<p>I'm looking for some feedback from the CC community for a friend of my daughter's who wants to pursue a degree in chemical engineering. He wants to study at a college located in NE, NY, PA, NJ or DE. His short-term post-college plans lean more towards graduate school than employment. How would you rank the CE programs at the following schools:</p>
<p>RPI
Worcester Tech
Northeastern University
Lafayette College
Lehigh University
University of Rochester
Drexel University
Clarkson University
Bucknell University
University of Delaware</p>
<p>I haven't listed MIT or any of the Ivies because while his stats are strong they are not so strong as to make admission to those schools a liklihood.</p>
<p>Undergraduate engineering specialties:
Chemical E
Methodology (At schools whose highest degree is a doctorate)</p>
<ol>
<li>Massachusetts Inst. of Technology </li>
<li>University of CaliforniaBerkeley * </li>
<li>Univ. of MinnesotaTwin Cities * </li>
<li>Univ. of WisconsinMadison * </li>
<li>Stanford University (CA) </li>
<li>California Institute of Technology
U. of IllinoisUrbana-Champaign * </li>
<li>University of TexasAustin * </li>
<li>Princeton University (NJ) </li>
<li>Georgia Institute of Technology * </li>
<li>University of Delaware * (a school in your list)</li>
<li>University of MichiganAnn Arbor * </li>
<li>Purdue Univ.West Lafayette (IN)* </li>
<li>Cornell University (NY) </li>
<li>Carnegie Mellon University (PA) </li>
<li>Univ. of CaliforniaSanta Barbara * </li>
<li>University of Washington *
Northwestern University (IL) </li>
<li>University of Pennsylvania </li>
<li>Pennsylvania State U.University Park * (a school in your area-PA)</li>
<li>Rice University (TX)
Texas A&M Univ.College Station * </li>
<li>Johns Hopkins University (MD)
Virginia Tech * </li>
<li>North Carolina State U.Raleigh *
University of Notre Dame (IN)
University of Virginia * </li>
<li>denotes a public school. </li>
</ol>
<p>Undergraduate engineering specialties:
Chemical E
Methodology (At schools whose highest degree is a bachelor's or master's)</p>
<ol>
<li>Rose-Hulman Inst. of Tech. (IN) </li>
<li>Cooper Union (NY) </li>
<li>Rowan University (NJ)* </li>
<li>Bucknell University (PA) (school in your list)
Lafayette College (PA) (school in your list)</li>
<li>denotes a public school.</li>
</ol>
<p>Tom -- Thanks. I actually was aware of the US News rankings but others may not be. However, what I'm really after are the educated opinions of posters on CC with firsthand experience either as students or parents of students with the schools on my D's friend's list.</p>
<p>"Unflexible curriculum. Is highly structured and all chem E courses are offered once a year- so if you dont stick with the semester by semester curriculum for whatever reason, you automatically delay graduation by a year. Also there's too many restrictions as far as gen eds are concerned- have to take one course with the "IL'(international cultures) designation and one with the 'U.S' designation. I want more freedom and free electives. "</p>
<p>Thats what you, racna, said about PSU Chem E in another post.</p>
<p>I have a question, hows the Co-op in PSU Eng?</p>
<p>and wow, wed to sun party in PSU-- thats crazy!!</p>
<p>I'm actually in a satellite campus of PSU (Del. County; freshman)
I'm planning to go into Ind Eng.</p>
<p>Lehigh University is a great place. There is a poster on CC, rogracer, who went there for undergrad. I would PM him if he doesn't see this thread.</p>
<p>I have a friend who went to Delaware for chemE and he says it's absolutely great. It's one of the best programs in the nation.</p>
<p>tom: my reasons for wanting to transfer out have nothing to do with the quality of the program. Just because it's not working for me doesn't mean it won't work for you. PSU is known to have a really strong engineering program and it offers basically any engineering major you can think of.</p>
<p>The Co-op program is extremely good. There are career fairs around here all the time and almost every engineering company comes to recruit. There's like a book full of companies that you have to look through...then you can pick the companies you're interested in and meet with them during the fair.</p>
<p>Well, after looking at exhaustively at engineering schools (although for electrical) here's my thoughts.</p>
<p>RPI - great
Worcester Tech - great
Northeastern University - great if you are committed to co-op program
Lafayette College - didn't look at
Lehigh University - didn't look at
University of Rochester - in spite of what you might hear on CC, U of R is NOT a top engineering school (except for optics). RIT or SUNY Buffalo are far superior.
Drexel University - looked at, eliminated due to miserable students
Clarkson University - OK
Bucknell University - son didn't like
University of Delaware - not a top engineering school, not much student support, but a nice school overall.</p>
<p>Penn State - great dept, a little rough for an undergrad (BIG, lots of TAs, etc)
Pittsburgh - very nice engineering dept, intimate
Rose-Hulman - Really nice, but small and far away.</p>
<p>weenie -- Thanks for your thoughts. I've read many of your posts as a "lurker" here for the past year or so and they are 99.9% of the time candid, well-considered and helpful. You have a S or D attending Denison as I recall. This is a school my D will be visiting this summer. Just curious, any reason you didn't look into Lehigh or Lafayette for engineering (granted it's electrical, not chem).</p>
<p>Hudson - We had a pretty hard time getting my son to "enjoy" college visits, so we had to try to narrow it down - although we still managed to visit lots of schools. If it had been up to me we probably would have visited those schools, but he looked at Bucknell with elder son and really didn't like the liberal arts feeling of it (and all the other LACs). He just didn't see himself fitting in. I suspect both Lehigh and Lafayette might feel a little more techie, but I really have no idea. Also, I was pretty concerned about getting more very expensive schools into the mix. Even though both offer merit money it just seemed to me like my son wouldn't qualify for enough to make it worth it (but who knows really).</p>
<p>As you might know I'm sort of an advocate for doing engineering within a regular university -- but, obviously, my son, and many others, don't see it that way. LOL </p>
<p>I do have a friend though, whose kid is there and dropped out of engineering (NOT that that's unusual). They feel there wasn't much support for the engineering students. He got put in a dorm with non-engineering students and ended up goofing off (failing important courses) and not really working together with other engineering students (a really important thing, I think). He also claimed he had trouble seeing professors for extra help (but who knows if that was true or not!).</p>