Trying to Transfer to a Top 5-10 engineering school. Thanks

Transfer Students
1

I am an undergraduate student at a Top 40 engineering school in the US. I just completed my first year and in the first semester i had a 4.0 and in the second semester i have a 3.79 ( English dropped it down). I am done with calculus 1,2 . physics 1, and chemistry along with some economics and programming courses ( had A in those two). can i transfer out to a Top 5 top 10 Engineering school ? I have quite a lot of volunteer work, A scholarship and also Two internships after i was done with high school.

Thank You For the responses

2

You need to be more specific. To which school(s) would you like to transfer? If you list the 5-10, people can be more helpful to you.

You should reconsider why you want to transfer. If the reason is just to move up in rankings, then you are probably wasting your time and money. It might be best to make the most of your current school.

Good luck!

3

Well I was thinking about schools like UIUC, Purdue, Georgia Tech etc

4

Are you unhappy at your current school?

5

Well, I just think that I would have better opportunities at these schools, Although all the top tech companies do come at our Career Fair. i was just wondering how My school Iowa State would stack up with these

6

I’m no expert, hopefully some experts will check in here, but I think you will have better job prospects as a “top” student at Iowa State than you will as a mid level transfer student at UIUC, Purdue, or GT.



If you are happy and you are doing well at Iowa State, you should reconsider your desire to transfer out.



Good luck!

7

Thanks For Your Suggestion.

8

I agree with @STEM2017 . While you CAN transfer out of your current institution, and you do have a good chance at better schools, transferring will not bring any tangible change in job prospects.



Due to the higher rigor of courses in other higher ranked schools, while you may be academically succeeding in Iowa State, you may find yourself struggling to adapt to the intense change of course difficulty.

9

I agree with @STEM2017 also. If you are a top student where you are (which is a good school) you will attract more attention. If you have built up relationships with professors, that is a plus. When you need a recommendation better to be the student who the professor knows then the new student who just transferred in. Look into the opportunities you have in front of you before chasing a small jump in rankings.

10

One additional thing to consider. If you do well at Iowa State you will be able to attend ANY of the above mentioned schools for graduate study.

11

Iowa State has a fine engineering program. It also is a large research university (like UIUC and Purdue) and can offer you the opportunity to do research on a funded project. Unlike the other universities you mentioned, it also runs Ames National Laboratory which can provide additional opportunities.

Transferring may cost you a semester or two towards graduation if all of your courses don’t transfer or if the curriculum is sufficiently different that you are missing some prerequisites. The most important thing about an engineering degree is that it is ABET accredited and that companies come to recruit. You can make the degree as rigorous as you want by choosing the right technical electives and your preparation won’t be any worse than the schools you list.

Finally, you don’t say whether you are in state for ISU but if so, it will cost you significantly more to attend an out of state public university. Not a good financial deal if you ask me…

12

Well @xraymancs the courses are the same at all the schools (some might be a bit different at the advanced levels). since they are technically a same caliber of engineering schools ( some better like UIUC and Purdue as mentioned ) and i checked with their office and they said that all of my courses will be transferred from Iowa State to the mentioned schools. Do you consider Iowa State to be a school that will help me in the future, I know it has been a top engineering school for a long time ( considering the amount of schools there are in the US and the ones that provide engineering), the way Purdue, UIUC and Georgia Tech would.
Thanks

13

Yes, absolutely. If you are primarily interested in working as an engineer, then what you want is a school that has an ABET accredited degree, opportunities for internships, and lots of companies coming to recruit. Iowa State certainly fits that bill.

Remember that these “rankings” of engineering schools, like that put out by USNWR are rankings of their graduate, NOT undergraduate programs. If you read the methodology, USNWR even says that they only rank schools with doctoral programs. So taking these rankings as a measure of the undergraduate programs is really a stretch. The presumed quality of the graduate programs is not terribly relevant to whether the undergraduate program delivers a quality education. It may marginally be beneficial if you are interested in pursuing a Ph.D. and want to find more on campus research experiences but it is really rather a small effect. If you want to get a Ph.D. then what you do in college is much more important than the school you attend. I am sure that plenty of students from ISU get into the most selective graduate programs.