Large State School vs Small Tech School for female engineer?

College Majors Engineering Majors
21

I want to point out that a lot of the perceived drawbacks of large schools are not necessarily features of large schools if a student is proactive. Most of the same things that small schools can offer can be had at a larger school with a little bit of legwork. Just to address the issues brought up in the original post:

The thing about big schools is that they usually have plenty of support options, but students are responsible to seek them out.

In my time spent at three different large schools as an undergraduate, graduate, and now faculty member, I’ve never seen this be an issue. As long as a student doesn’t fail any courses and stays on sequence, then they will be fine. At large schools, there are often options for students who are off-sequence as well, though not infinite options.

This is true at any school, not just large schools. At large schools, though, there tends to be more research in general, and that means more diverse opportunities in that realm if an undergraduate chooses to pursue that route. Of course, it is faculty dependent since some of us like to hire undergraduates and some don’t. Most of us who hire undergraduates are doing so as a trial run and recruiting tool for future graduate students, so the positions are somewhat competitive.

Much like the issue of “support”, face time with professors is available but really up to the students at large schools. I am more than happy to sit down with students in my office and discuss class, offer advice, etc. provided I am not in the middle of crunch time on a grant or other such deliverable, and I’ve gotten to know a reasonable number of students.

I think this is true anywhere, to be honest. Distractions are all over, not just at large schools.

Going to a larger school doesn’t necessarily (or even usually) correspond with academic/career disadvantages, as this line seems to imply. This is not a choice between social and academic life. It’s one about personal fit.

Why is this relevant?

A few comments of my own:
[ul]
[]As has been mentioned by others, aerospace programs in general tend to skew toward larger programs anyway. This is, in part, because they are expensive to operate. This is especially true if you look at high-dollar equipment like wind tunnels.
[]Usually, at large schools, there is still a degree of close-knit camaraderie, but it is among students in a department rather than the school as a whole.
[]Small schools certainly do typically have more personal attention per student than larger schools, though may make up for this with fewer specialized electives.
[]Either option should set up a student for either industry or graduate study upon graduation. For the later, the key is to try to get research experience in some way. For the former, internships and/or coops.
[/ul]

Other questions? Fire away! I’ve got answers and opinions galore!

22

Again, it depends entirely upon the school. I’m not sure anyone would say MIT is lacking in specialized electives. They have just over 4000 undergrads, small by nearly any measure. I also wouldn’t say MIT students get an inordinate amount of faculty attention. In fact, the opposite is probably true. The point I’m trying to make is that distinguishing by size alone is a poor metric. Choose qualities that are important and the schools that have said qualities. They will almost certainly be all over the map size wise.

23

From the OP:

That’s why. UMich has “big time sports” and spirit (Go Blue!) in spades. And I thought it was funny!

24

Being from a smaller university on your list, I would like to note that many of the smaller school assumptions stated here are just assumptions.

For WPI:

See aerospace @ https://www.wpi.edu/academics/departments/aerospace-engineering. It takes you right through job placement, do your research;

See gender support @ https://www.wpi.edu/student-experience/resources/lgbtq-support

For engineering majors, WPI probably has the best oversea research program going anywhere! For study abroad see https://www.wpi.edu/project-based-learning/global-project-program/project-immersion/boston

For the past two years the entering classes are about 43% women

Both music and drama are VERY well developed and the STEM majors get to participate because the STEM majors ARE the performers and often playwrights. Drama and Music majors do not make up the organizations. Hear the WPI full symphony orchestra the internet @ https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=WPI+symphony+orchastra

“New Voices” is the nation’s longest continuously running collegiate new and original play festival! See https://www.wpi.edu/student-experience/community/voices.

Participation and balanced activity is widely encouraged and students are involved. A “team player” can be a club hockey player, a musician, a champion women’s Rowing team or belong to one of over 220 organizations. True, we do not watch so much as we are too busy participating. See https://athletics.wpi.edu/landing/index

Research is the working program for ALL undergraduates in three different projects. Working with others on projects and interdisciplinary teamwork are essential.

