<p>I am a student with a 3.55 (hope to make it a 3.6) GPA at a very good (not top ten, but ~1400 SAT avg) University. I am an mechanical engineering junior who doesn't really like his options coming out of school (wrong fields)... I am interested in doing one of these three:</p>
<p>1) Pursue PHD track for aerospace or mechanical (fluid side most likely)- higher level material does interest me some- and I could see myself going prof</p>
<p>2) Pursue a Masters in Petroleum Eng- my school doesn't have good pull with the integrateds, and this was my initial desire. Timing is terrible, and going to grad school could solve both problems.</p>
<p>3) Pursue a Masters in Systems Eng- I had exposure to this field this summer, and I caught my eye. I have only 1 class worth of background in systems, and a masters would most likely be necessary...</p>
<p>I will not be able to finance grad school, and I really do not want to take on much more in the way of loans. </p>
<p>So, I was wondering.
1) will I be competitive for an Assistanceship (which of the three programs)?
2) What path's should I take to be competitive? (I have no research exposure yet- looking to start up some this or next semester).
3) What caliber school should I be looking at (which of the three programs)? any specific school suggestions-wanna avoid the midwest?</p>
<p>Only consider getting a PhD if you intended to pursue research or academics. It will weed you lot of jobs outside those areas. If you don't know where you want to be at this point, I really wouldn't consider a PhD.</p>
<p>1) Depends on the school and program. Requirements vary drastically across schools, but a lot depends on how well you mesh with the research interests with a professor who has research funding. If you are pursuing a PhD, you will likely be supported, while Masters you may not.</p>
<p>2) As you can probably tell from the forums, Grad admission can be very subjective. I'd say a good start is get the fundamentals down. You have a good GPA and getting GRE scores is important. As you probably already know, research is important if you are pursuing a MS degree. If you don't want to do research, you may want to consider of M.Eng which is purely taking classes with no thesis. You may want to look into getting involved with a professional society on campus. For example, the AIAA on our campus is always presenting and publishing about things they are working on. On the application every school I applied to, they asked about my publications, so schools do ask about it. </p>
<p>3) A good starting point is speaking with your professors regarding your interests and they can probably recommend programs. Another resource, which is far from perfect, is the rankings (ie. US News). Please use these as a starting point, and then investigate each program individually. This can be very time consuming, but it's important to familiarize yourself with the programs and their professors. Unfortunately, I can't help you much with which school, but it sounds like you need to decide which path to go on first.</p>