<p>and it sounds like uva is my best bet so far for what i want, but ill make sure to visit both :)</p>
<p>Go to UVa. Classes are smaller, your peers will be smarter, graduate school placement is better and job recruiting is better. Seriously, how is this even a question? If you got into Yale or Harvard would you choose VT because it's "better" in engineering? You do realize that the engineering rankings are based on research and graduate studies, right?</p>
<p>And guillaume, VT isn't superior in the sciences. Last I checked, UVa outranks VT in nearly every math/natural science discipline and has a major research hospital. Like I said above, it's also better to do undergraduate engineering at UVa.</p>
<p>my son is double majoring in sys eng and econ. sys seems to go good with econ but not so sure what you can do with an econ minor in mech eng other than to enrich youself (maybe marketing?). Since you do not have to pick your discipline until the end of you 1st yr, talk to your professors.</p>
<p>
[quote]
By the way UMOpap, not to be a total jerk, but I read somewhere else that you said that MIT has a "decent econ program"...from what source are you gathering this information...with what can you back up this statement? It seems clear that you are not a fan of rankings, but if you were not aware, MIT's Econ Dept is far from "decent" and it is in fact rated No. 1 in the country. You may not agree with the rankings, but I find it hard to believe such a statement unless you have first hand experience with MIT's Econ Dept. My point is...base your statements with facts, so what you're saying can be a bit more credible.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Yeah it's a valid question so no you're not being a jerk =]</p>
<p>I said decent not in a pejorative sense, yes MIT is a fantastic school. But I don't think I can definitively say something so absolute as phenomenal or awful without having attended. </p>
<p>Some reasons I think the econ program is competitive:</p>
<p>1.) Course listings - read through the entire list, a lot of them are related to careers I want to pursue so would be a great fit. A lot of them are not offered at some other schools.
2.) Visited the campus, met one of the teachers who is incredible through a current student who is a friend of mine and actually got me interested in the school itself since at the time I was like most people I know and didn't associate econ with MIT.
3.) Lots of programs in addition to the curriculum that supplement the learning. Forgot the name but there was an outlet for having speakers and workshops for students to get practical knowledge from the real world I was rather impressed by.</p>
<p>Make what you will of the rankings but I generally don't take them seriously. They fluctuate and are calculated on factors that are quite subjective. I guess I was more bothered by the fact that you said neither are strong schools in the areas you listed since they aren't the best like MIT. There are plenty of schools who can hold their own, if you want to quantify everything think about how many institutions there are in the U.S. #20-30's in the rankings don't look too bad now huh? All I'm saying is look at schools more holistically instead of just rankings that change every year.</p>
<p>Edit:
And to OP, good luck wherever you end up going.</p>
<p>Needless to say, I totally agree with cavalier302 and in case the OP didn't know, UVA's commerce school was just ranked no. 1 in the nation (it beat UPenn's Wharton)...in case you are interested in combining an engineering major with a comm minor. On that same note, johnnyboi21 since you're latino, I don't know if this means anything to you but the latino community at UVA is large, vibrant and diverse. You'll find anything from California chicanos to Spaniards to wealthy Latin-American international students (I happen to be Chilean btw ;). We have a bunch of latino groups on grounds and the e-school has its own (I have quite a few latino friends who are engineers), anyway, I don't know how diverse Vtech is...guessing not that much...anyway, you can send me a message if you'd like to get more info.</p>
<p>yea, it actually does mean alot. :)</p>
<p>thanks wahoomb. (bolivian & ecuadorian btw :P)</p>
<p>U.S. News & World Report's “America's Best Colleges 2008” (fall 2007)</p>
<p>Virginia Tech ranked 29th among national public universities. Among national universities, Virginia Tech is ranked 71st.[7] The Virginia Tech College of Engineering undergraduate program was ranked 14th in the nation (tied with Johns Hopkins and Northwestern) among all accredited engineering schools that offer doctorates. It was eighth among engineering schools at public universities. Six Virginia Tech undergraduate engineering specialties ranked among the top 20 of their respective peer programs (aerospace engineering, 14th; civil engineering, 11th; electrical engineering, 17th; engineering science and mechanics, 8th; environmental engineering, 14th; industrial engineering, 6th (tied with Stanford as of 2009 rankings); and mechanical engineering, 14th).</p>
<p>Honestly, guillaume you don't need to "toot" VT's engineering horn. Anyone that knows anything about engineering schools knows that VT excels in producing damn fine engineers. :) As does UVA. As davh01 stated, their process is distinctively different for the undergrad student though. If the OP wants to broaden his/her horizon with other academic interests, along with the other social factors, UVA may be the best route to take. At VT your engineering schedule really doesn't allow for much involvement in other disciplines.</p>
<p>FWIW, my s's roommate is an engineering student at VT as is our neighbor's son. Both had the VT and UVA option and both chose VT because they were convinced that having the intense VT engineering program vs. the more liberal arts UVA approach was what they wanted. It is all in what you want out of your choice. Good luck to you as you decide.</p>
