<p>What are Princeton's undergraduate engineering programs like? Please don't just compare Princeton with MIT or Cornell, etc. I wanna know how Princeton is by itself, not compared to others</p>
<p>^^ Relative to itself, it’s about average.</p>
<p>^That made my morning!</p>
<p>I will tell you that we have family connections to Princeton, yet my (almost) freshman engineering student wouldn’t even apply. </p>
<p>This decision is after 2 separate visits. During the first, the impression was that the engineering students are the outcasts…sent to the edge of campus to toil amongst themselves. The tour was OK, but nothing significant other than “here’s the new building”. No real interaction between the guide and anyone in the building…very cold. All business. Shhh…people are working.</p>
<p>The second trip was spur of the moment given an opportunity to stop. Maybe visit one was a bad day. </p>
<p>We walked the Engineering building, then up to the admissions office and back. 30-40 minutes in total. Nobody smiled. NOBODY! Not even the person behind the admissions welcome desk, who seemed a bit upset we interrupted her by opening the door.</p>
<p>It might be a great place to study engineering, but it was the least friendly school we visited (of 8 or 9). I know you’re not looking for comparisons, but at Dartmouth (not the final choice) on a Saturday morning last August, one of the professors found us wandering (at 8am) and walked us through the engineering building on his way to a meeting. He was there for other reasons, and was so friendly, and so proud of the school, he took the time to see us around. The 3 or 4 students in the building all smiled and said hello to him / us. Not even the slightest sense of that openness or community at Princeton. </p>
<p>@EyeVeee - its unfortunate that your visits were not more informative and welcoming. My son is a rising CEE junior at Princeton. He loves his studies and department. When he initially visited we did the separate engineering tour and found the guide and everyone we encountered helpful, informative and enthusiastic. </p>
<p>First year studies were filled with prerequisites so he didn’t enjoy them as much, but second year (digging into more actual engineering topics) was great. The work load is very heavy but all instructors (profs and preceptors) have been available and supportive. Office hours are plentiful and students collaborate much more than he expected initially. He’s excited about the courses he’s enrolled in this coming fall and the opportunity to do some independent research in the spring. </p>
<p>In terms of social connections, he has many, many friends across campus and to my knowledge doesn’t feel isolated in any way. It’s unfortunate that you got the impression that engineering students are somehow viewed as ‘outcasts’. The only comment I recall him ever sharing that might be somehow construed as some kind of separation is an AB student commenting to him, “Wow…engineering. You must be smart.” He found that both funny and ridiculous knowing that there are MANY extremely intelligent students in every academic area at Princeton. Beyond that, he has felt a strong sense of community and shares close friendships and moves in social circles with a broad spectrum of personalities on campus. </p>
<p>@mommamia26 - What specifically are you asking about BSE studies at Princeton? Atmosphere? Opportunities for research? Faculty? </p>
<p>my main concern is probably the quality of the professors and learning environment. I assume even if it’s not the best like the top schools like MIT, Princeton is still a very high quality place to study engineering, correct me if I’m wrong</p>
<p>@mommamia26 - quality of professors is high. Learning environment is a bit broad to answer as asked. </p>
<p>Princeton is a large research University, so a lot of energy, focus, teaching and research goes into graduate students. Undergrads at all research universities benefit from the research in many ways, but it also comes at a price. Undergrads see less of their professors than they do at smaller schools. Graduate students will handle much of the heavy lifting for undergrad classes, and will get the choice research assignments.</p>
<p>You should also note that engineering has it’s own rankings and reviews by school and program. Ivy League tends to mean a bit less to engineering than it would for humanities or arts. In the end, unless it’s MIT or Stanford, an Ivy League diploma caries a great deal more cache than the state research universities.</p>
