I’m a junior in high school and im looking to major in mechanical
engineering.
I have some schools that im interested in applying to, here they are:
UMD college park, cooper union, upenn, lehigh, penn state university park, johns hopkins, and stevens institute of tech
What do you think of this list?
Here are some stats…
GPA 3.77 unweighted
2140 SAT superscore (over 2 test dates) 680 CR 720 M 740 Writing
NJ student
Putting cost aside, and strictly focusing on academics, what other schools do you suggest I look into? I’d prefer to stay in the boston to DC corridor.
I’ve heard good things about all of the schools on your list (and on swamp’s list too). As you look at other CC threads, watch for the wise theme about including a variety of schools (safety, match, reach).
If you like Boston, consider Northeastern. it is in the city, but with a slighly more campus-y feel at it’s core than you’d expect. The have an excellent co-op program. With your stats, you might qualify for some merit scholarship funds. I know you are intially “putting cost aside” … but since few families can afford $60k/year, it’s never to early to be thinking finances too.
Big vs small program is not of upmost importance. Id prefer a medium sized one though.
Ive visited upenn, stevens, and rutgers. (Ill apply to rutgers, but i just did not put it on the initial list bc i wanted to get schools of higher prestige)
RPI is a good suggestion thank you.
Do you know of any others?
@colorado_mom
I do have a general list of reach, match, and safety. I orginially posted my reaches and some matches to find other schools on those levels.
I have thought about northeastern and the co-op sounds very enticing. Is it up to snuff with the other schools though?
And are there any other schools u can recommend?
Thank you!
Most ABET accredited programs are a decent choice,
Northeastern is a decent school and keeps getting better in the rankings. There are especially good opportunities if you can get accepted into Honors. But college choice is all about fit. (Example - students that don’t want to cycle through 6 month co-ops won’t like Northeastern.) So do your research and continue doing visits to see what you like.
I second WPI and Case. Both are good schools where students seem happy and they offer good merit. I also like Lehigh a lot.
I’d eliminate Swarthmore and Union. The programs are pretty small with few toys.
I’d caution you about only using prestige and academics as your guide. It FAR more important to find a program you’ll fit well into, both academically, but just as importantly, non-academically.
Think about weather, your hobbies, whether or not the typical college experience (football games, etc.) is important to you, what the curriculum is like, for instance is it a book grind with no labs for two years or do you get hands on earlier, plus anything else you can think of. Then you can really form a good list.
@eyemgh what is it that you like about lehigh?
And yes id stil take all of those things listed into account, but after ive made sure that the schools im picking have the appropriate academic levels
Thanks for your thoughts.
We all liked the campus, the engineering facilities and the school spirit.
As for academics first, that’s a little tougher than you might guess to perfectly qualify. What is quality and according to whom? Rankings are notoriously bad because the methodologies are flawed or even non-existent. Follow them and you’re really reading perceptions based on graduate programs, not undergrad.
All ABET accredited programs are pretty sound. They have to be or they wouldn’t be accredited. That’s not to say they are all the same. They aren’t. The gaps aren’t as vast though as some would have you believe.
What I recommend instead is to start FIRST with other criteria like teaching style, class size, non-academic activities, size, location, etc. and THEN add then add in the academic filter. Otherwise I could very easily give you a list of 100 schools, maybe more. There are lots of good ones.