My son wants to major in computer engineering. He’s thinking about Purdue and Wisconsin but OSU is a bit more affordable than UW and potentially less cold. I see that OSU has a first year exploratory engineering program. How hard is it to get your first choice after the first year? We are OOS. 1330 SAT and 3.8 WGPA.
I had two that went through the old process. They both got their first choice majors BME and ECE on the EE track. Last year was the first year with the holistic application for all majors. Before last year’s change they were for the most part gpa based. It seems like under the new system fewer courses are required to declare your major.
ECE had one of the lower gpa thresholds under the old system for a guaranteed admission. They continue to build capacity especially in their CS department and there is a nice electronics lab. My S in ECE has had nice research opportunities.
My youngest is a freshman there this year and plans to apply to his major in Spring. He assured me when he finalized his college decision that he’ll be ok studying any engineering discipline.
My D assured me the same several years ago when BME was her first choice major and knew she’d have to be at the top of the pool to get that. Later after she was in she said if she hadn’t made it, she would have just continued to re-apply.
I think that’s part of why they’ve moved to this system that has them list several majors, so they can move on with the curriculum they need. Under the old system, it was possible to repeat courses to bump your gpa and get into your major. They’d prefer to see students move through the curriculum and get out after 8 semesters.
I haven’t seen a lot of complaints, but that may be because students had been aware of the prior gpa cutoffs and results have matched expectations.
Keep an eye out for their next annual engineering report that lists retention, graduating gpas/honors participation by major, research dollars by dept and lots of other interesting data.
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Thank you. Your older kids have been pleased with internship and job opportunities? Are jobs available throughout the Midwest?
I like to use this site https://www.engineerjobs.com to get a feel for current demand.
My kids have all had a good experience with OSU.
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