<p>Whew. Thanks for all the info.</p>
<p>in regards to dmt117. I’m a ME major and haven’t taken any major specific courses yet, so I can’t speak for those, but I know the intro courses that every engineering major has to take is well thought out and executed. The material is relevant and useful. They do their job well as “intro” courses. Keep that purpose in mind. They aren’t the most stimulating or exciting classes but they give you small tastes of various engineering themes. I won’t lie, it is kind of set up so that if you teach yourself the material you will do better. For example I found using trial and error to be the most effective teaching method. I just tried, failed and tried again over and over until things clicked. But what class isn’t like that? And that being said if you have any problems or can’t teach yourself something then the professors are more than happy to help during their office hours or if you contact them. 2 teachers I had were actually so enthusiastic that is was annoying. Ohanahi and Reap are so enthralled with their classes/material that it can rub you wrong. </p>
<p>As for the reputation thing I would argue for both sides. Tech has a strong reputation because of its highly gifted recruits AND because it puts out excellent engineers. One of the first things I noticed in my engineering classes was that EVERYONE was so gifted. I mean obviously you had those who bombed and whatnot but the vast majority of the kids had the make up to succeed. Some failed because they partied too much, others because they weren’t interested in the material but in the end everyone was capable. In high school every graduating class pretty much has the 5-10 people who are simply stars and everyone knows will be something special… VT is more like every classroom has that many. So yes VT has stud recruits but as someone who has talked/been to several engineering companies in VA I can attest to the fact that VT is VA’s farm for engineers. VT is highly respected for its ability to produce industry ready engineers. Thus, respect</p>
<p>GoOakland, thanks for the reply. I’m a 20-year experienced engineer thinking about VT for my younger son. I completely agree that part of a college education is learning to discover/learn things on your own. You shouldn’t be spoon-fed the way you are in high school. It sounds like VT has the right balance.</p>
<p>Maybe you can help me with one more thing. My elder son is a sophomore at UMass Amherst (we are from Massachusetts), and while I’m overall satisfied with the school and especially pleased with the engineering education he’s getting, I’m not happy with the uniformly leftwing political views that get rammed down his throat in the liberal arts classes he takes. There’s basically no escaping it at UMass; there are a lot of gen ed requirements and they are almost all taught from a leftwing political context.</p>
<p>I’m not looking for a specifically conservative campus, but I assume that VT is not in thrall to liberal ideology the way UMass is. I’d like my son to take a U.S. history course that is balanced and more than merely a recitation of America’s crimes (although I have no problem with acknowledging and faciing America’s shortcomings.) Actually, this is one of the main reasons I’m considering forking over an OOS tuition rather than staying in-state.</p>
<p>most of the students here are more liberal leaning as most students hail from northern Va, but there are plenty of people with conservative backgrounds and upbringings</p>
<p>History classes involving the US in college are pretty uniformly anti-US, in part to try and counteract the hilarious white-washing that happens in highschool and in part because, honestly, we’ll screw anybody to get ours and viewed from the outside? We’re pretty much evil. It’s nice to be on the inside though,</p>
<p>Anyway, I have a feeling you’ll have an issue with what you consider to be the left wing anywhere that isn’t Bob Jones, so I certainly wouldn’t advise your kid one way or the other based on that.</p>
<p>Chuy, thank you for the classy and intelligent response. You are a credit to Virginia Tech.</p>
<p>to dmt117, it has been a pleasure to peruse this thread but I agree that was a really rude entry from chuy. Probably just a long week! He is usually very helpful. BTW, my son is applying early decision Engineering. We live in Maine.</p>
<p>Tech has large population of both political backgrounds. darknight is right in that there are MANY students from the Northern Virginia area, the DC suburbs and such, that have a heavy, heavy liberal view point. But you have to remember that places like Richmond and the Tidewater regions can counter that. I mean don’t get me wrong there are liberals from both of these areas especially if they’re from the actual cities. But the surrounding suburbs of these areas are highly conservative from my experience. Several of the surrounding counties of Richmond still have that southern/country atmosphere so there are plenty of die hard conservatives. And the Tidewater region has a lot of military so you’ll find your conservatives from there too. </p>
<p>In the end I would say yes VT has/is more liberal but as Chuy said its not a good reason to sway your decision. My family was pretty concerned about how liberal of an influence I would get when I got there too. And like I said, after being there I don’t think that’s a valid worry. You gotta grow up and find what you believe eventually</p>
<p>GoOakland, that’s a fair reply. But if you look back at my original question, I’m not so much concerned about the student population as the professors. American universities provide excellent vocational training in technical specialties like engineering, but it is very difficult to get a genuine education in them. To be genuinely educated is to have a deep enough grounding in history, philosophy and literature to get beyond a bumper sticker view of things, whether from a liberal or conservative perspective. Here in Mass, the bumper stickers are all liberal, and you need to be careful about questioning them.</p>
<p>Chuy is right that nearly all American universities promote a uniformly left-wing point of view, except for some outliers like Bob Jones (which I’m not really familiar with, but it apparently serves as a right-wing bogeyman for the left). Of course, the answer to a uniformly right-wing point of view at Bob Jones is not a uniformly left-wing view at VT, but a genuine education that, through history, literature, etc., puts these competing propagandas in perspective and shows the limitations of each of them. Such a genuine education is very difficult to get nowadays, and I was wondering if there was a better chance of getting it at VT than UMass… at this point I’m not convinced there is.</p>
