I was alluding to just like going to classes. You kinda go in building. Go to class. Go to another building like 5 minute walk to the next class. It’s not like your going across and meeting 50,000 along the way. Think some people have this vision of what it’s like. Game day. Different story… But that is just all kinds of fun.
I suggest walking behind the matching band before they go into the stadium they are on the streets playing. Superfun 
no, that was literally 10,000 along one pedestrian pathway going to class (most class buildings require to take that pathway, so 10,000 going to class at the same time on a campus of 50,000 is probably even lowballing it). People couldn’t really “meet”, they only had 15mn to get to class 
If I stayed away then (no idea why parents decided to “go visit” then) and I never came close to any area near the stadium on Game days :D, it’s like, 150,000 people were there.
It is still a less useful categorization. For example, a CS major and a business major could both go to work for a computing company (or a finance company, or whatever) in different jobs after graduation, but it is likely that other possible jobs and industries that they were applying to were very different.
@data Since my son is considering 4/5 of this list, I appreciate what the data is telling me: first year salary is NOT relevant to selecting a college. Please correct me if I’m wrong, because I’m back to fit
@MarylandJOE Excellent advice and thank you for providing this view from the inside.
@MYOS1634 Gobsmacked. My greatest college fear in one word.
@Knowsstuff Just when I was about to ask if Michigan has music opportunities for non-music majors
Btw, I’ve been to one football game in the big house. It snowed about NINE inches on my lap before the game was called
You have mentioned your student probably needing supports in college. What is the basis for this comment? Does he currently get special modifications or support in High School?
All college professors have office hours. All are accessible via email. All will make appointments with students. There are tutorial services available at every college I know about. For all of these things, any student can access these…but the student needs to do so. No one is going to knock on his door or make a call telling him this might be a good idea.
My engineering kid knew that some courses were going to be tougher than others. She was at the tutoring center the first day of the term signing up fo tutorial services for those courses. She didn’t want to risk getting behind. For some, she continued the tutorial services all term long. For others, she got off to a good start and did not need them. She also participated in study groups for some courses.
Point being…your kid needs to be able to self identify when he needs help and not waste time getting that help. There is nothing wrong with seeking out tutorial help. The schools have it for a reason.
I wouldn’t use the word “overcrowding”, but popular freshman intro classes are quite large at many of the discussed colleges. This includes more than just CS, but I’ll continue with the intro CS example. GradeGuide at Michigan shows 931 students enrolled in EECS 280: Programming and Introductory Data Structures. The most recent available year is Winter 2018. Considering the recent CS increase, It may be well over 1000 students today.
Stanford had 551 students enrolled in Autumn 2020 CS 106A: Programming Methodology, and gets well over 1000 students across the full academic year. Stanford broke this large class of 551 students in to 95 smaller sections, so each section had ~551/95 = 6 students. The sections are typically led by a grad student TA. With only ~6 students per section, students have a chance to ask questions and get personal attention, which is usually not practical in the large lecture. Many other colleges do something similar, with a common large lecture taught by a well known professor in the field and smaller sections led by grad students.
Some colleges use different models. Some choose to have several different lectures instead of one large one. Smaller colleges tend to have much fewer big classes due to the much smaller student body size. I’ll use Grinell as example since it was mentioned earlier. Grinell’s CDS shows only 1 class with more than 39 students, and no classes with more than 49 students. So I expect most students at Grinell never see a class with more than 40 students, including intro CS.
@thumper Yes, I totally agree with you. He does a good job at recognizing when he’s slipping or not grasping a concept. It doesn’t happen very often, but when a situation arises, I’m in the other room and hear about it first. I’m the coach. Breathe… what’s the problem… what are you going to do about it… do you need to email your teacher?
So college, take away ME. Hopefully the self-talk will be there… I need help… what should I do… who should I talk to… where should I go etc.
He doesn’t receive any services or help in high school. He has a strong work ethic and digs in when things get hard.
I am guessing that he will need help along the way as the rigor increases. Math gets hard, right?! The greater concern is that he dislikes reaching out and tends to count on himself (internalize/withdraw) so the “support” piece means learning to embrace the discomfort of scheduling the tutoring, going to office hours, motivating to join a group review session.
