<p>HI,
I recently received my acceptances from each of these schools. RPI and WPI are comparable in price, and Uconn is about half of that price for me. I am interested in Aerospace Engineering, and I had a 4.2 GPA in high school with a 32 ACT and a 2160 SAT. I am interested in sports, namely track, and I would be interested in joining the team at RPI or WPI. One major issue that concerns me about WPI is its national reputation and how this might affect my future career plans, especially in astronautics. I like its project-based curriculum, but I am not sure if the internships and research opportunities of the other two schools would be better received by potential employers. What types of employers have frequented WPI in past years especially in the field of Aerospace and astronautics? I have a month to make my descision, and your help is greatly needed.<br>
Thanks!</p>
<p>PS if any of you can comment on the social life at Uconn compared to that of WPI or RPI i would be appreciative. Also, how do RPI's academics, social life, etc compare to those of WPI? Thanks again!</p>
<p>There are numerous WPI vs RPI threads on both the WPI and RPI forums. There is a recent discussion here on the WPI forum that may address some of your questions (though not necessarily specifically related to aerospace / astronautics). My daughter is a WPI freshman who narrowed down her selection to WPI and RPI. She liked them both but at the end of the day thought WPI was a better fit for her. She is a varsity athlete and involved in many other campus activities. Her stats were similar to yours (as are most WPI & RPI students) an she is doing very well academically. I can’t speak to aerospace, but I know that when my D was considering schools, she heard time and again from engineering managers that WPI is one of their favorite schools to hire new grads from. We are from the northeast, so it is well known here. RPI may have slightly more name recognition nationally, but I’m not sure if that is true in industry or just in general.</p>
<p>You have 3 great choices and will get an excellent education at all of these schools. Read some of the threads comparing schools (again, lots of info in the recent one on this forum), got to accepted student days if you are able, and choose the school that is the best fit for you. Good luck with your decision. This is an exciting time!</p>
<p>My S is currently a sophomore at WPI (a CS major) and very happy. He also had to choose between RPI and UCONN Honors. Although he’s not involved in any of the athletic programs, he actively uses the brand new athletic center, and is involved in some of the sports clubs and is very happy socially.</p>
<p>There are many reasons why WPI was a great choice for him (he also really likes the 4 term system).</p>
<p>He didn’t want UCONN because it’s very large and too many kids from high school.</p>
<p>He wasn’t thrilled with Troy, NY (RPI), not that Worcester is so great, but it’s so accessible to both Boston and Providence where he has many friends in college and they can easily visit each other. For this reason alone, he wouldn’t have been as happy at RPI (and my husband is a RPI alum).</p>
<p>Regarding internships…he has gotten amazing, and very well paid CS summer internships via the WPI career fairs…both in Boston (which is a great place to spend summers!). Although he has had paid CS summer internships since 15 years old, I believe that he never would have had the same opportunities offered if he attended UCONN…too many people competing. And again, WPI’s proximity to Boston, makes internship interviews there very doable.</p>
<p>I realize that WPI costs a lot more than UCONN, but I feel the smaller size of WPI, and the project oriented education, allows my S to stand out and be visible with a very appealing type of education (per employers), which I believe will translate into great job opportunities upon graduation. I also realize that I’m talking about CS, which has very different career opportunities than aerospace engineering, but from my perspective, WPI was a great choice and will pay great dividends for my S.</p>
<p>Good luck…WPI, RPI and UCONN are all great college choices!!!</p>
<p>Consider sending an email to the aerospace department with your specific questions -
<a href=“mailto:ae@wpi.edu”>ae@wpi.edu</a></p>
<p>Other than that there are a ton of WPI versus RPI threads in this forum or the College Search and Selection forum, so do a search and starting reading
My son chose WPI over RPI; he liked the project based curriculum, study abroad opportunities, location, and general “vibe” better.</p>
<p>You can get somewhat of a feel for job opportunites thru the schools by looking at the job fair pages of their web sites. My D is at WPI so I have looked at their web page and there are quite a few companies listed.</p>
<p>A good college job fair is a start to one’s job/intern search. Job hunting can go well beyond that. I hired several people from WPI at the company I worked for in SoCal (am now retired). They took the effort to contact my company. Don’t recall ever getting a resume from RPI, but that isn’t a negative in my mind just the way it was.</p>
<p>None of your schools has a huge national reputation (IMHO) but WPI and RPI have enough of one in the engineering community that you should have no problem. UConn is a little less well known. In the end, it will come down to what subjects you studied, what is your GPA and how well you come across as a team player that will help make you attractive to employers.</p>
<p>Discussing specifically Aerospace (of which there seems to be little information on on this site), how is WPI better? Do the projects substitute for internships in the engineering areas? How do potential employers see them compared to internships? It seems that WPI is stronger in the computers field over the mechanical engineering subject areas…Is this an accurate deduction?</p>
<p>Hmmm, I’ve never really thought of WPI being less strong in Mech Eng areas, quite the opposite in fact. This is just my perception, though, so YMMV.</p>
<p>I would take BeanTownGirl’s advice and send an e-mail with specific questions and concerns to the aerospace department. WPI faculty are very approachable. Ask about job and grad school placement rates for last year’s graduating class and the places they ended up. Ask about internships that aero students have had, what types of projects students have done, etc.</p>
<p>The projects are in addition to summer internships. I checked the Career Center’s site and they took down the info on the last career Fair in order to advertise the upcoming one for the Life Sciences majors
Send them an email and I’m sure they can email you a PDF of the companies recruiting for aero interns and full-time employees from the job fair in February.
People at WPI are very helpful. They may even be able to give you specific names of companies that recruit aero students.</p>
<p>Thank you beantowngirl, that first link was exactly what i was looking for. Now, one other thing that I have been hearing in relation to WPI’s reputation issues (regional reputation vs national) is that they are “growing” in industry reputation what evidence is there to back this claim up?</p>
