<p>However, that is your experience, and you must include the caveat that “your experience may vary” since everyone is different. Shoot, I think for me, business would be hard because I would be so unmotivated because it is so boring to me, yet conventional wisdom would say that business is usually not an overly difficult major.</p>
<p>ok, its generally accepted that ChemE is harder than ME, thats more of a general consensus among those who study engineering, although personal experience will vary</p>
<p>ME and ChemE are both versatile degrees, but there is much, much more overlap with other disciplines and ChemE than MechE</p>
<p>I have a cousin studying ME at Berkeley and his friend studies ChemE, his friend has the option to dual major in materials science or even NE, my cousin does not have that option…and although MEs can work in the biotech industry, it is more BME based. ChemEs can work in pharma or regenerative medicine areas that require a strong
background in Chem</p>
<p>ChEs also have higher starting salaries, if that is also of interest to the OP</p>
<p>
That’s a joke and false (assuming I’m reading this gibberish correctly).</p>
<p>MechE is a far broader degree that has many opportunities open for it. For example, I’d say a huge portion of MEs can compete <em>directly</em> with Civil Engineers upon graduation within the construction industry. MEs can work in the Aerospace industry directly. MEs can work in the chemical processing industry! MEs can also work in plant design, which is something which ChemEs specialize in. MEs can also work in MatE & NucE. Granted, Chemical is higher paying (and is probably harder to get) - it simply is not more versatile though.</p>
<p>I found an interesting article on Yahoo!</p>
<p>[Best-Paying</a> Degrees in 2010- Yahoo! HotJobs](<a href=“http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/career-articles-best_paying_degrees_in_2010-1173]Best-Paying”>http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/career-articles-best_paying_degrees_in_2010-1173)</p>
<p>ChemE also gets a boost to its average starting pay due to the fact that a larger percentage of them work in the oil industry than MEs. The actual difference is not THAT much higher than an ME makes.</p>
<p>But the objective fact remains that ME is one of, if not the most versatile engineering discipline. ChemE is somewhere in the middle of the pack as far as versatility goes.</p>
<p>I knew several chemEs when I was in school and they all seemed to have a certain arrogance just because statistically, their starting salaries were a few thousand dollars higher than say MEs or EEs. As boneh3ad said, part of this is due to the larger percentage of chemEs in the oil industry an because, in my opinion, chemE is more of a niche field that tends to be a little more specialized right off the bat. Yet some people assume that this small difference in salary indicates that chemE is the be all and end all of engineering and that it must be the hardest engineering degree. A ME or an EE or a structural engineer, etc… that is specialized in a specific area can earn an equivalent salary to a chemE.</p>
<p>the fact that ChemE’s can work in the oil industry just furthers the point that its a versatile degree</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>No it doesn’t. All it does is prove that ChemE’s can work in the oil industry, which, by the way, hires engineers of ALL disciplines. Chemical Engineers are one of the more preferred types, but no more than Petroleum Engineers or Mechanical Engineers.</p>
<p>ChemE is plenty versatile. It just isn’t quite as versatile as ME, EE or Civil. I have plenty of respect for Chemical Engineers and what they do, but if you just look at it objectively, there are a wider array of jobs out there for ME, EE, and Civil than ChemE. That said, ChemE is more versatile than CS, MatSci, Aero and Nuke. It really is right in the middle. That isn’t a knock on ChemE, it is just the way it is.</p>
<p>I understand how it is argued that MechE is so broad that it is the best option in many cases. However, why would a school offer Aero, Mat.Sci, or Nuke if MechE was so much better. Is there even a reason to pursue a specialized major? They wouldn’t offer these if there was no demand for them.</p>
<p>I never said MechE was better, just that it was more broad.</p>
<p>I will use the example of Mechanical vs. Aero. The two subjects cover essentially the same material, and for all intents and purposes, Aero is essentially a specialized version of Mechanical. However, if you know you want to work in aerospace, particularly in the aerodynamics area, you get a lot more comprehensive coverage of that in Aero. An Aero degree won’t get you a job in a lot of places that a MechE degree will, but for certain jobs, you will be more qualified than the average MechE who took a less comprehensive set of fluid mechanics courses. You can still get Aero jobs as a MechE, you just may get passed over sometimes for an Aero since he will have less of a learning curve (unless a MechE tailors his electives to cover the extra material).</p>