My son just got hired by an international company from Michigan. They interviewed engineering students, LSA and Ross Students for basically similar jobs and rotations… So now figure that into your quotes…Lol. … So yes lots of this gets skewed to a point.
This is such a huge statement and wish most would do so. I tell every new students that goes to college to use all the resources till you can prove you don’t need to. I told my kids that, that is that we are paying for and it’s free. Take advantage of all the free stuff colleges offer…lol…
It may be less useful for comparison purpose with other colleges, but it may make more sense for MIT, as more of its graduates likely work in an industry outside their majors than a typical college. Another reason could be that so many students are in its EECS program that categorizing by major would present a distorted picture.
I’ve been made aware that another college, Swarthmore, has the same pass/fail grading policy for its freshman in their first semester.
The pass/fail grading for students’ first semester (or the first 2 quarters at Caltech) in their freshman year help smooth their transition to the rigors required in college (in the Caltech’s case, students also have to get used to its quarter system that most aren’t accustomed to), but they aren’t designed so students can “take it easy”. At all these schools, letter grades (known as “shadow” or “hidden” grades) are still assigned by the professors. A student knows his/her grades. So does his/her advisor. The registrar still keeps the student’s full record, including these “shadow” or “hidden” grades. They just don’t appear on an official transcript.
To get back to the original topic, what happens to engineering majors who drop out?
It depends on WHY they drop out of engineering.
If they were in a general first year and didn’t get into their preferred field, they may get into a less desirable field OR get into an engineering major in another college (environmental engineering may be in the college of agriculture, some majors such as petroleum engineering may be in another college, industrial engineering may be linked to business…)
If they failed 1st year math and physics, they need to make up the Fs (or Ds) in the summer and switch to a less math or physics heavy major.
If they failed physics but not math they may turn to math related majors such as statistics, bioinformatics, actuarial science, cs, computing, cybersecueity, data science.
If they switched out because they realized it wasn’t for them and didn’t fail any class, they can pick anything, even double major - their science classes will fulfill science generally eds, their humanities req for engineering as well as freshman composition will also count toward gen eds regardless major, so they’ll be okay.
My suggestion…take yourself out of the “what should I do” equation now. You can make a list of things your kid can do and give it to him to hang by his desk or whatever. But let HIM be the one taking the lead here.
The best advice I ever got from a teacher was a fourth grade teacher, and it was about math…she said “please don’t help your kid. He needs to do this work”. It was the last time I did anything except to make sure that school work was taken back to school. And I didn’t even do that after 6th grade.
Re: math skills getting harder. They do and don’t. First the math sequences are important because the skills build upon the previous skill set. Second, many of the “harder” math courses are actually applying math. My engineer kid LOVED the upper level courses…differential equations and so forth…but wasn’t a huge fan of calculus.
Anyway…my point is…you need to build that independent “know what to do if I’m stuck” skill. If you continue to intervene…he won’t learn to do this on his own as well. He needs HIS voice in his head…not yours.
Note that for special needs kids (even if they’re 2E) staying out of it may be terribly counterproductive. I agree the voice in his head should be his own, but if there’s none, his parent’s voice helping him along is better than not knowing what to do and spiraling, which can easily happen with 2E kids when they leave for college and their adaptive systems no longer work.
This has been an interesting thread. A couple years ago, I had the same concerns for my then HS junior. He wasnt sure if he wanted to do engineering, he thought maybe computer science.
We looked at schools that intro classes weren’t too big and schools that werent all Tech just in case he decided to change majors. He also wanted an engineering program where he was able to take more non- stem classes. He is currently a Freshman engineering student where he doesnt have to declare specific major until end of sophomore year. His school also has a first year engineering class to explore different types of engineering and it was great for him.
For CS/DS, many schools have set up barriers to switch to these majors. These majors also require discrete math that isn’t part of an engineering curriculum. Since OP’s son is also interested in CS, it’s probably advisable in this case for him to either select a college that has no such barrier or apply to be a CS major in a college that has such barrier.
@MYOS1634 Thank you… this does answer my original question nicely. As my son explores his Plan A, it’s helpful to know what else is out there. He’s planning on doing an engineering pre-college program this summer and may be on Plan B before college even starts. Also, he could be interested in computer science programs. I realize he would need to decide on this before applying to certain schools.