Northeastern or Purdue

Hi everyone!
I’m a HS senior who is having trouble deciding upon whether to attend Purdue or Northeastern this Fall. Northeastern has offered me a 22k a year scholarship along with acceptance to their honors college and while Purdue hasn’t offered me any merit scholarships or honors college, they appear to be the more prestigious engineering university based on the rankings.

I’m not sure which engineering major I’ll go into yet (debating between Chem, Mech, and Electrical) and even less sure of my future post undergrad (may go for an MBA or just straight to employment) which makes it even harder for me to choose between the two. I generally like Northeastern more due to the Co-ops, location, honors college, and merit aid, but I’m worried it doesn’t carry the same alumni base and networking, and therefore job opportunities that Purdue has. I’ve already done a lot of research into this decision but would really value and appreciate any input this forum could bring.

Purdue is the better academic engineering / prestige between the two for sure, but NEU is very solid and certianly not out of compassion.

I wouldn’t be worried about the career prospects between the two - NEU’s co-op program does more than a fine job getting one a very nice engineering gig. 50% of students get full-time job offers from one of their previous co-op’s when they graduate. You’ll also have plenty of experience under your belt. NEU has one of the top (often #1) rated career centers of all US colleges. Purdue engineering will have a larger alumni network than NEU, but the co-op program and career center, along with being in Boston, offers plenty of networking and job opportunities.

It sounds like you like NEU more generally - I think you should go with that (along with the added bonus of being much cheaper) versus simply going for the slightly more prestigious / better ranked. Fit and your happiness while attending is important and both are Top 50 schools for engineering.

D1 was considering Northeastern for a different major. She had an incredible scholarship there too. Something we kept hearing when we talked with students there was that they had co-ops that weren’t really great, but it helped them figure out what they didn’t want to do. While I do think that is valuable, I argued that they could find out what they don’t want to do in a much shorter summer internship situation. Why be stuck for so long in a co-op in something you don’t want to do?

Anyway, again it was a different major, but the same principle applies. Ask what co-ops students are getting (not just the REALLY cool ones that make it to the glossy publications.) It’s helpful to talk to as many students as you can to get more data points.

Also be sure to understand exactly what is expected on your part to receive their merit aid. It took some digging on our part. Understand what time commitments you’re agreeing to.

I’ve read about lots of student liked their NEU co-ops. However it is true that wherever you go to school the co-ops early in the career are more likely to be uninteresting. The advantage with school with 5-month co-op is more time to get traction on the job. (I had 2 summer internships - great experiences, but limited due to short timeframe). We do have a neighbor that did 6month Purdue co-op, but not sure if that is typical or not.

OP - Do you know where you want your final job? NEU has a terrific reputation near Boston. For other areas, Purdue may be more recognized name.

Sorry, I typed that reply on my phone - “compassion” is meant to be “comparison”.

As far as liking your co-op / the quality of co-op’s, most of my friends are incredibly happy with their co-ops. However, I think there’s a distinction to be made between not personally liking your co-op and having a bad co-op. The former is a great way to learn if you truly like your major’s career - the job is often a good quality, but simply not for you. The latter is obviously much more troubling, but I haven’t heard any co-op horror stories from my friends.

To the 6 month vs 3 month point, the experience for a job you like is far more valuable in 6 months than just 3 - the companies really get to teach you more and give you more meaningful work in that time - the 50% stat I mentioned isn’t something you’re going to get from doing internships because the companies aren’t investing nearly as much in you.

It does depend on the major, but for Engineering, you’d be hard pressed to find better positions. I personally am friends with people working at the JPL on the mars rover and at iRobot for their first co-ops - these aren’t just the glossy ones in the publications.

For my major (Computer Science), Intuit hires two co-ops pretty much every semester/cycle. Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Apple are all regular names I have heard from my friends having interviews. I know at least one person currently working at each.

Long story short, you’re going to have good job prospects at NEU from all of this, and you will have good prospects at Purdue with its rank / prestige / alumni network.

@colorado_mom
I’m not quite sure where I want my final job to be, part of me is intrigued about working in Silicon Valley, but I’m so young that I feel it’s all subject to change

@PengsPhils
I know Northeastern has some really amazing Co-ops for engineering, and I’m especially excited for the Nasa JPL one, but I’m just worried about the depth of co-ops. Specifically, I’m worried about how many co-ops are actually available from the top engineering companies in comparison to some of these other, smaller companies, and if the people I hear about on these amazing Co-ops are a smaller but vocal minority compared to the vast majority of engineering students that work at lesser-known, minor companies in Boston.

I’m wondering if my fears of having to compete with all the other engineering students for these very limited but incredible co-ops are legitimate, or if it’s overblown and more likely than not I’ll be able to get my foot in the door at these companies as well.

Also, thank you for all the replies I really appreciate it

@RobJustRob

I think you’re correct when it comes to the smaller but vocal group for the big name co-ops in engineering, but there are plenty of great jobs at the smaller companies in Boston who will also offer great experience and connections - many people end up having multiple offers in their co-op search and choose between two or more great places. I wouldn’t call it a vast majority, but I think a majority do probably work for smaller companies in Boston, but no school is going to have a majority of its students going to the top tier companies while they are still in school - if you go to a school in Silicon Valley, most students will be working for smaller companies there too, simply because they make up a majority of the job market. That doesn’t mean the jobs aren’t as good - they just don’t carry the high level of prestige. Some companies even offer higher pay because they know they are in direct competition with the big name companies. If anything, the companies compete just as much as the students do.