Participation is a large part of what WPI is about!

25

No doubt, little WPI has all that going for it, and why my son almost chose it. Without question, they have the best study abroad program for engineers. They don’t do GEs in some foreign country. They work on engineering projects all around the globe.

26

Yes, but those engineers have to make the same time commitment to the band that a sociology major makes, and I inferred that the OP’s daughter wanted to do things like sports or clubs but didn’t want the major time commitment at D1 schools. Just using band as an example of something that can be big and time consuming at a big school or smaller and less of a time commitment at a smaller school/smaller band. I think some things are easier to do at a smaller school like joining the chamber orchestra or participating in a play were there are no theater majors at the school. Not as much competition for parts.

The engineering work is similar at big and small schools, but for my daughter the ECs were very different. My nephew went to a big school in engineering at the same time, and I think their academic experiences were similar. Both knew their professors, both worked for professors, both asked to be TAs, etc. It was the activities that were different, including big time sports v small sports. My daughter played her sport on the varsity team but my nephew did not play on the club team as it was very competitive (and expensive) and he didn’t want to put in the time. No opportunities for intramurals at the big school in sports he was interested in.

I’m a big school person, so I’d always take the big school. Just pointing out that the smaller schools do have some opportunities on a small scale that the bigger schools many not have.

27

Just an FYI, since I’m familiar with UMich, if the OP’s D wants to okay club level or IM sports, then here’s a listing of both:

https://recsports.umich.edu/intramurals/sports-offered/

https://recsports.umich.edu/clubs/

Seems like an extensive list to me and may be the same as other big schools on the OP’s list.

28

Agree that knowing the schools makes a difference. For example, if one of the smaller schools is Harvey Mudd, the Claremont Consortium adds a lot to the number of students and non-STEM courses available compared to other smaller standalone technology focused schools. My D was a Mudder; if it is on your D’s list, feel free to PM me.

29

Picking outliers doesn’t make your point stronger. Of course it depends on the school, but there are some generalization that hold on average more broadly, thus my use of the word “usually”.

Being top xx in sport yy is not a prerequisite for having “big time sports” at an institution. I think it was pretty clear the implication was that major conference sports with fans who care qualifies here. Anything more is icing and probably isn’t (not should it be) a distinguishing factor. There are plenty of reasons to choose Michigan. Trying to brag about what the AP voters think of the various programs is distracting.

This is not typical. Most big schools have large, healthy intramural programs, generally with multiple-tiered leagues for the most popular sports to control for differences in competitive ability amongst students.

30

You might also want to look into how females are regarded in the different schools. For instance, my niece, an engineering major, found the males at her school were very supportive and worked collaboratively with the females. She has friends (female) who went to other schools who did not have that same experience. They were both small schools but from a female perspective had a different feel.

31

The teaching style will vary (project based, traditional lecture, upside down classroom) may be more important to her than class size, or institution size. Exams and grading - multiple choice versus problems solved in graded blue books. Have her sit in on classes with students.

Does she want to take humanities classes, an entrepreneurial or business minor, foreign language minor or any other interests with non-stem majors? Live with some non-stem majors. This was a big factor for D1. Yes, engineers can be diverse but collaborating with an English, art or finance major makes you a better writer, more creative and able to convey your best business plan for your new product or make your research grant stand out.

As mentioned undergraduate research availability varies. It is absolutely very possible to find a university with endless undergraduate opportunities. Scroll through the Goldwater scholarship and nominee awards to see where they study and contribute to research.

Knowing what your department major early helps the search. Visit the aero dept at her top schools. Look through the curriculum map. Is it flexible enough to study abroad, include enough core (aero requires knowledge from multiple depts similar to robotics) and does it leave enough spaces for her to explore her other interests.

My college students have friends at both the smaller and larger schools you mentioned. They are all having good experiences, the best ones however are where the student decided to explore and create their own community.

Ours chose a 10k undergraduate population with less than 2k engineers and lots of collaboration between colleges within the university.

