@ShrimpBurrito yay, that’s super!
@momzilla2D I think you and your Dd should spend time exploring different career paths in engineering. I wouldn’t use the word creative to describe the jobs that the engineers we know actually do on a daily basis. Engineering is a broad category that encompasses a lot of different career paths. It might be helpful for her to narrow down what she envisions and what type of background it will take to get there.
I would also have her explore the work environments for the different fields. I know that I personally would never have wanted to work at some of the plants where my Dh has worked and I know that I would have failed at his job even if I had had the educational background for it. If she has never been inside a factory, shadowing different engineers to see what goes on in day to day operations in their jobs might help give her direction. Shadowing across different industries would also be an excellent opportunity for perspective.
Fwiw, I wouldn’t worry about the robotics club exactly bc of my 1st paragraph. I personally see robotics in terms of engineering careers as parallel to elementary and high school experiments as representative of science careers. They do not largely translate well to the real world job market.
Very good advice, @Mom2aphysicsgeek . I agree about the factory environment. Not for me.
So much good news here that I feel bad venting. D will not do as well as she wanted to on one of her IB finals. Her score which was the highest in the class - without a curve would be a C. That is appalling. Her teacher talked about applying a curve but that doesn’t negate the fact that the whole class didn’t know their stuff at finals time.
I think a lot of people tell the kids they need experience in a field before college. My son was a top student and decided he wanted to majornin science - bio/chem area. He had top stats across the board but no research experience. Most of his ECs were related to music. But it didn’t matter. He was accepted to almost every school he applied to and is about to graduate from Yale. He is right now flying around the country for grad school interviews. Now, research experience is most important. It’s not expected in HS.
Regarding engineering I think a lot of kids think they might like it but have no real exposure to what it’s like. So while a job/class isn’t needed for a strong app, some type of exposure can really help them decide if it’s right for them. My son was unsure about eng or pure science. He did a one week summer engineering program and by the end he knew he didn’t want to be an engineer. So if you can squeeze in a short program or shadowing experience that could be really valuable.
Because engineering is one of the majors you typically jump right into freshman year, it helps to have a good sense that it’s the right place. You can choose what type as you go along.
Search for colleges here to see the overall and math scores for engineering programs. Lots of other data about size of program, majors offered, high school course recommendations, etc. as well.
@Musicmom2015 I read your thread about the schools he applied to for undergrad. =D> What is he looking to do for graduate school?
To add on engineering, one observation I’ve had is that it is difficult at most schools with ABET accredited programs to finish in 4 years if you don’t start out as an engineering major. You can switch out from engineering into other majors and graduate on time, but not vice versa.
I bet this kind of drives the push for applicants who are thinking engineering to be a bit further along in their thought process about what they want to do. Really hard for a HS kid I imagine.
No engineers so far in my house. DS18 is strong in math and science and thought maybe at young age but after doing a couple of summer programs decided it wasn’t a passion for him. He is premed now and it feels like this is much more him. Diagnosis versus design. And the human aspect.
@lkg4answers My Son is applying to PhD programs in biophysics. He wants to do research and perhaps end up as a professor. So, for all of our angst over his undergrad, where he gets his PhD will matter more. Two interviews down and 5 more to go!
It’s not spring break so I’m putting it here instead of the spring break visit thread, but DD will visit RIT this Saturday. It’s local to us and my alma mater (and my wife’s). Just a last minute thing my wife set up.
Also not spring break, but we just signed up for the NJIT winter open house on Sun Feb 10. I bribed DD20 into making the trip with seeing a broadway show on Saturday evening 
She’s a broadway superfan!
@Musicmom2015 Our ds went through that process last yr but for theoretical cosmology vs biophysics. Thankfully, my only involvement was waiting to hear where he would be going!
For all of the 2020 parents who are filled with angst about where they go for UG, it really can be much ado about nothing. What your students do as UGs (courses taken, GPA, on-campus research, summer internships/co-ops,REUs, etc) will more than likely be more important than where they attend. Ds’s UG experience at Bama was great and graduating w/o debt is huge. He is getting married in May. If he had UG debt, living as poor grad students would take on a totally different meaning than both of them being completely debt-free.