What NEU’s co-op program offers is a great selection of jobs from both the big companies and the small ones, all paying well and offering valuable experience - in the case of engineering, while the top names are competitive for sure, there are more decent co-ops available than students usually - this goes for a lot of other fields like CS and Business.

Regardless of if you end up at the big name companies or not, chances are you are going to at the very least interview with them of them over your time here and have those opportunities / connections. Often, students with multiple offers end up saving one as a later connection / opportunity, for their next co-op or even a full-time job.

Short version: The program is legit and it isn’t just a few top outliers - there is a broad spectrum of companies.

Hope that helps!

When we were researching/visiting NEU in 2009, the campus reps said that bad economy had meant a downturn in the number of corporate positions. (Not sure if there has been a rebound or not). However they claimed to have added more opportunities in other companies so that all students that really tried for a co-op got one. My thought at the time was that the top students probably would have the best choice of co-op options. OP - Your scholarship probably means NEU considers you in top tier of their applicants, so you have a good shot at doing well in college / co-op priority. The same may be true at Purdue.

@PengsPhils

Thank you for the reply, it really does help. The thing about Northeastern is the more I read about it, the more I feel like this is a really, really good school. The job placement is top-notch and I’m sure having all those Co-ops on your resume helps when applying to grad-school. However, then I see these rankings and see Northeastern a bit lower and worse-off than I’d expect so I think “what’s the problem, are there really 41 schools that can offer more for engineering?” I know rankings aren’t gospel, but at my high school (and this site for that matter) they seem to matter a lot to everyone.

@colorado_mom

That’s what I’m hoping for at NEU or Purdue. It really sways me towards Northeastern just because as you said, based on their merit scholarship and honors invitation, they already consider me a top tier applicant.

Northeastern is definitely a better school overall. They are ranked higher, lower admission percentage, and higher average sat/gpa

@RobJustRob, the bottom line is that you and only you create the ranking methodology that is best for you. It sounds like you’ve done a good job at sorting it out and have come to a good conclusion. Really, on the end it’s much more about what you do with your time. Have fun and congratulations on arriving at a very well reasoned decision!

I think it’s pretty clear that NEU is your choice here - @eyemgh hit the nail on the head really with his post.

As far as rankings go, you have to remember that NEU is rising up the ranks fast. In 1996, it was ranked below #150 overall by US News (now ranked in Top 50 overall) - the school has undergone an incredible transformation in every aspect - student quality, facilities, commuter to residential, tons of faculty hired, admissions standards, research, everything - many of the rankings have not caught up - that changes for the better with each year. The one constant in NEU has always been the academic philosophy, which works hand in hand with the co-op program, now over 100 years old. I think that one of the key factors in NEU rising up has been a resonating of that philosophy, which you seem to like.

I say wait for any other schools you may still be waiting on, and after that go for Northeastern!

“The job placement is top-notch and I’m sure having all those Co-ops on your resume helps when applying to grad-school.”

I’m a big fan of NEU, and it’s hard to beat co-op experience when applying for jobs. However if you are think you might want to go directly to grad school,make sure you find ways to get some research experience. That is possible at NEU, but you’ll need to seek out. Also I’ve heard that you can do research in place of co-op for one of your “experiential learning” periods. .

My D is a 4th year engineering student at Northeastern, working at her 3rd coop. Her first was a small company in Cambridge. She had other options at top-tier companies, but this interested her the most. And she was able to do real work. The 2nd was a well known international company, now she’s in Silicon valley. Her friends have all had great coops as well - it’s not just a few positions for the glossy brochure. She’s also worked in a research lab at Northeastern, which turned into an REU (paid internship) her first summer.

As far as summer internships vs. coops, the software manager at the engineering company I work for said he strongly prefers coops over students who’ve done summer internships when hiring full time. He said the typical summer wasn’t long enough to do real work, not like a 6month position.

Be careful with rankings. While Northeastern has been doing very well with US News, you have to look at the methodology. One national rankings ranks them very poorly because percentage of students graduating in 4 year is important in their calculations. Since most NEU students are in 5 year programs, it doesn’t make sense. They say it’s ok because they offer a 4 year degree.

Think about where you want to live for the next 4-5 years.

@krnBoston, USNWR uses a different methodology for engineering than they do for other majors. For UG engineering it is 100% based on institutional reputations (as judged by other institutions, hence the minimal movement in positions), so NE isn’t impacted negatively by the five year program. With that said, rankings in general should be taken as a little data point, if that, and certainly not the be all end all.

@eyemgh That was my point completely - be careful using rankings as a major deciding factor. Institutional reputation seems even shadier than some of the other things I’ve heard of - especially as the only factor.

Thank you again everyone who has replied and given me advice. I was leaning towards Northeastern, and you guys have pretty much confirmed that decision for me.

I agree too on the discussion of rankings. This site seems to put a lot of weight into them, but for engineering, the more research I put into the subject, the more I’m starting to realize it’s a lot more about what you do (Co-ops, research, etc) than where you go.