<p>I know the engineering programs at UMich are top notch, and this probably requires a lot of work. A lot of information I have seen tells of how engineering students just study all day, during lunch, all night, etc.</p>
<p>Is this really true? I was looking to major in aerospace engineering, as well as participate in Army ROTC. Does it really require THAT much work and studying? As of now, I rarely study and get by pretty well.</p>
<p>I would be looking to graduate with at minimum a 3.3 gpa, preferably higher. Ia this even possible?</p>
<p>It’s not THAT hard. You can graduate with a 3.3, lots of people do it. Given, I’ve only been here for 1 year, so take however you want.</p>
<p>Personally I’ve found that I’ve needed to spend about 20 hrs out of class per credit throughout the semester. Breaks down to about an hour and 25 minutes per credit per week out of class. </p>
<p>I’m expecting that number to go up due to the classes I’ll be taking in the fall, and I don’t know how that number will maintain as I start taking actual engineering classes. But that’s my first year experience.</p>
<p>Finnbarr, I wouldn’t worry about anything. Engineers definitely don’t need to study as much as it seems. Probably a little more than a typical LSA student but it shouldn’t be anything to worry about. That said, on average in my five semesters at Michigan, I studied/did homework for 15-20 hours outside of school each week and I currently have a pretty high gpa. That, and I typically work ~10 hours per week/do clubs/socialize. So its not terrible.</p>
<p>These kids are engineers only, remember that. They don’t have Army ROTC and all the other stuff that comes with that. Army ROTC is going to take up a ton of time.</p>
<p>I’m not going to say it’s not doable, but if you want to do engineering, participate in AROTC, and maintain a 3.3 in AeroE it’s going to be tough.</p>
<p>Trust me, I’ve done it… By the way, don’t listen to any freshmen when it comes to engineering, most of them have only taken prereqs and the difficulty is nowhere close to upper-level classes.</p>
<p>Most of the kids I know in ROTC are either A) no longer in engineering B) kicked out because they couldn’t maintain their grades or C) left because they couldn’t do it all.</p>
<p>Most of my ROTC friends that are also doing engineering have a 2.5-2.8.</p>
<p>Well then the military would have no engineering majors…</p>
<p>And anywhere from 7-10 is “required” but it requires more than that. Plus expect to work out 4-5 days a weeks for an hour or two to max the PFT/PFA.</p>
<p>Thanks for the insight everyone. Really though, i’m not too prone to studying, so maybe I will switch majors. I’ll be joining the Army, and wouldn’t want to jeopardize my branch selection by majoring in something too difficult, which I will likely never need. And frankly, i’m not lazy, but 20+ hours a week seems nuts. Call me naive, but what time do college students get done with classes to put in all this time? Or does it all just cut into sleep?
Maybe a major in Chinese (or Korean or Japanese). Maybe a double major with some business field. I don’t know.<br>
Hopefully the Army will let me change my intended major once I am in. I chose aero, but it’s not looking too good now.</p>
<p>Josh, are/were you a cadet? How is the program? What are some other popular majors that ROTC students undertake?</p>
<p>EDIT: Don’t think I am a lazy doosher that shouldn’t join the Army. Seems like above text gave off that kind of idea. I intend to serve a career, and don’t plan on joining the corps of engineers. I just thought aero engineering was kinda cool, as I like space.</p>
<p>EDIT 2: When applying to the university, do you apply to specific colleges? I haven’t started the app yet. What if I apply to the CoE, and decide to switch out as soon as I get there, or after my first semester? Can you switch to a different school like that? Are any schools easier or harder to apply to (as a highschooler)? I am OOS, and yes, in NJ.</p>
<p>I was Air Force but left for other reasons besides academics. I had a 4 year Type I scholarship, too. I can tell you that I would not be a Computer Science major today if I had stuck with AFROTC and probably would’ve lost my scholarship (for switching majors).</p>
<p>Yeah at most colleges of UMich’s caliber I’m sure around 20 hours of work per week is a norm. Consider that with a productive Sunday you can get 6 hours done, then Monday thru Thursday night you do 3.5 hours, that’s really not bad. I was at 25 spring quarter, but I did like 9 hours on Sunday and 9 on Wednesday, so those days sucked but the other days were tight. </p>
<p>Your sleep schedule will probably shift back a couple hours (more time at night to do HW), you’ll have breaks in classes during the day (time to do HW), and depending on whether or not you do ROTC freshman generally have more free time than in high school because they aren’t in many activities yet. </p>
<p>I don’t know much about ROTC but is the ROTC scholarship money worth it for you (aka can your parents easily afford college)? If not I think you can go to officer school the summer after graduating or something.</p>
<p>wait I don’t get it…20 hours per week of studying? Thats only about 3 hours of studying each day, that sounds too good to be true. Engineers only study 3 hours on the weekends too?</p>
<p>^Well, that’s focused studying, and that’s in addition to classes, and that’s only for the first year prerequisites (well, at least that’s all I was talking about).</p>
<p>It’s not “too good to be true” because it’s not that good in the first place. Believe me, you will wish there was more time in the day when you get to college. With 20 hours of class per week and 20 hours of work, you basically have a full time job. On top of that, many people do research or have an actual job. You will also have extracurricular commitments. Most of these things will be condensed from Sunday to Thursday because of “social commitments” (football, drinking, etc.) on Fridays and Saturdays. So anyway, 20 hours is more than you think.</p>
<p>For 200/300 level engineering courses (at UMich and my previous university), I spent on average 20 hours/week studying/doing homework/etc. It’s really not that bad if you find time in between classes to do your homework (then the topic is fresh in your mind too). There are plenty of hours in the day to do your work, as long as you manage your time effectively. It can be hard to do this though, especially with the tempting internet!</p>
<p>I think you can do engineering, and ROTC would basically be a job on top of your studies. If you’re looking for a LSA alternative, you could look into mathematics and some of their concentrations. Operations research, for example, was born out of the military in WWII.</p>
<p>well not everyone has a 20 hour commitment to a job. I feel like 3 hours a day of studying in college is not enough, especially for engineering/science majors.</p>
<p>collegeboundguy: Well I don’t know how it works at UMich specifically, but at my uni, on psets there are basically three options. Half-butt them and get like a 60 or 70 (partial credit ftw!), get a 90-100 on your own, or get a 90-100 with help from peers, office hours, cheating online, whatever. The middle option, getting a 90-100 completely on your own, is not what most people do. It requires far more work, especially on what we call “tricky” psets, that are nearly impossible to do without help. If you want more work, do that middle option, add more classes, double major, fulfill reqs for premed even if there’s only a .5% chance you go to med school, etc. </p>
<p>Believe me, if you want to study more in college, it’s really not that hard to do. If you want to push yourself, start with a lot of classes fall semester freshman year, drop classes one by one if necessary (for a challenge you seem to seek, necessary basically means not having time to do anything you want to do, like eat or sleep). This of course is assuming your school has a drop policy in place.</p>