<p>I did five years of engineering because I changed from Computer Engineering to Civil. My school wasn't the best. It was a technical college in Florida. However, since I got out in May, I have yet to find a firm that is willing to take me. I don't know how much of the economy I can blame as opposed to my 2.6 GPA. I'm at a crossroads. I can either go join Officer's Canidate School and go to Afghanistan, I can go to Master's School and increase my debt, continue searching, or give up on engineering all together. </p>
<p>I've been trying to understand this recession as much as possible, as to where the jobs may go, but I have no idea how to predict the most likely future. Government jobs are the way to go, and my GPA won't get my foot in the door. I'm open to any suggestions at this point.</p>
<p>I want to continue pursuing civil engineering.</p>
<p>Trying for a Masters isn’t really going to help you because your GPA is so low and most schools may not accept you unless they are a middle or lower tier graduate school. Since you want to do civil, definitely make sure you take and pass the EIT. It is more important in civil than any other engineering field. Having that will help but won’t necessarily get you into anywhere automatically. It is just something you should do anyway.</p>
<p>Your dilemma isn’t really where the jobs will go and when. Your dilemma is deciding how best to strengthen your overall resume/profile so that you can start making up for that low GPA.</p>
<p>Don’t give up on engineering if you like engineering.</p>
<p>Going to graduate school would be a very good thing if you like engineering and would enjoy taking more classes. You might have to apply a couple times, but it certainly won’t hurt you. If you can get a fellowship it will help on costs.</p>
<p>Keep looking for jobs. The job market will come back.</p>
<p>What school? If it’s a half decent school, you can probably get into a respectable master’s program. Hunker down and graduate from there with a very high GPA, and you’ll be OK.</p>
<p>My apologies for the delayed response time. I haven’t taken the EIT exam yet. I’m aiming for the April one and I already registered once and failed to register with the NCEES website too. Since I don’t have the 3.0, grad schools usually make me take the GRE, unless it’s at my school. I went to Florida Institute of Tech, not to rub it in or say I’m as prestigous as GaTech or MIT. I don’t think I want to go back to it. I had enough grief from that place.</p>
<p>Usually? The GRE is required for every respectable grad school that I have heard of unless you are doing it as part of a BS/MS program and very few other special circumstances. You either take the GRE or you don’t go to grad school.</p>
<p>Even with a 4.0, the vast majority of grad schools would require you to take the GRE. Are you opposed to doing that? A very high GRE score could balance out your GPA in admssions.</p>
<p>I think what might be happening is that because of the bad economy employers or potential employers have a larger pool of applicants to look than they have had in previous years which means that they can be more selective of who they hire. Also, I think a lot of firms might be only hiring the “bare minimuim” to keep their businesses functioning.</p>
<p>carnelian, why, exactly, would the economy affect the number of applicants? The only reason it allows employers to be more selective is that they can’t afford to hire as many people so they are forced to be more selective than they otherwise would be.</p>
<p>I suppose you could argue that there are more people applying simply because there are a lot of workers that lost their jobs that are also applying, but that is a relatively small number compared to the total number of engineers and is offset by the fact that a lot of recent grads are doing grad school instead of getting jobs because of the economy.</p>
<p>The problem with the economy is that there is very little infrastructure development going on, which is where a lot of Civil Engineers get hired into. When it does pick up, and there will be a lag between financing and development back to financing and then to construction, those who have the work experience will have the upper hand for most jobs. </p>
<p>If you are interested in the military than it might be a good route, not everyone goes to war torn areas.</p>
<p>You could look into grad schools, but the low gpa will be an issue.</p>
<p>I would try harder to get the work experience. Cast a wider net if possible.</p>