<p>National Academy of Engineering members:</p>
<p>Cal, 86</p>
<p>USC, 23
UCLA, 20</p>
<p>
That’s not quite true. USC is strongest in engineering (and undergraduate business). Its simply not very strong in the field, especially in the graduate arena. -.-</p>
<p>UCLA tends to rank roughly the same for all graduate fields and it still outranks USC in practically every category.</p>
<p>EDIT: Also, your use of the number of National Academy of Engineers members is a faulty method of measuring undergraduate engineering strength. </p>
<p>First of all, members could have attended graduate school (and this graduate school may or may not necessarily be the same as the undergraduate school). Second, these are fairly isolate, individual events. This is nothing comparable to measuring the number of a university’s undergrads that make it into law or med school which number in the thousands and thousands.</p>
<p>Remember, Drax12 is measuring the success of a school’s undergraduate population.</p>
<p>UCB:
</p>
<p>Are you mixing and matching undergrad and grad degrees again? I don’t have any reason to doubt your numbers, but if you have a link…</p>
<p>I’d also like to see the Nobelists filtered for undergrad education.</p>
<p>UCB:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Life & Hard Sciences: Bio, Biochem, Biophysics, Chem, MIMG, MCDB, are all very strong at UCLA, and undergrads benefit from med students being on campus as opposed to USC’s med being off campus, and Cal not having a med school. (I suppose now, you’re going to claim UCSF as a part of Cal again.)</p>
<p>It’s hardly worth arguing the rankings of Philosophy, Econ, Psychology, English and other humanities and Social Science departments, because most graduates in these fields don’t become professionals in these fields. I know a design major who went to law school - she very well could be Elle Woods; I heard of music majors who went to med school. Rankings of departments, perceived by many or publication driven, are highly overrated to the experiences of the vast majority of undergrads.</p>
<p>Haha, I’m not “mixing grad and undergrad”. Those are NAE members on the current faculty. Faculty teach both grad and undergrad. Faculty distinction gives an academic program its reputation…the numbers are presented to show the gap in engineering faculty among these programs, esp. since incoming undergrad student quality is about the same for these three schools.</p>
<p>
Nope, USC’s strongest/most prestigious program is the film school. Probably closely followed by the Annnenberg school for communication.</p>
<p>So to sum it all up</p>
<p>MY school>>>>Your school>>>>the other guy’s school.</p>
<p>You’re nothing if not predictable. Same spiel over and over about ranking of faculty.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I don’t think there’s anyone here who questioned whether Cal had the better engineering school of the three, more reputable, etc.</p>
<p>But again, even in engineering, in addition to my humanities/social-science example above, I don’t see what significance there would be in having more academy members related to the undergrad world. </p>
<p>The engineering students I knew were always taught from textbooks. These textbooks made their rounds at the various universities. This generally means that the material conveyed to the undergrads is recycled over and over because the material is so elementary in the field, in addition to helping the student in a step-by-step basis of foundational learning. </p>
<p>But these more complex concepts in the field for undergrads are still elementary in relation to the higher, more cutting-edge concepts in this field, which these academy members might promote. For these academy members to introduce these concepts to undergrads would be useless because the cutting edge would be beyond the students’ scope of learning. </p>
<p>Of course these don’t apply to the stars who are readily discernable by faculty even early on as undergrads. Ronald Sugar, who just retired as head of Northrup-Grumman, was one of these stars even as a community-college student at, I think it was, El Camino College. His star status wasn’t at all deterred by attending a ‘lower-tiered’ engineering school at UCLA, or even worse a community college before.</p>
<p>But then you said yourself, that there’s little difference in the quality of students who choose among the three. And most of the e-grads at these schools are your typical unimaginative grunts who were taught from textbooks. But if you’re counting stars, people who’ve started their own chip firms or headed large publicly-held companies, UCLA has done pretty well.</p>
<p>
Omg, UCB. That’s a complete tangent from Drax’s direct evidence of undergraduate strength. Not all the same professors teach grad and undergrad, NAE instructors might not improve the quality of non-cutting edge education, and you don’t even account for USC’s lower student faculty ratio.</p>
<p>^ Not a tangent when the discussion is on department strength. Faculty gives an academic program its distinction…not so much undergrads. Especially when UG student stats are nearly identical in the comparison of USC, Berkeley and UCLA.</p>
<p>
This doesn’t match my experience at Berkeley.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>You weren’t taught from textbooks.</p></li>
<li><p>There wasn’t a need for step-by-step foundational learning: I’m speaking not only within engineering, etc, but of basic physics, mathematics, chem in your case, etc.</p></li>
<li><p>You were taught cutting-edge concepts within your field.</p></li>
<li><p>You were taught grad concepts and were obviously able to latch onto them.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Care to explain, instead of giving a one-sentence answer? I’m not speaking of labs where the student is able to convey concepts in lectures to projects at hand.</p>
<p>^ Haha!</p>
<p>Sure, allow me to enlighten you. A lot of my engineering profs at Berkeley used textbooks for supplement and taught from their own materials.</p>
<p>For example, my thermodynamics prof was John Prausnitz, known as the father of molecular thermodynamics. He incorporated a lot of his own research into the undergrad curicculum and was one of the few people to receive the National Medal of Science.</p>
<p>My biochemical engineering prof was Jay Keasling, a talented young prof whose research has even been featured on the Colbert Report:
[Jay</a> Keasling - The Colbert Report - 3/10/09 - Video Clip | Comedy Central](<a href=“The Colbert Report - TV Series | Comedy Central US”>The Colbert Report - TV Series | Comedy Central US)
