<p>I know different majors are harder to different people, but why is chemical engineering regarded as one of the hardest? The pre-engineering classes are the same, is it the organic chemistry? Or is it the classes during the junior and senior year?</p>
<p>From what I've heard, and for where I go to school, ChemE is hard because of the pure number of difficult, heavy math, physics, and chemistry based courses you have to take. You have to take math to DiffEQ, lots of physics, OChem and PChem, Thermo, heat and mass transfer, fluid dynamics, separation processes, reaction engineering, and the list goes on. It's a lot of work to manage, and quite a bit of it can be very hard. You basically get no electives outside of ChemE since it requires so many classes.</p>
<p>I think it's more about the intensity and difficulty of the math and physics applied in the chemE courses. There's this one required course at the school that I went to that was more or less modern physics in a chemE setting. Unless modern physics is a required course in the engineering school's curriculum, none of the other majors will ever touch that.</p>
<p>I wouldn't say the amount of work or the number of courses is specific to chemE though; it's pretty much the case in any of the engineering disciplines that you decide to study.</p>
<p>How does the level of difficulty of EE compare with that of ChemE?</p>
<p>EE is for physics ppl and ChemE is for Chem ppl. But EE ppl also do CS and other types of programming like Matlab.</p>
<p>^Except that ChemE is more based on physics than chemistry. ^</p>
<p>As a chemical engineering grad, I agree with Dauntless9. </p>
<p>It took me 5 years to graduate with full semesters of course loads...granted I didn't have any of the lower division courses out of the way from AP credits.</p>
<p>If you're interested in the types of courses and curriculum involved for a ChemE major check out the following publication from my alma mater, UC Berkeley:</p>
<p>I'm sure other programs have similar courses.</p>
<p>Keep in mind too that you're rewarded for your hard work...Chemical engineering graduates are normally the highest paid out of college.</p>
<p>By how much? I'm not familiar with any reliable sources for income figures. If you would please do the favor, I'd appreciate it.</p>
<p>I'm a freshman considering different areas of engineering.</p>
<p>^ Average starting salary, according to this survey, is $55,900/year for ChemE grads. Next highest is EE at $52,899/year.</p>
<p>I did not see a year for the data. But, I'm sure it's fairly recent:</p>
<p>Thank you.</p>
<p>I should caution, do an engineering discipline because it interests you, not because it's average salary is $3000 more. And averages can be misleading in many ways. I don't mean to knock on the stats though (thank you for providing them UCB), it's a fair question, and ChemE's make good money (as do most other engineering majors). </p>
<p>I would like to assert though, ChemE's do have more work in terms of required classes than other engineering majors. Naturally, results may vary by school ( maybe EE does have as many as ChemE at some places), but at my school, ChemE requires a whopping 272 units of coursework to major in, the next highest being EE with 204 units of coursework. To translate, that's 6 or 7 more classes for a ChemE. We don't get any free electives...</p>
<p>I also did quick check of engineering at U of I, a school I am somewhat familiar with, and found that ChemE there has no free electives, while EE, MechE, and MatSE do. Again, I'm not arguing that the work is conceptually more difficult, but more "work" in that one must take more math/science intensive engineering courses. Of course, the counter to my argument is that there will be that zealous student that takes engineering courses for all their electives, and thus matches the ChemE's involvement. Oh well, this post has gotten too long, and I don't take it that seriously anyway.</p>
<p>I too am a Chem E. grad, and I thought it was a tough major. I can't account for comparison to other engineering since I didn't major in any of them. I can say that my brother-in-law and best friend are both MechEs and they don't make nearly as much as I do, but are very happy with their jobs and lifestyles. I didn't get the ChemE because I thought I'd make more, but because I wanted the challenge. Also, now, when I go to interview for jobs I have heard hiring managers and HR personnel refer to the degree as "THE" degree, and business schools even over looked my pathetic gpa and admitted me (maybe because my GMAT was good and I have a few years of experience, too).</p>
<p>I wasn't going to choose it because of it's higher mean salary. Remember, I'm just a freshman considering possibilities, learning and outweighing pros and cons of each field. I know the most about EE (that statement doesn't indicate any personal preference, though), but my school, UW-Madison, has a pretty well ranked ChemE program. </p>
<p>I guess I'll talk to some advisors and upperclassmen at my campus. Thanks.</p>
<p>Check in at the placement office too. You can get a better idea of the sorts of companies that recruit graduates in different majors, and their locations (which may or may not matter to you). I tried to be a co-op student, years ago, and the time spent in the placement office was very well spent.</p>
<p>I don't think chemical engineering is so hard, but I don't have anything to compare it against, either. It's not like you can double major in two engineering disciplines (well, you might if you enjoy mental anguish).</p>