Haha, he will be just an avg kid at a school like Michigan. Their avg GPA is 32-35 Act with 3.9 unweighted GPA. That is one reason my son wanted to go there. His high school was similar…
Again, he will be fine trust me on that… BTW - we don’t talk about personal pm on here but you stated Illinois suburban school with 1,000 per class. Most of the experts from Illinois on here already know the school… Lol… 
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One of the differences, for an engineering major, is that almost all of their classes will be STEM. S19 is a mathy kid but wasn’t sold on engineering and certainly did not like the curriculum where taking a decent amount of history, English, etc. wasn’t an option. He’s at an LAC majoring in physics and math and still has a ton of room for non-STEM classes and he prefers the balance. He’s not sure if he would pursue engineering as a profession. If he does, it would require a masters. But he’s happy with his choice for now. Some physics majors do get engineering-type jobs out of undergrad but eventually need a masters. He could easily end up using his math degree more, though, and end up in something more business-y. This road keeps his options open and let’s him have the more rounded undergrad experience he wanted.
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@Knowsstuff All good! I think his high school is important to the context of this discussion 
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That actually depends. My son’s 2 minors could of been in just about anything. If he wanted history/psychology etc he could of done that… This depends on the school. Also some engineering kids aren’t wired this way. They are where they want to be.
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@homerdog Thank you for this anecdote! I appreciate the LAC angle and started another thread about CS&LACs. LACs and big universities would seem to provide potential diversity beyond engineering and have more options to explore.
For my kid, he does not like English or writing one bit. Enjoys history though. Language not so much. I can’t see him seeking diversity too far outside stem. The LACs on the list have open curricula so that he could take classes in areas of strength/interest.
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oh for sure. S19 knows engineers at UIUC and Bradley and their schedules are booked solid with STEM. I was an engineering major at Northwestern for a year and a half (a hundred years ago haha) before I transferred out of engineering and there seemed little to no room for anything but STEM. So, it pays to look at each individual school.
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@homerdog It’s a little early to tell if engineering will a hit or bust. He may love being immersed in engineering, but having options seems like a good idea!
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Search- has your son been exposed to writers like Philip Dick, Ursula Le Guin, Douglas Adams? There are lengthy lists online of the “deans” or masters of literary sci fi, genre-bending works which encompass science, mythology, comedy, or whatever. There are a LOT of kids who don’t like “English”, which to them means reading Edith Wharton and William James and having to write an essay about it, who LOVE literature- and especially literature as taught in college. One of my kids took a class called “Anarchy” which was basically subversive works (fiction and non-fiction) which he said was amazing. If your son enjoys history I bet there are some literary works he’d love but it might take some effort to identify what those are…
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I wouldn’t rely too much on his GPA for college selection. GPAs are wildly uneven. A small difference in GPA from different schools means absolutely nothing. His test score is a better indicator, especially if it isn’t the result of excessive prep.
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@blossom I would say the bigger issue is that he doesn’t care to write and reflect on what he reads
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@1NJParent Naviance shows data specific to his high school. I can see GPAs/test scores from all the kids in his school who applied over the last 5 years. There are a lot of applications, so it should be a fair representation. Of course we can’t see essays, ECs, LORs, etc.
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Agree with @knowsstuff that it depends. My D had plenty of room in her schedule to minor and/or get a certification in nearly any subject area. Her certification is in collaborative leadership which was through the College of Education. Two of her chem e friends have minors in Spanish.
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Both Northwestern and UMich give legacy preferences, as I recall, and I assume there’re many legacies in your region. Naviance data may also be less predictive for Northwestern than for UMich because the former is likely more holistic.
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Nope. Not any more. First off naviance doesn’t represent engineering just the general school unless something has changed. Many, many legacy have been denied at Michigan just on CC over the last 2-3 years. Both schools are holistic to a point and what class they are trying to build. That’s just been my experience.
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Northwestern seems to have relatively light humanities and social studies requirements – 7 out of 48 courses (14.5%), although there are also 5 free electives (so up to 25% if all 5 free electives are used for humanities and social studies): https://www.mccormick.northwestern.edu/academics/undergraduate/core-curriculum/ .
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that sounds right. So only one class per quarter could be a humanities class.
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If you used all of your free electives for humanities or social studies, that would be about right. If you took only the minimum of 7 such courses over 12 quarters, then it would be lower than that on average.
Many other colleges have higher volume humanities and social studies requirements than Northwestern.
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My Dad told me I must attend Penn State in-state and I desperately wanted to leave PA. I knew his pocket-book was more important than his pride for his football team. So, I chose Virginia Tech (VPI back then), because it was the best engineering college I could find that was less expensive out-of-state than in-state Penn State. I ended up paying all my tuition and fees the last 3 years anyways.
I recall an ‘Oh my gosh’ moment, at Orientation as a Virginia Tech freshman engineering student. Our engineering group was packed into a giant auditorium with our parents and the Dean of Engineering opened the very first presentation with, “Parents and your freshman student, look at the nearest student and family on your left. Now look at the nearest student and family on your right. Chances are high one of those two students will not be an engineering student by summer vacation. They will either drop out of Virginia Tech or move on to another major. You need to be realistic and prepare a Plan B.” Ouch! Message read loud and clear by my parents and me.
VT (VPI - Virginia Polytechnic Institute back then) was definitely a “weed-em-out” engineering college back then. I don’t have statistics, but it seems the 50% that dropped out of engineering freshman year leaned towards Economics, the Business School, math/sciences or packed their bags to go home.
I earned my BS in Engineering, but only was blessed with 1 free elective in 5 years, because I switched from one engineering major to another engineering major. The free elective I chose was “The Economics of Sports” and it was easily my most interesting class.
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The current full name is Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
https://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/?q=virginia+polytechnic&s=all&id=233921
It was probably less selective then, like most colleges. Less selective colleges that have engineering commonly have high attrition out of engineering.
Currently, VT does have a 3.0 GPA requirement for frosh engineering students to choose any major; those below 3.0 GPA are subject to competitive admission based on major capacity. It is possible that some such students who do not get their preferred engineering majors leave engineering entirely.
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Most of the engineering presentations we attended referenced those days in the sense of “the look right, look left, those students won’t be here days are over”. Weeding out now happens during the admissions process.
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