He mainly taught from his own Powerpoint presentations and used a lot of info from his current research. </p>
<p>So, no, I wasn’t just taught from a textbook “making the rounds at various universities”, I was taught by the pioneering minds in their respective fields who happened to write the textbook!</p>
<p>Sure, intro chem, math and physics used textbooks as well, but we weren’t slavishly bound to them…the thing about Berkeley is you have a chance to learn from some of the best minds in their respective field. George Smoot was back teaching his undergrad physics course the day after he won the Nobel Prize: [url=<a href=“http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2006/smoot-photo.html]George”>http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2006/smoot-photo.html]George</a> F. Smoot - Photo Gallery<a href=“last%20picture”>/url</a>.</p>
<p>… sound highly accomplished. But there are doubtlessly profs at UCLA (and USC) that are doing pioneer research in nanotechnology, fluid, and thermodynamics, etc, also.</p>
<p>But the idea of supplementing textbooks with the profs own materials is nothing new. When I said engineering students were taught from a textbook, this would be different than an English class, say, that would use 10 novels and reference books all at the discretion of the prof. These classes are more free-flowing than the sciences, which are much, much more textbook bound. There’s less wiggle-room in course material in science courses for profs because the materials the students in these classes have to be taught to the students and conveyed by the prof by quarter/semester’s end, or else the student could have added less foundation. </p>
<p>Intro chem, calculus, physics courses are strictly textbook bound and taught generally by lesser-known profs, in generally, larger lecture settings, with even less wiggle room of “freelance.” Nice embellishment, nonetheless.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>So they wrote all the textbooks, another nice embellishment. And they supplemented their textbooks with their own materials, bypassing the textbooks they all wrote and used in all these classes. Nice thinking, UCB.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>What counts as a rigorous academic field? Most of UCLA’s strengths are in L&S. The gap between UCLA and USC is much larger than the gap between Berkeley and UCLA in most of those fields. Engineering is one of USC’s strengths.</p>
<p>Did I say they wrote all the textbooks? No.</p>
<p>But a significant number of the classes that I can remember with a textbook:
Thermodynamics: [Molecular</a> Thermodynamics of Fluid-Phase Equilibria: Amazon.ca: John M. Prausnitz, Rudiger N. Lichtenthaler, Edmundo Gomes de Azevedo: Books](<a href=“http://www.amazon.ca/Molecular-Thermodynamics-Fluid-Phase-Equilibria-Prausnitz/dp/0139777458]Molecular”>http://www.amazon.ca/Molecular-Thermodynamics-Fluid-Phase-Equilibria-Prausnitz/dp/0139777458)
Biochemical engineering: [Amazon.com:</a> Biochemical Engineering (Chemical Industries) (9780824700997): Douglas S. Clark, Harvey W. Blanch: Books](<a href=“http://www.amazon.com/Biochemical-Engineering-Chemical-Industries-Douglas/dp/0824700996]Amazon.com:”>http://www.amazon.com/Biochemical-Engineering-Chemical-Industries-Douglas/dp/0824700996)
Organic Chemistry: [Amazon.com:</a> Introduction to Organic Chemistry, Revised Printing (4th Edition) (9780139738500): Andrew Streitwieser, Heathcock, Kosower: Books](<a href=“http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Organic-Chemistry-Revised-Printing/dp/0139738509]Amazon.com:”>http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Organic-Chemistry-Revised-Printing/dp/0139738509)
Fluid Mechanics: [Amazon.com:</a> Process Fluid Mechanics, (Prentice-Hall International Series in the Physical and Chemical Engineering Sciences) (9780137231638): Morton M. Denn: Books](<a href=“http://www.amazon.com/Mechanics-Prentice-Hall-International-Physical-Engineering/dp/0137231636]Amazon.com:”>http://www.amazon.com/Mechanics-Prentice-Hall-International-Physical-Engineering/dp/0137231636)</p>
<p>were written by profs at Berkeley. I said they supplemented the material with their own current research…no embellishments.</p>
<p>
Sure there are…Berkeley just has more (as indicated by the NAE numbers).</p>
<p>^You don’t need to be a part of the NAE to conduct research. The NAE is simply an honor. It could still be possible that UCLA and (especially) USC have more “cutting-edge” researcher professors than Berkeley. </p>
<p>Practically every professor I’ve met conducts some sort of research and practically all of it is “pioneer”. (If the research isn’t “pioneer”, is it really research at all? Wouldn’t it just be peer evaluation of some sort?)</p>
<p>Whether any of their work will be worth pennies in the future is up for debate. -.-</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Embellishment… Intro classes, large, 300 students, leaves a lot of wiggle room and freelancing, absolutely.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Sure sounds all-inclusive.</p>
<p>Of the four textbooks, three sound impressive, but then, Im no engineer. The Intro to Organic Chem textbook is somewhat laughable. But it is good that he taught the intro class, deigning from his Ivory Tower.</p>
<p>sentiment, drax mentioned researchers… NAE is an award for distinguished researchers, who have contributed significantly to their fields.</p>
<p>
<em>shrugs</em> Profs don’t care…the kids that don’t keep up are weeded out. </p>
<p>
Uh, it’s not “laughable”. The course was Organic Chem 112A/B…organic chemistry for chemistry and chemical engineering majors. Don’t let the cover and name fool you…read some of the reviews.</p>
<p>
Pure speculation at this point. Only way to tell is come back in 15-20 years and see if more researchers at USC have been honored by NAE than Berkeley profs going forward.</p>
<p>I was responding to this snippet of your previous post.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>NAE numbers are not an indicator of how many “pioneer” researchers are present at a university. NAE is an indicator of how many “distinguished” researchers are at a universities, but that was not what Drax was talking about.</p>
<p>^ Uh huh…you can “pioneer” research in a lot of topics no one cares about and won’t lead to anything significant. Results are what gets noticed…and elevates department reputation. That is my point.</p>