UPenn: College of Arts & Sciences or School of Engineering and Applied Science

<p>I am going to UPenn and I was wondering which school would be a better choice (College of Arts & Sciences vs. School of Engineering and Applied Science). I know Penn isn't known for its Engineering in particular, so would it look better to have a science-focused degree from the College or an engineering degree from SEAS?</p>

<p>I guess it depends on the type of engineering? I know their bioengineering major is one of the best in the US and chemical engineering ranks within the top 20.</p>

<p>Look better for what? Unless you are going to be premed (which you can do in either seas or the college) engineers get better jobs on average than pure scientists.</p>

<p>Engineering majors are different from the pure science majors (physics, chemistry, biochemistry, biology). They a lot more applied and with the exception of physics are a lot more math oriented. It depends on your preference.</p>

<p>If you’re doing pre-med/law do the college (CAS), if you’re doing pure engineering do the engineering school (SEAS), if you’re doing finance/business do the business school (Wharton).</p>

<p>Hi, my college is a partner school and I’m currently studying in Europe. I’m trying to go to Penn for a year on exchange and I wanted to know what the pre-law program was like. Anything on bio-ethics, intellectual property?</p>

<p>shaheirunderdog, there are plenty of people in SEAS who are premed/prelaw. I would choose between CAS and SEAS based on what you want to do as an undergrad, for example biochemistry versus CBE or BE.</p>

<p>^ doing pre-med/law at SEAS would be much harder, CAS is a much better fit for pre-med/law</p>

<p>Yes it is harder to do premed/prelaw in engineering, but many people genuinely interested in engineering choose to do so. For example, many people in BE and CBE are premed.
Although engineering is a lot more work than choosing one of these majors, but it’s a great background to have if you want to go into medicine or law. Engineering majors are also great for certain areas of law like patent law.If you go into medicine, when you eventually want to get a job/start residency doctors like engineers because they are usually very good at solving problems, and if one does biomedical engineering they may know a lot about technological aspects of medicine.
However, if you are interested in pure non-applied science, than it would be better to apply to CAS and study something like Physics, Math, Biophysics, Biochemistry, Chemistry, Biology, etc. Still very demanding majors, but for most only 36 credits are required instead of 40.
I personally think it’s very silly to choose a major based on getting into graduate school, you should do what you are interested in and what you think will help you grow intellectually. Of course law school and medical school do care a lot about GPA, but in the long run it will help you the most to do what’s most fulfilling while working hard and learning how to think critically.</p>

<p>to cherrycola7:</p>

<p>there are definitely a few classes on bioethics and intellectual property. i know mostly about bioethics and they’re mainly offered through the “History and Sociology of Science” department, and specifically under that department, HSOC, or health and societies. bunch of bioethics courses, sociology of bioethics, and anthropology-focused bioethics…very interesting stuff</p>

<p>Thank you! That’s exactly what I want to do!</p>