<p>Finally, I get kind of tired of the "who is better?" argument between some of the UVA and VT supporters. Both schools offer great educations and each has certain departments/schools that are stronger than at the other school. Why is that so hard for some people to admit/accept?</p>
<p>I ask myself that same question KandKsmom as there is obviously no rivalry between UVA and Vtech, not in academics at least. UVA's academic rivals are William & Mary, UC Berkeley, Georgetown, Duke, UCLA, UNC Chapel Hill, Cornell, etc.</p>
<p>Agreed Kandks.</p>
<p>wahoomb, Again, it all depends on the department/major.....</p>
<p>Any student who is pretty set on a particular path needs to keep that in mind when comparing many, many, schools, not just UVA and VT.</p>
<p>dang, you guys need to stop arguing, especially about freaking programs at state universities, lol.</p>
<p>Um, I'd say Vtech has better program overall, but a uva engineer degree has more prestige to it since it's from uva, a highly respected college.</p>
<p>im really think i might go to uva now. i want to major in engineering, but i also wanted to do something with economics/business. </p>
<p>i know there is an engineering business minor that uva offers, would that be a could path to go on if im interested in economics?</p>
<p>If you have concurrent interests in both engineering and economics/business (two majors in very different schools), I think everyone can agree that it would be better for you to go to UVa.</p>
<p>for guillaume, as well as for anyone reading the post by "barrons" that is mentioned: yes, that document represents UVa airing out its dirty laundry a little bit, and anyone reading it would probably tend to get an overall negative impression. However, bear in mind two things-
1) the report apparently reflects UVa's sincere desire to recognize and address perceived shortcomings. Isn't that a good thing? Shouldn't all schools be doing this? and, as a related point,
2) what's missing from your comparison of UVa vs. VT is any similar "insider's" document relating to VT. Do you really think that such a study commissioned by VT would be uniformly positive? Wouldn't you really expect to find similarly concerning observations?
Just for the record, at least some of the UVa findings (of which I have "independent" knowledge) are quite valid. But the blanket statement that VT is superior in the sciences (or engineering, for that matter) is not accurate.</p>
<p>To the OP–look past all the sniping and focus on the fact that you have two wonderful options. <em>Where</em> you go isn’t nearly as important as <em>what</em> you do when you get there. Go visit, consider $$, and revel in the fact that you have these available to you. You’ll be fine with either one. Really.</p>
<p>Agree with ingerp that what you do when you get there is important. Where you go is important in terms of college recuiting. When economy is bad, companies will bypass campus recruiting of lesser known schools. Last year I was talking to a manager in IT who was going to uva for recruiting but did not plan to go to vt because of limited travel funds and only two positions open that likely to have more than enough candiates from uva. </p>
<p>Recruitment is sometimes done by someone in human resources who may not know much about engineering schools. You would have to pass them before you are invited for an interview with the technical people who is more familiar which school is stronger. Human resources also do the inital screening when you send in an application. You do not write well (many engineers do not), your application is filed and never gets to the technical people. </p>
<p>Who you think would get hired?
Candidate A, an engineering student from top ranked engineering school currently rank 5th and Candidate B is from a small engineering school ranked 86. Candidate A’s gpa is ~10% better and both invited to the company for interview and did well. The interview was conducted by an engineer and two supervisors and they all have the same conclusion which candidate was better fit.</p>
<p>Candidate B was given an offer:
Reason?<br>
A had 123 credit hours with ~25% non-science/technical classes.<br>
B had 150 credit hours with ~15% non-science/technical classes.</p>
<p>All concluded that A is either not very intestest in technical work, party too much or lazy.
With more non-technical course and a light course load, A should have a much better gpa.</p>
<p>Does a high gpa get you a job? I graduated from a class where 95% of the students either got multiple job offers or went to graduate school. One of my classmate graduate with honors and no job offers. Reasons I can think of why he did not get a job offer is probably personality and did not do well in the interviews. No extra curricular activity and view as anti social. (He told one on the interviewers asked “Chris, you are doing very well in school and have great gpa why aren’t more involved in school activities?”.</p>
<p>Just like the college application process, an employer not only look where you went school but your gpa, credit hours, course selection, interview and activities.</p>
<p>I believe that it is easier to become an employer if you go to UVa since you’ll have a much broader education. Engineers that specialize too much will be rather employees unless you create or discover something new, which I think is pretty hard.</p>
<p>As the daughter of a proud, brilliant electrical engineer who didn’t invent or discover anything, but who was a reliable company “employee” for 40 years, I say… nothing wrong with that. We sure could use more guys (and girls) like him today.</p>
<p>But time has changed. people expected to work for the same company until they retire. 15 years or so, companies no longer wants people to stay more than 10 years (at a management training in my company actually says 7 or 8) due to high cost insurance and retirement for older owrkers. if you do the same thing over and over, that learning curve peaks in about 10 years and is cheaper to pay younger engineers. in additional, a lot of low level engineering tasks are now farmed to coutries like India and China and you want to be in a position where you can manager those work farm to others.</p>