<p>any1 know where UMDCP ranks in undergraduate civil engineering?</p>
<p>Crossover, unfortunately, I think I'm the only regularly-posting civ around here. ;)</p>
<p>I looked over the program again, in a lot more depth, and I can give you my general impressions of the department, at the very least.</p>
<p>Faculty looks reasonably large, giving a pretty wide breadth of expertise. The vast majority of them graduated from the very top schools, which means they know what they're talking about. They're not pioneers of the field, though.</p>
<p>Not a whole lot of research focus on the heavy hitters, like computing applications, structures, seismic, or mechanics. Lots of focus on more local concerns like geotech, transportation and infrastructure, and water resources. That means, not a lot of big research money going into the program, and only local stakeholders asking about more localized problems. Not a ton of razor-edge stuff coming out of their research labs.</p>
<p>In terms of course offerings, they offer all the basics, but that's pretty much it. If you wanted further enrichment, for example, something beyond basic steel design or structural analysis or transportation engineering, you're not going to find it at UMd. You'd be hard pressed to compete with seniors at other schools in terms of getting those advanced courses that'll give you the extra edge in grad school applications or on job interviews.</p>
<p>UMd looks like it'll give you a good, solid civil engineering education. Call it McCivil. If you aspire to do anything really innovative, though, like design cutting-edge skyscrapers or bridges or something, I'm not sure it'll pack enough of a punch to allow you to cruise into the top grad programs without your doing quite a bit of extra work.</p>
<p>Thanks alot for that insight</p>
<p>crossover-- I'm from Md & hire UMd civil engineers...aibarr is on the mark...solid department for the most part, produces comparably skilled civil's as Penn State & VaTech. Good, practical design skills. Decent coop program, & appears they have plenty of funding. Other than an annual recruiting visit, I don't know any prof's personally in civil, although I have worked a sister dept, bioeng, over the years, & they've been great. I don't know precisely where UMd civil "ranks", but I always thought engineering was pretty strong at Md in general.</p>
<p>hey aibarr could you take a look at the UT-Knoxville Civ Engineering program. Looks pretty solid, and they are getting a new building in 08, so seems like money is going into it.</p>
<p>(First off, PC, thanks! =) Nice to know that I'm reasonably on-the-mark...)</p>
<p>OK, I took a look at UTK.</p>
<p>You're right; it's pretty solid. They seem to be more slanted towards environmental engineering, and they're quite strong in transportation engineering, having headhunted some people away from A&M's TTI. Again, not a whole lot of people in the computing and mechanics aspects of things, but it looks like they're trying to make a major push towards that direction, with the recent hiring of Dr. Qiuhong Zhao. They seem to do a lot of field testing.</p>
<p>Course selection is pretty complete, actually. Again, you're not going to find a whole lot of ridiculously advanced courses, but you'll find more enrichment beyond the basics than you would at UMd. It'd be a better preparation for grad school.</p>
<p>I don't imagine that it's particularly a feeder school for the top grad programs, but it seems like it would be very doable to get into a good grad program. I wouldn't go there for grad school, but it seems like a pretty good second-tier civ program that's putting in a lot of good effort to aspire to something greater. =)</p>