Junior Seeks Engineering School with Personality

College Majors Engineering Majors
1

<p>Hi,</p>

<p>I am a Junior, and thus far my college search is not going well. </p>

<p>To start with the basics:</p>

<p>My SAT scores, transcript, ECs, and teacher recs are all solid. (780 CR 770 M 670 W) I am interested in Engineering, most likely ChemE BiomedE. </p>

<p>But I am having trouble finding schools that have a strong engineering program as well as an interesting and diverse student population. For me, it is most important to find a socially and politically active community, preferably with a commitment to the environment. I want classmates who are academically-focused but also love to relax and participate in IM sports and the like. I seek a community with personality, and with a soul. Diversity a plus, Pretentiousness a minus.</p>

<p>Any suggestions welcome!</p>

2

<p>you should be able to get a possible scholarship at some big ten schools. Where do you live?</p>

<p>Illinois, University of Michigan, Purdue, and Wisconsin are all great engineering schools with a ton of school spirit and sense of community.</p>

3

<p>Check out Clemson. I'm not sure about their rankings, but they fit the other criteria.</p>

4

<p>Rice Rice Rice Rice Rice.</p>

<p>You're describing Rice perfectly. I'm a super-biased alumna, but what you describe is Rice University.</p>

<p>The Rice student body is academically focused. They are work-hard, play-hard, and excellent in ChemE and BioE. </p>

<p>It's got a great amount of diversity, and that diversity is really celebrated, with each cultural student organization hosting annual events to show people what their cultures are like, and membership of cultural organizations is by no means ever limited to just people descendent from that culture. My roommate the Catholic violin performance major from Utah would love to perform belly dances and cook with the middle eastern clubs, and another of my friends who was a Mormon engineering and history major was in the hispanic culture society and would teach salsa dancing in his spare time.</p>

<p>At Rice, everyone is so much more than just what they study. People have a lot of obscure hobbies... I was an engineering major who was also DM of the scatter band and tuned pianos in my spare time for the music school. My husband would sneak out of the Shepherd School conservatory atmosphere and his masters music composition studies to conduct orchestras for college musicals.</p>

<p>Powder puff football is HUGE. Intramural softball teams are everywhere. Ultimate Frisbee is also really really big on campus.</p>

<p>Students are academically intense, but are wholistically chill and a little bit quirky. Zero pretention. Nobody really knows anybody else's social status... all that really matters is whether someone nearby has a car big enough and functional enough to drive us all to House of Pies for midnight snacks.</p>

<p>Community service is big, with lots of Habitat for Humanity projects in foreign countries (my roommate went to Honduras over spring break one year). Engineers Without Borders helps to set up sustainable communities in foreign countries, and there are several organizations on campus (Sierra Club etc.) that are real activists when it comes to environmental issues. There's an active political scene, with folks from all sides of the spectrum, though there's the liberal lean that you tend to see in academia. Professors get involved, too, with the students... but nobody is made to feel like an outsider, no matter what their views. I walked into a Rice for Peace meeting at the height of the Iraq invasion and took a pro-troops anti-war stance and nobody chewed off any of my limbs. I was pleasantly surprised.</p>

<p>Rice is just a fabulous place, and it sounds like something you'd really be interested in... Definitely check it out. Feel free to PM/IM me if you're interested.</p>

5

<p>MPC,</p>

<p>I live in Maryland but I don't feel too restricted by location. I would prefer not to go allll the way out to the west coast, but am willing to make exceptions for a perfect fit.</p>

6

<p>Check out Olin Engineering.</p>

7

<p>aibarr, she said pretentiousness is a minus. :)</p>

<p>I'd say Berkeley fits your bill. It is a crusher though, in terms of difficulty.</p>

8

<p>large public universities in general would be suitable.</p>

<p>you might wanna look at Northwestern.</p>

9

<p>Maryland is very diverse and spirited, has a good engineering program, and is in-state.</p>

10

<p>Second Berkeley. Any day through Sproul Plaza is like walking through a convention. There's a trillion clubs and associations and they're always recruiting. The courses are tough, but I really don't think they are that brutal after you finish lower division. Take ChemE though. It's probably the first or second toughest engineering major there, but all the BioE people I knew, said that their major wasn't all that useful in the real world.</p>

11

<p>
[quote]
aibarr, she said pretentiousness is a minus.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Overzealousness != pretentiousness. ;)</p>

12

<p>Let's see...you have a 1550 SAT math + verbal, and implied that your other qualifications are along the same line. You want to be able to find people with a commitment to the environment. You want academically focused classmates. You want to play IM sports. You want personality in your community. You want to do ChemE or BioE. You want diversity.</p>

<p>Why is MIT not on your list? I mean, I wouldn't say that the majority of the students are activists, but you'd be able to <em>find</em> the activists trivially (and there are plenty of them). And environmentalism, especially in terms of energy research and sustainable development, is the new black. And everything else that I listed in my first paragraph is a complete fit with MIT (including that it has one of the highest IM sports participation rates in the country).</p>

13

<p>seriously if you're from maryland umd is the best bang for your buck. it is consistently ranked in the top 20 engineering programs and moving up. we have hands on engineering classes (in the first class you take you build and autonomous hovercraft) and everyone is pretty serious about their work (the av. engineering student here is definitely smarter than your av. student in general here). we've got like every club ever (like juggling and high five day and ballroom). the campus is really diverse. we've got lost of school spirit to support our usually (except slightly mediocre this year) great sports teams. and we lead in environmental issues. the university has recently stated that it wants to be number one in like of an environmental footprint. it's making a green dining hall. last fall it hosted a national environmental conference. plus with your stats you would probably get into honors and maybe gemstone or honors humanities. so basically i go to maryland and am really biased but it has everything you describe that you want in a school, so you should come here!</p>

14

<p>
[quote]
socially and politically active community, preferably with a commitment to the *environment*

[/quote]
</p>

<p>this alone screams berkeley. where else can you find institution so renowned for its liberal hippies, tree hugging phenomenon. goto UCB</p>

15

<p>If you're from Cali, definitely choose Berkeley. Fits your criteria perfectly.</p>

16

<p>I am loving these suggestions! Thanks so much!</p>

<p>Maryland is definitely on my list, especially because I have tuition remission through a family member. It's a little toooo close though.</p>

17

<p>I was also going to suggest looking into Rice. My son is a freshman engineering student there and loving it for a lot of the reasons you're stating -- but Aibarr explained it really well. Rice is especially unique for its level of diversity AND integration, mostly due to the residential college set-up.</p>