The undergraduate student body at IIT is about 3,000 and about 30% are international students. The graduate enrollment is about 5,000 and 60% are international students. It has been my experience that many of the international students find positions, at least for their Optional Practical Training period, in the U.S. The Career Center is certainly used to working with International students and the students and faculty are all quite welcoming of international students.
The neighborhood is much, much better than when i started as a faculty member there in the 1980’s. I have personally never had a problem and neither have my two children who have attended IIT. If you are looking for the “college” experience that others have alluded to, then IIT is probably not the place for you. As far as athletics, we are moving to Division III and the major sports teams are soccer, women’s volleyball, men’s baseball and the swim teams. IIT is primarily a technical university and that means that engineering and sciences are dominant majors even though we have other majors too.
I notice that the OP’s son wants to get a graduate degree and so having a solid research experience is essential. being an international student, means that the REU programs are not available to him so it is important to have an on-campus experience. IIT have graduate programs at the Ph.D. level in physics and electrical engineering and there are opportunities for undergraduates to participate.
@PurpleTitan - I think that Engineering Physics degrees appeal to those who are more interested in physics but feel that an ABET accredited degree give them a better opportunity for employment. Alternatives are just plain Physics or Applied Physics and the fact is that these majors are pretty good for getting jobs too. I think it is a matter of taste.
One thing to consider is how easy it will be for your child to get to and from your country. Virginia Tech is going to be considerably more challenging than Illinois.
Buffalo has superb international student services and is very diverse as a campus and city. The campus is almost 20% international. It also has a low cost of living and a growing, well-ranked engineering school. I would venture it has the best quality of life aside from weather.
Buffalo is a real city (though much smaller than Chicago), but, in contrast to IIT, UB is not actually in the city. The main campus of UB, including the engineering school, is in a suburban area 7 or 8 miles from the city proper. It’s relatively easy to get back and forth to the city on university shuttle buses, but day-to-day life there feels suburban, not urban.
I could not find any ABET accredited Engineering Physics or Engineering Science degree at SUNY UB (assuming this is Binghamton). There is ABET-accredited Engineering Science at Stony Brook but it looks much closer to Material Science than EE. If the interest really is more along the subject of materials science, I would recommend choosing a school that at least has a Materials Engineering degree if not Engineering Physics/Science. Florida Tech does not have such a degree, IIT has a Materials Science and Engineering, SUNY Binghamton does not have anything similar, and VT has both Engineering Science and Mechanics BS and Materials Science and Engineering BS.
My opinion as an engineer who worked a couple of years in the consulting design business with a BS degree and now have spent many years in research and development with a PhD in engineering is that a traditional engineering degree (design focused) is going to be much better for getting a job with a bachelor’s degree. I think an Engineering Science or Engineering Physics degree, like Physics or Applied Physics, is likely to require a graduate degree for a job. So it is fine if the plan is to go to graduate school, but what if your son changes his mind before he gets there?
Since this student is interested in graduate school, I am assuming they would be less interested in a program with a heavy applied design focus. Have you looked at the actual course requirements for the EE degrees?
My opinion as an engineer who worked a couple of years in the consulting design business with a BS degree and now have spent many years in research and development with a PhD in engineering is that a more traditional engineering degree (design focused) is going to be much better for getting a job with a bachelor’s degree. I think Engineering Science or Engineering Physics, like Physics or Applied Physics, is likely to require a graduate degree for a job. So it is fine if the plan is to go to graduate school, but what if your son changes his mind?
I agree with all the comments about other aspects of fit as well.
UB means Buffalo, which has a large SEAS, Engineering college. Buffalo is the largest SUNY college with almost 20000 undergrads and almost 10000 graduate students, a med school, dental school, and a law school.
^Thanks, I should have noticed that from previous posts. Had trouble finding SUNY Buffalo on the ABET site. Now that I found it, the Engineering Physics program at UB is NOT ABET accredited.
ABET accreditation is for specific programs, not institutions.
Hi StemFamily,
thank you for the Response. Would you elaborate what degree will be - more traditional engineering degree (design focused) ?
Also , in US Universities, we choose Engineering based on 1st year GPA ?, right ? In case , my S wants to opt for EE after 1st year ,even though admitted for Engg. Science or Physics, can he do that ?
I like the VA Tech approach:
All freshmen and transfer students admitted to engineering are admitted to General Engineering. Once specific course requirements have been completed, students become eligible to declare any of the 14 degree granting engineering majors offered at Virginia Tech. https://www.eng.vt.edu/students/undergraduate_degrees
Yep, the ease of declaring for or switching to a major is very dependent on which university you are talking about.
It seems that at VTech, declaring for EE isn’t difficult (according to what @BrownParent found).
Probably the same at IIT ( @xraymancs can comment) and FTech.
Not sure about the 2 SUNYs.
Changing majors at IIT within the College of Engineering is generally not a problem. Even moving from the Engineering College to the College of Science is easy. The one move that is hardest is to go into the College of Architecture as they have a very constrained curriculum from the first semester.