What to do in college to get into a top engineering grad school?

Graduate School
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<p>What do you need to do in college to get into a top engineering graduate program, such as MIT or Stanford where you can do research and have tuition waved? Of course you major in engineering, but what's important in grad school admissions for engineering programs?</p>

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<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/graduate-school/348756-graduate-school-admissions-101-a.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/graduate-school/348756-graduate-school-admissions-101-a.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>1) Research. This lets you know if you want to be a researcher, signals to grad schools that you can be a researcher, and gets you letters of recommendation from current researchers. Publications are nice, but not necessary.</p>

<p>2) Get good letters of recommendation.</p>

<p>3) Write a solid personal statement that signals maturity and future success.</p>

<p>4) Get a high GPA, 3.7+.</p>

<p>5) Do well on the GRE math, 800 ideally.</p>

<p>6) Get lucky.</p>

<p>7) Remember that these metrics are not ends in themselves, and that you should just focus on doing good work and let the cards fall as they may.</p>

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<p>My advice: do research for at least a semester (ideally a year) and see if you like it. You might get unlucky and do research in a field you don’t like. Change labs/professors if need be. But by the end of your junior year you should have a clear idea of whether or not you can see yourself doing full-time research.</p>

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<p>Is 3.7 is enough for a top top school?</p>

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<p>a 3.5 will get you into a top top, but 3.7 is better… after that point it doesn’t matter.</p>

<p>you are accepted based on your research potential. gpa has some say in this, but not nearly as much as your research, LoR’s, or SoP</p>