My angst is over finding a good fit. I’m not concerned with the status of the college as long as there are opportunities for jobs and internships. I agree about how nice it is to graduate without debt.
@momzilla2D
I wouldn’t worry too much if she’s not interested in programming. Mine isn’t either.
When daughter first told me she wanted to do engineering, I tried to discourage her. I couldn’t picture her doing it at all, and thought she picked it randomly because she loves math and science and knew it would pay well. However, as I challenged and questioned her more, I figured out that she has really put a lot of thought into this. She really has a passion for it. I know in the beginning she watched a lot of YouTube videos made by different types of engineers basically telling about what it was really like to do their jobs. That seemed to help her a lot.
Also, since your daughter is still undecided, I’d recommend you and your daughter explore different degrees in the science field. An easy way to do this is to pull up course catalogues at schools she’s interested in. Look through the different science/math/engineering degrees offered. If she sees a major that interests her, have her look up the descriptions for the major specific classes required for that degree. Read through those. Do they appeal to her? If so, she can research that degree more to learn more about career paths. If those classes don’t appeal, continue looking. I’ve known quite a few people who think they know what they want to do until they read the course listings and realize they’d hate most of the classes. This can really help you discover fields you’ve never even heard of before that might be a good fit. Good luck.
We found this to be true. Every school has told us that for their program, you have to go in declared from the beginning, and you jump right in. You can switch out, but not in. On top of that, your schedule has basically zero flexibility. There are almost no elective classes offered. You don’t really get a say in what you take when.
I definitely suggest asking schools when you visit for the course plan for the degree. Every school we visited was able to give us an exact schedule for all four years. It’s very eye opening. Basically, six extremely advanced math, science, or engineering classes every semester.
This is us as well.
We aren’t focused on aesthetics or prestige. For us it’s firstly: Does the school have a good ABET program? Good career services? Good internship opportunities? Good job placement? And secondly: Will daughter be successful here? Will the school meet her needs as far as her learning style? Will she have professors who care about her succeeding or who are just trying to weed kids out?
We are a very practical family. We’ve discussed we aren’t picking schools based on dorms or food or anything like that. Obviously, I want her to enjoy her time, but the purpose of college is to get a good job. That’s the goal. That’s what we are looking at.
Re: ABET accreditation Dd’s second choice school (for now) is a liberal arts school without ABET accreditation. If she majored in computer science there, are there any risks or negatives to doing that?
DS20 is home recovering from food poisoning ( suspect). He has missed 2 days of mid terms by now. Next week will be make ups. Hope this doesn’t delay his first semester grades further as their schedule is already very late. He missed a couple of summer programs’ deadlines. He was able to submit 2 so far. Still waiting for recommendation letters to be written and uploaded by the teachers. He has 2 more that he is interested in. These have later due dates so hopefully he won’t miss any again.
As far as engineering, I agree with everyone that Math and Physics are very important. Since D17 is a ChemE, thus chem is very important for her as well. S20 is getting more and more into AI, he probably will go into CS with some AI mixed in. So math, physics and bio are important for him.
@ebh87 I am sure if ABET is now more expected for CS or not. For many yrs, it wasn’t. Whether or not it is becoming more the norm now is a valid question and one worth investigating. Have you read the ABET website? https://www.abet.org/accreditation/ I didn’t read it, but you might find answers there. The biggest thing with ABET is that industry knows that the degree represents specific standards.
Agree with @Mom2aphysicsgeek wholeheartedly about UG angst. My D17 just recently was nominated for a Goldwater Scholarship by her large (OOS) state school. She has been doing research at the school for her second year, and was able to land a research internship at Northwestern the summer between freshman and sophomore year. She’s held two executive positions on boards for her Honors College. She loves football and basketball, which were also big factors in where she chose to go, knowing she could excel as the big fish in a small pond. Oh, and the graduating w/o debt is an added bonus…
@bigmacbeth Congrats to your dd. Best wishes to her on the Goldwater! She sounds like she is definition of blooming where you are planted. Gladwell is right from our experience.
And @ebh87 oops…that should have said I am NOT sure.
@whataboutcollege have him look into Cognitive Science.
Just toured UCLA engineering and was told that they had 4 GEs and no room for other classes.