32

For what it is worth, see more recent Goldwater results from WPI @ https://www.wpi.edu/about/awards/goldwater-scholars

MIT really cleaned up this year!

33

That could easily happen due to the makeup of a particular class. It might not have anything to do with the school.

I never had any issues working with guys in engineering school, even 35 years ago. If you work hard and get along with people, you’re fine.

34

@sushiritto. My son plays intramural sports at Michigan(flag football and softball) and actually refs and umpires in some (his job) all while being an engineering student and started a tech club with weekly meetings and getting 2 project grants and in April putting on a major tech conference at Michigan.

If you have the drive at any of the these schools you can make anything happen.

Time management is also a good thing :wink:

35

@MaineLonghorn
“I never had any issues working with guys in engineering school, even 35 years ago. If you work hard and get along with people, you’re fine.”

True, but each of us is a collection of our own life experiences. Something is still at work out there as the data indicates women still seem to be dodging ME, EE, ChEng, CE, and even the PH majors. MA and Life Science related courses, including BME are doing well. It is difficult for me to buy the argument that this bias is genetic.

36

Somehow I doubt that endemic sexism in ME/EE/ChemE/CE departments is the cause of women being underrepresented in those careers. I won’t deny it exists, this particular issue starts before any female students would even have been exposed to that. If sexism is the cause, it is a variety that is more culturally-ingrained and dissuades women from applying to those programs in the first place.

If sexism in the department was the root cause, you’d expect incoming student numbers to be balanced and then women to drop out at a higher rate, but I don’t believe that is the case in the data (though I’ll happily be proved wrong if someone had data like that handy).

We have a real problem in my department, which is a combined ME/AE department, with the low number of female students (I think it is something like 20% female), and this starts with the incoming classes. Fixing it will take a concerted outreach effort to encourage more applicants as well as curtailing whatever internal issues may exist that drive them away once they are here.

37

Being ranked, whether by the AP, NCAA or RPI, is the definition of “big time sports” IMO.

First, there’s a difference between 110,000 fans who pack the Big House on Saturdays, where tailgating and pre-game parties nearly shuts down Ann Arbor, for example, and a half-filled stadium or arena to watch mediocrity or a last place team. Being ranked by whatever service, will get a university football bowl bids, College Football Playoff, March Madness, the Frozen Four, the College World Series, etc. Ranking is more than just relevancy. Ranking translates to larger alumni donations to the school, which funds all sorts of programs.

But it doesn’t matter how we define “big time sports,” the OP has chosen to apply to Florida, Arizona, Michigan and Purdue, which are all “big time sports” schools, highly ranked in various sports as well as their Engineering programs. And I’m not the first, nor the last, here on CC to brag about a school, whether it’s their athletics or their academics.

38

Work environment and culture definitely contributes to staying in your field. It likely also contributes to major choices because of the lack of female industry role models and professors.

The manufacturing and design environment in the aero and gas turbine industries were all male cultures 30+ years ago from the accessories and system manufacturing shop floor, engineering depts and upper management at engine and airframe companies, vendors, military maintenance, gas turbine sites… The culture required a female to ignore behavior, find allies and not talk with a manager or Human Resources. I’m glad for the training, awareness and laws so that D1 will not have the same experiences but disappointed that the eng departments have not significantly increased female enrollment.

I never thought about not having any female professors until D1 was happy to have her first female STEM professor junior year, especially for an engineering class. She is a CBE and does not feel under represented in class or have limited early career opportunities. She does consider the glass ceiling at a large employer with 9 male members of the board and the final number 10 is a female responsible for Human Resources.

39

Some schools have better gender ratios overall. Mudd is 50% female. My D had a lot of female profs and a large group of female STEM friends there.

40

That’s true, but just because you didn’t start it, doesn’t mean it isn’t distracting to continue it. As the person who is tasked with keeping the engineering subforum on topic, my goal is to try to steer threads in a direction that keeps them maximally useful for the person posting the questions. Getting into debates about whether 110,000 fans in the Big House versus, say, 70,000 at Arizona matters to a discussion like this is simply a distraction.