<p>If you’re worried about how left OR how right of an education your child is going to get enough to publicly ask other people about it, I imagine that either they’re: hopelessly indoctrinated on your party-line spiel (boy, you really let them find their place in the world!) or are against you completely.</p>
<p>It’s amazing to me that allegedly college-educated people cannot grasp the idea that a true education should transcend political ideology… that they can only think in terms of who’s ideology is being propagated. Since I question the propagation of liberal ideology on campus, they assume it can only be because I am in favor of propagating either conservative ideology or my own ideology. And then they shortly devolve into personal insult.</p>
<p>Is this what four years of a Virginia Tech education produces? I was hoping for better.</p>
<p>As an adult and a parent I agree with dm117… the responses to the posts were not what I would expect from students. Mass is a very liberal state and I do respect the concern of forcing one point of view upon it’s students. In some states the high school curriculum represents the overall political opinion of the state. A broad point of view/respect for all opinions should be represented and I think it would bother me if it was not. I do however think that Virginia is a mixed state and would hope that professors were not one sided. This forum may not have been the best place to ask the question because the responses show they do not understand the question. Call the school and ask about the curriculum. Dont judge VTech on a few responses.</p>
<p>Bandgy, that is excellent advice… and I am sure you, as do I, take everything on CC with a major grain of salt. Anyone can say anything on here or represent themselves as anyone. I will be talking to the school when we visit in November… but, naturally, what I will be getting from them is their marketing response, which also has to be taken with a grain of salt.</p>
<p>The ideal response would have been a bunch of VT grads telling me I’ve got VT all wrong, something like “it’s not about politics here at VT, the profs I have had showed me how fascinating history/literature/philosophy is, and although I used to have no real interest in history or philosophy, I love reading it now.” Most tech students have little interest in the humanities and view those courses as box checks; a great professor will spark an interest in the humanities and draw a student out of his bumper sticker thinking. This is when real education begins. Unfortunately, either out of political belief or mere laziness, a lot of profs are content to allow students to parrot back talking points (as long as they are the right ones), which is a shame, because it gyps them out of a real education. The responses I’ve gotten indicate to me that it is possible to get through VT this way; but then, this is true of just about any college these days. But I don’t attach a lot of significance to the responses on CC; it’s just a minor data point. If there had been an avalanche of responses defending humanities teaching at VT, rather than a couple that did nothing more than insult me, that would have meant something. But like I say, just a minor data point.</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure the type of prof I am talking about exists at VT, as they do at UMass (David Lenson in Comparative Literature is one.) You just have to work hard to find them if you want to do more than check boxes in your humanities electives, or parrot back approved opinions.</p>
<p>Probably a better way to solicit what I was after was to do it indirectly: Who are the best non-technical professors you’ve had at VT and why? (I’m already sold on the technical education at VT… as I am at UMass).</p>
<p>dmt117 - - i think i understand (and agree) with your point about a real education requires deep grounding in history, philosophy etc. I had the same concern abut my daughter selecting a technical degree rather than liberal arts. I want both of my daughters to attend school for an education - not a job. </p>
<p>But having said that, there she is at VT studying engineering. She will minor in history or art history or perhaps architectural history thereby satisfying her desire for a well rounded education… She applied and was accepted/waitlisted to two of the 5 year programs you find at non-engineerings schools. 3 years of applied physics with 2 years at Columbia or RPI. Has your son thought about this type of program?</p>
<p>While I was really in favor of such programs, we ultimately found that VT had sufficient humanities courses to satisfy her. As to the liberal leanings of such courses, I have no clue but I would be shocked if they were more liberal than UMass - is there anywhere more liberal than UMass?</p>
<p>“Most tech students have little interest in the humanities and view those courses as box checks;…”</p>
<p>I would have defended many of your points until I got to this statement. Since you seem to have already known what the answer to your question was why did you bother to post the question.</p>
<p>The question isn’t about students, its about professors.</p>
<p>I hate to break up the flow here, but on the VT website it advertises:</p>
<p>“SPECIAL TO VIRGINIA TECH: Unlike some other colleges and universities, Virginia Tech requires a computer of all new students so the cost of attendance includes a one-time allowance of $2,500 toward the purchase of a computer.”</p>
<p>What I was wondering is, What is considered “toward the purchase of a computer”? Will it include money for the Incoming Undergraduate Software Bundle (a req. for attendance at VT) and/or other programs that I want on my computer?</p>
<p>Every school calculates a “Cost of Attendance” (CoA) that is an estimate of how much it’ll actually cost you to go to school for that year. It typically includes room, board, books, tuition, etc. With most types of financial aid you can only get aid up to the CoA (minus the Expected Family Contribution (EFC)), so you couldn’t, for example, take out $10,000 in subsidized student loans if the CoA was only $8,000. </p>
<p>VT puts the extra $2,500 on the calculated CoA freshman year so that you can get more aid if you need it, to buy the computer. There is no way for them to know if you actually spend it on a computer or not.</p>
<p>Thanks, chuy.</p>