<p>Similarly, MatSci is really a subset of ChemE, but if you know you want to work in materials, especially in very specific areas of materials science, you are better off with a MatSci degree than a general ChemE degree, you just won’t be as marketable outside of your specialty area. You essentially have a more limited backup plan.</p>
<p>The specialty majors are important and do a great job for people who absolutely know they want to go into a certain niche in the market.</p>
<p>Aero is really a subset of MechE
MatSci is really a subset of ChemE
Environmental is really a subset of Civil
CompE is really a subset of EE
Nuke, from what I can tell, is like a hybrid of MechE and Physics for the most part.</p>
<p>That is a little oversimplified, but hopefully it makes sense.</p>
<p>Ok, so the only advantage to the broad undergrad is to leave more career options?</p>
<p>Well, it DOES leave more career options open, so I suppose that IS an advantage. I would just be careful when describing it that way though. It leaves more options open but people usually do it because they have a general career in mind before they started and that was the means to their goal. It is only a small subset of students who do a major because it is broad (at least by the time they graduate, it is fairly common when students START their degree).</p>
<p>A broad degree has the advantage that it leaves many doors open in case your plans change and that it offers a lot of flexibility in how you tailor your electives.</p>
<p>A more focused degree has the advantage that you can specialize a lot more effectively and so you have the advantage for a certain subset of jobs.</p>
<p>As for me? I went into mechanical engineering knowing that I wanted to work in aerospace but knowing that the industry is always going through cycles of layoffs, so I wanted to make sure that if I for any reason ever got laid off, I would be able to work in a broader array of places just in case. I ended up going to grad school for aerospace engineering, so that broadness is kind of a moot point now, but the entire point of grad school is to specialize, so it doesn’t really matter there.</p>
<p>
No. If you want to work on powertrain design for an automotive company a Mechanical engineering degree can be considered the best option. </p>
<p>Frankly, a broad degree can allow you specialization once you’ve gotten to the technical elective level. For example, if you really wanted to do powertrain stuff once you graduate you’d probably do something like this (all tech elecs at my school):
- Combustion Engine Design
- Advanced FEA
- Advanced Controls
- Thermo III
- Fluids III</p>
<p>I can tell you that other than the #1 selection you’d probably be taking some of the most beastly classes available at the technical elective level at my school though.</p>
<p>SO according to you (BONEH3AD) the main difference between chemical and mechanical is that mechanical is much more broader than chemical???</p>
<p>musaab, be more specific. broader could be in an academic or industry context. </p>
<p>For example, an Aero E and ME may both study Fluid Mechanics, yet ME’s are eligible for more jobs
in a variety of industries that encompass the fluid sciences vs. an Aero E. In this case, ‘broader’
would be true in an industry context but not in an academic context.</p>
<p>No, the main difference between MechE and ChemE is that MechE is based on mechanics and ChemE is based on chemistry. There is very, very little overlap. MechE is generally a little bit broader of a field than ChemE, but the two fields don’t overlap much. On the other hand, MechE and Civil overlap quite a bit and MechE and AeroE overlap almost completely. Similarly, ChemE and MatSci overlap almost completely in most cases.</p>
<p>MechE and ChemE are like apples and oranges… wholly different beasts.</p>
<p>wow I completely disagree, surprised to hear someone could actually not see the relationship between chem E and Mech E. </p>
<p>Besides that many Chem E job postings are cross listed with none other than ME’s, I actually worked as a Chem E last summer (but I’m an ME). Thermo, Heat Transfer, Fluids, Mass transfer, all major topics of chem E so I don’t know where you coming from saying they are very very little overlap, they’re similar in both academic and industry contexts.</p>
<p>Probably because that represets about 30% of all ME topics and work.</p>
<p>yea thats true</p>
<p>And another iPhone spelling fail by boneh3ad…</p>