students day presentation, the faculty showed us a chart that declared that 75% of UCLA’s Engineering TA’s were from Chinese speaking countries. We are an Asian mixed multilingual family so we have no problem with foreign instructors with accents. But there just seemed to be a shocking lack of diversity among the TA’s and who wants TA’s to be the main source of education for my kid anyway? $33-$35K a year and little access to professors? Give me a break! At Cal Poly, 100% of my son’s education is delivered by real professors including the labs! That is the difference between a research college and a teaching college. Funny that you mentioned Harvey Mudd as that was one of the schools high up on our list. Excellent school, great reputation, but at the end of the day not a match for several reasons. First, the school offers a general engineering degree only. It offers a unique liberal arts education, but in engineering specialization is very important. Second, it costs $55K a year and offers scholarships to relatively few students. We would not have qualified for a penny of assistance due to my income and the fact that our kid was really nothing special to them. His excellent stats, tech related summer internships, and valedictory scholar status was greeted with polite yawns. The tour was fun and the students were quirky and intense. The faculty was nice and helpful. However, the pressure that the kids over there are under seemed a bit excessive for us. After two tours and an interview there, we decided to give it a rest.</p>
<p>LMU was a school we considered but did not apply to for several reasons. First, it is a great school but not ranked that well in Engineering. The alumni network for engineers did not seem that strong. Also, and again for engineering only, locally it has to compete with UCLA, USC, Cal Tech, Cal Poly Pomona and two other CSU’s with strong Engineering reputations. Cal State Long Beach and Cal State Northridge. Additionally, LMU is literally just down the road from us and our kid wanted to at least get out of the neighborhood.</p>
<p>I.e. the school itself conveys the impression that changing major may be difficult, though obviously it can vary depending on how popular the target major is relative to its capacity. They may want to set expectations low on the likelihood of changing major, so that students wanting to change major are more likely to be pleasantly surprised than unpleasantly surprised.</p>
<p>However, at a lot of other universities, changing major requires applying to do so, at least to majors which are more popular than they have capacity for (i.e. Cal Poly SLO is not unique in this respect). If concerned, put “change major” or “change major [target major]” in the search box of the various universities to see what comes up.</p>
<p>Ivies aren’t bad for engineering, but many engineers from the schools don’t go to engineering jobs. They go to business instead, which might be more lucrative (better hours, etc. unless you’re talking about the intense business jobs like Wall Street, investment banking, then not really). And go to the place you’d get the best overall experience in college. It’s a time not just for academics, but to grow. A lot of people tell me they learn more outside of class than from the classes themselves, but idk. I’m just a freshman</p>
<p>Sorry folks I know this is ivy thread, but we started a conversation here…Thanks Osakadad, again, amazing info, many of us go down the same road! He loved the feel of CalPoly, almost seems to good to be true (money and quality) so that may be the choice if he gets it. It seems comfortable there, doesn’t feel big like others. His changing major interest would either be within engineering (electrical v mechanical) or possibly to computer science. That’s the “furthest” he would move. He is trying to figure out if CS is a hobby for him or a career. I get that going from anything outside engineering into it would be a problem. Does your son have any room for business or econ electives at cal poly? Their admin office told me they either discourage or don’t allow double majors, can’t remember exactly, but it didn’t sound like it was possible. Does he like his weekends there (meaning kids are on campus, I realize studying and stuff, but I hear LMU pretty much clears out). Ya, LMU engineering is tiny, didn’t realize how small till I looked it up last night. LMU was a total safety that we made him apply to cause he wants to be in LA; frankly it wasn’t on the radar till he got this great package and it got me wondering if you can get a good engineering education in a small department??? Ya, Harvey Mudd not high on the list, heard what you are saying, tons of $ and you either like location or not. Great info on UCLA. Looks great on the outside, but resources and getting lost in the crowd worry me, and you really dug in, I wouldn’t have thought to find those TA %, missed that on our tour. I should look at Berkeley and Davis in that light. The last big contender and his fav is USC. I like the size of the department there and we are familiar with it, neighborhood and all. Price tag there could be scary though.Thanks for understanding and continuing to offer your advice/experience, it means the world to me and is really getting me great perspective I wouldn’t have otherwise from someone that’s been there done that. It seems we are doing the same dance you did with a similar type son.</p>
<p>For small schools and departments, check the course catalogs and schedules to see what offerings there are, and how often each course is offered.</p>
<p>Good place to start, thanks usbalumnus. Assuming class offerings looked good or acceptable, how do you know if faculty has good reputation/background and labs are good? Any school sounds great on their website.</p>
<p>Just to clear something up. Someone said on this thread that CS is not engineering. This may be true but the Computer Science and Software Engineering department at Cal Poly actually is in the College of Engineering. See link: [Home</a> - College of Engineering - Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo](<a href=“http://ceng.calpoly.edu/departments/]Home”>http://ceng.calpoly.edu/departments/)</p>
<p>CADREAMING - Yes, we were pretty skeptical about Cal Poly at first. Too good to be true, right? But each year it just keeps getting better. The kid loves it and we love going there to visit. We have enjoyed the hot springs, hiking, beaches, local restaurants and local wine. My kid is an outdoorsy photographer, hiker, road biker and rock climber. Perfect for him. The students are sought after even in this economy and the cost is less than half of what we would have paid at a Harvey Mudd or a USC.</p>
<p>I’ve had the opportunity to teach at UCLA extension, USC (the Academy of Business Leadership Summer Business Institute) and a couple of other schools in So Cal. USC is without question one of those schools that will have clout and name value among firms that employ engineers especially in So Cal. It just depends on where you want to go and the type of education you want.</p>
<p>I suggest that after you get the acceptance letters/notifications go to every single Admitted Student’s Day/Open House you can. Nothing is more informative than attending these events and possibly have your kid do an overnight on campus with some students. The exercise of choosing a school must be capped off with a campus visit. Also, drift away from the teachers and faculty as often as you can and strike up conversations with students and ask them flat out what they think about the school. We were surprised at how candid the kids were with us. You will know in your gut which school to choose after all that. Good luck!</p>
<p>Truly thanks Osakadad, yes I have all the info I can handle till the letters come in. Sorry for all the panic questions, it was easy till so much money was thrown at us and I think that clouded things for awhile. Back in focus.We have actually toured every school he applied to, so are in good shape, but will for sure go to the accepted kids meetings since now that I “met you” I realize I will get more/different there than on the first tour, like the UCLA info you mentioned. (I may have skipped those thinking I had been there done that.) Thanks for all your time and you really made a difference for me. Eventually I will check back in and see if you are still around and let you know where he goes. Thanks again.</p>
<p>On your next campus visits, really dig deep into program content and teaching methodology. I can honestly say that we we asked a lot of hard questions to the professors and administrators and went out of our way to meet students in the campus coffee shops and food courts. We did it in as natural a way as possible and the kids are the best source for information. The best way to strike up a conversation with a student is to ask directions on campus. Then follow up with, “By the way what is your major and how do you like the school?” Some kids are really helpful and will actually escort you to your destination and you can chat along the way if you are lucky. Kids will tell you of their frustrations with the administration, fee increases, bad teachers, etc. They will also share their best experiences too. If the majority of students won’t give you the time of day, you know you are not on a friendly or helpful campus. If every kid stops and helps then you know the culture is open and warm.</p>