I have this same post on a different forum, but I was told to put it in the forum for one of the universities .(http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/engineering-majors/1813285-umd-college-park-vs-upitt-engineering.html)
Which of these schools is better for biomedical engineering? They are both on my college list and I want to eliminate one of them. Also does anyone know the job placement rate for engineering at each of these schools? I know both of them are expensive and these are not my financial safeties, however does one give better financial aid to low income-students (my parents make 32k/year) or gives out merit scholarships more freely than the other (4.08 GPA, 32 ACT) (I am OOS). Thank you for all the info.
By US News, Pitt’s undergrad biomedical engineering is consistently ranked ahead of UMD’s. Pitt’s ranking last year was 19th. I don’t know if Maryland’s undergrad bioengineering program is ranked, but by the looks of it, it isn’t ranked higher than Pitt’s.
Pitt’s graduate bioengineering is ranked 16th. UMD’s ranked 33rd. In 2013, Pitt had $11.9 million in biomedical engineering R&D, while College Park had $7.5 million. This speaks to the faculty that will teach classes and whose labs you will work in. This reflects on what opportunities you will be exposed to.
On the bio side, the two aren’t on the same level at all. Pitt brings in the 5th most amount of bio/health science research funding in the country ($420 million), College Park comes in at 127th ($36 m).
As far as job placement, your probably going to have to ask people at those schools. I would think placing engineers is high for both, and well, pretty much everywhere.
As far as merit and aid scholarships, you should probably apply to both and see what you get from them. That said, according to both schools’ common data sets, more than twice as many undergrads at Pitt received merit awards last year, and that is with Pitt having 7,000 less students. Pitt also awarded more students need-based aid, again, with Pitt having 30% less students. The financial packages seemed to average the same. Out-of-state tuition rates look about the same, with Pitt maybe being slightly cheaper.