<p>I was a student many years ago, but my perspective is that 1) engineering is tough everywhere and 2) Princeton engineers are different because they can write. In the old days the engineers were more serious and had to work harder than us liberal arts majors. Yes, they had fun, but they didn’t have time for as many ECs as we did. But to be fair I see the same thing today at my son’s Big State U. </p>
<p>Having said that, I do think your son should go with his gut. Princeton is a great place, but if it doesn’t feel right to your son, he should go somewhere else. </p>
<p>EyeVeee,</p>
<p>I learned about this link from American Society for Engineering Education on cc and found out Ivy engineering has an exception… the student profile for Math SAT/ACT: Cornell is stronger than Stanford. You may be surprised, me too when I saw this for the first time.</p>
<p><a href=“http://profiles.asee.org/profiles/5586/screen/19?school_name=Cornell+University”>http://profiles.asee.org/profiles/5586/screen/19?school_name=Cornell+University</a>
<a href=“http://profiles.asee.org/profiles/5566/screen/19?school_name=Massachusetts+Institute+of+Technology”>http://profiles.asee.org/profiles/5566/screen/19?school_name=Massachusetts+Institute+of+Technology</a>
<a href=“http://profiles.asee.org/profiles/5694/screen/19?school_name=Stanford+University”>http://profiles.asee.org/profiles/5694/screen/19?school_name=Stanford+University</a></p>
<p>@Findmoreinfo </p>
<p>You’re surprise is warranted, as it’s based on misleading data. The Cornell statistics are based on the School of Engineering (9,481 applications out of a total to Cornell of 37,000). MIT is also all Engineering. Alas the Stanford stats are for entire school. </p>
<p>The whole school stats for Cornell are lower for the SAT than they are at Stanford. No ACT data.</p>
<p>I don’t put too much stock in the USNews rankings, but Stanford is #2 overall for Engineering…Cornell #13. Princeton is #17. It’s a bit like having the worst penthouse overlooking Central Park…but Stanford and MIT are the overall pinnacle. </p>
<p>Individual specialties obviously have different rankings / perceptions.</p>
<p>“The whole school stats for Cornell are lower for the SAT than they are at Stanford”</p>
<p>Ahh, you do know the undergrad size of Cornell is double the size of Stanford, correct? One should not take stats on the face value. I read on CC of the apples to apples comparison of the top 20 universities when taking size into consideration, these two schools are close.</p>
<p>“Stanford stats are for entire school”
Stanford is very science/engineering focused, the number would not off/up too much when only take engineering stats.</p>
<p>On rankings - I was talking about student profile, US News ranking is a totally different story.
But for Undergraduate Engineering Ranking you mentioned, you seem to made a mistake:
<a href=“http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/engineering-doctorate”>http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/engineering-doctorate</a>
Stanford is #2, Cornell is #7 (not 13).</p>
<p>I won’t continue to discuss Stanford/Cornell on this forum. Stanford, Cornell, Princeton, and MIT are on the top of the list for my daughter but they are all so hard to get into. It is just a dream for her, I guress. </p>
<p>Ahhhh @Findmoreinfo …you do realize you stated that your surprise to see “Cornell is stringer than Stanford”. Excuse it however you would like…the statement is wrong, based on misaligned data. Size, focus, or other qualifiers didn’t accompany your statement. Cornell is a reach for most; Stanford is the lottery for all.</p>
<p>Eyeveee, No need to steer from your original mistake: </p>
<p>"Ivy League tends to mean a bit less to engineering than it would for humanities or arts. In the end, unless it’s MIT or Stanford, an Ivy League diploma caries a great deal more cache than the state research universities. "</p>
<p>Ivy Cornell and Princeton Engineering are still top notch.</p>
<p>"Cornell is a reach for most; Stanford is the lottery for all. "
Nahhh, Princeton, Cornell, Stanford, MIT are all lottery for all when talking about Engineering. </p>
<p>And I never said “Cornell is stringer than Stanford”. hahaha. I guess I can stop here.</p>
<p>At least for academic research quality, Ivy engineering is not shoddy. See for example, </p>
<p><a href=“NRC Rankings Overview: Electrical and Computer Engineering”>http://chronicle.com/article/NRC-Rankings-Overview-/124726/</a>
<a href=“NRC Rankings Overview: Computer Sciences”>http://chronicle.com/article/NRC-Rankings-Overview-/124721/</a></p>
<p>(Click on S-rank high to list the schools by rank.)</p>