<p>Going into engineering, does one have better opportunities than the other? Which has better grad school/job placements?</p>
<p>MIT is the #1 engineering school in the world.</p>
<p>But this is undergrad</p>
<p>I think the op meant which has better grad school placements / job placements.</p>
<p>Hi there a few thoughts.</p>
<p>CP Davis is a big deal at Columbia, so congrats there. </p>
<p>As far as engineering schools - Columbia and MIT are very different and I knew many sets of students who chose Columbia over MIT and many of those were Davis Scholars. In general though, Columbia can’t compete with MIT’s reputation as a technical school, and as far as just sheer intensity of engineering training MIT is way up there.</p>
<p>So why would someone consider Columbia over MIT?</p>
<p>1) Smaller size. The engineering school at 350 students per year is more boutique, easier to stand out, do well, and by that extension you have great shot at grad school if you do well and that is what you want to do.
2) More of an all purpose education. Columbia sees technical and engineering training as “liberal art” in the sense that strong quantitative analytical training is necessary and helpful in almost any area of study. You will find students doing almost everything and anything and being very successful at it, and not necessarily in engineering. This means students who may not want to go into an engineering grad program or only engineering jobs - find Columbia’s flexibility alluring.
3) Better social atmosphere. Now this is more anecdotal and personal. Many students I know found MIT to be very sterile (in multiple ways), less fun, less free, and mathematically maddening. It takes a certain student to want that day in, day out. And a lot of students who may have thought they had it in them in high school, arrive at MIT and don’t quite think it is who they are. So think about it, meet the students, meet SEAS students - and some end up having the epiphany - ah yes, I am more Columbia.
4) People like Columbia’s approach to entrepreneurship, service learning. It is something very special to Columbia and only see it growing. They just had the Columbia Venture Competition to give students start-up funding. They do service projects in the neighborhood. It is a very unique way of looking at engineering as having immediate impact on society and I’ve said before, it is what I think engineering really ought to be.
5) Davis Scholars Program - though Denzera talks about how it wasn’t much in his time, by the time I went through and the rumbles I hear now, the program is getting more organized and they have some cool programming directly for engineers including engineering firm jobs, money for research, etc., that makes it a compelling program for an engineer. Also see it in the sense that you would be a big fish in a small pond, where in MIT you might be a littler fish. </p>
<p>But the last thought about who has better grad job placement - if you want to be an engineer for the rest of your life and have no thought beyond that - well, MIT is there. As a Columbia and MIT alum (who is now more partial to Columbia), MIT teaches you how to be a good processor of engineering information (a technocrat), but not necessarily does it give you the skill set to really effect change (you would have to figure that out on your lonesome). If you want to really change the way the world works in any number of fields whether it be engineering, or law, or education and medicine, Columbia is a fantastic place. I would say better, but I’m biased. Go to Days on Campus, meet with engineers and you will get a sense of how Columbia is different. If you get sucked into Luthien’s mantra that MIT is the only option out there, you wont do yourself justice. </p>
<p>In any case, good luck, and I hope you find Columbia to be a better option for you.</p>
<p>
Caltech is #1</p>
<p>Sorry, didn’t mean to get everyone so upset. jomjom, don’t know where you’re getting your rankings from. I was just trying to point out that MIT is known for its engineering program, so if that’s what the op wants to do, MIT is a good choice. I’m not saying Columbia is bad, in fact its just the opposite, I’m just pointing out the rankings. Either way, you can’t go wrong!</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice admissionsgeek.</p>
<p>I grew up in and around MIT (dad went there), took classes there for HSSP and Splash, often found myself there doing research… I think to really be happy there with no regrets, you have to be a TOTAL NERD.</p>
<p>Now, I don’t say that lightly and I don’t mean that pejoratively. Every sunday evening I play board games with my friends, for crying out loud. But MIT’s campus, and its student body, has a mentality that emphasizes the functional above the aesthetic on all subjects. Its halls feel like a high school, its plazas are lifeless slabs of concrete, its students revel in their dorkiness. I love dorkiness, but it has its time and place. If I had had to go there for 4 years, within a month I would’ve screamed over how much I wanted to see a tree - any tree, somewhere, anywhere. And I say this as a guy who likes Cambridge, in all its quirky glory, and thinks Anna’s Taqueria has better burritos than anywhere in all of NYC.</p>
<p>Columbia by contrast is only slightly less nerdily focused, but has so much more intellectual diversity on it. Liberal arts, history, politics, these are afterthoughts at MIT, but even the most serious math/science nerd at Columbia will get a taste of other disciplines. Perhaps that is the best thing about attending Columbia - everyone gets to play at being renaissance men and women for four years.</p>
<p>Now that said, employers seeking analytical thinkers - and that includes banks, hedge funds, top tech firms, and so forth - will prefer an equally qualified MIT guy to an equivalent Columbia SEAS guy. But the difference is one of degree, not of kind. Few opportunities will be available at MIT that are completely unavailable to Columbians (aside from tech startups - MIT is absolutely a hotbed of that, nearly unparalleled), but someone at Columbia will have to be more aggressive to secure the same opportunities. So yes, there will be a difference, but not an extreme one.</p>
<p>As the case with most top schools, it’s all about fit. Go to the admitted students’ weekend and figure out where you feel most at home.</p>
<p>Wow, today I realize how ridiculous my responses sound. Of course rankings should not be primary in decisions about where to spend the next 4 years of your life. Like the two who had great responses above, it is about fit. Denzera pointed out that MIT is all for nerdiness … and I like that a lot, so that is one reason I would lean towards MIT. However, I don’t know if that is what your looking for day in and day out. At Columbia, you will be immersed in all sorts of studies, and surrounded by people majoring in them, while at MIT basically everyone is majoring in math/science/engineering. There’s also location, size, traditions, and other cultural aspects of the school to weigh in. I second Denzera in that you should visit both first before making your decision.</p>
<p>clarification: i am not said columbia and mit alum, i was quoting someone who is on the board of trustees at columbia.</p>
<p>how could you possibly pass up MIT?</p>
<p>I’m not sure about the prestige of PC Davis Scholar, but I know quite a few people who have gone through MIT, and one friend who recently finished SEAS in Chem E, and one of the differences seems to be that MIT does have a much more rigorous, in depth, unique exploration of engineering/math/science topics, whereas Columbia engineering is solid, but lacks the standout factor of MIT’s. Columbia’s SEAS has the perk of while you won’t receive the same engineering experience, you will get better, standardized literature/LA core classes. So really it boils down to how committed you are to the study of engineering in its most relentless, top-notch form, versus how much you want to take a variety of classes and do more liberal arts. </p>
<p>The people I know at MIT are people who have known since ninth grade they have wanted to do (their B.S. field) and have a confidence in their desire to devote their undergraduate experience to really grilling themselves in those set of areas. The Columbia students seem to be more “I really am commited to engineering (or w/e) but I also want to maybe minor in X, take these classes, etc.”</p>
<p>Of course, this is garnered from a very small sample size of students who I know quite well.</p>