Engineering Degree

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems like engineering schools are probably losing competent students just because the kids and their parents are used to inflated HS GPAs, believe a B is the equivalent of an F, and think a freshman year GPA of 3.0 means they’re “bad at engineering.”

I do wonder though if many good well rounded students wind up pursuing engineering just because they got good grades in HS math - I mean not everyone who can get an A in HS Calculus is ready to be an engineer. I guess the question is what does a parent do about a kid in engineering who can't manage a full course load and fails a fairly standard high level course...do they bail before its gets worse or try to grind through in the hopes that they can make it through and the actual career will be heavy on other skills?

What do you think of kids who like math and very good at it but don't really enjoy physics? I see this in my DD and her friends group and they are interested in Engineering majors. They are still in 10th grade and so far they have been taking AP physics 1, getting good grades though. They show an interest in biomedical engineering since they like biology and chemistry too. Do you think kids who don't enjoy physics would be miserable in an engineering school?

[Anonymous]

The ChemE majors take more Chemistry and less Physics than other Eng degrees - at many universities. AeroE, Civil, MechE, and ECE majors usually take more Physics classes and maybe only one Chemistry class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
If you don't mind, I am a humanities major with engineering-type kids. From what I hear, a lot of courses are not only difficult but are graded differently than humanities.

That much is true. Also, engineering often curves to a 3.0/4 (or lower) while many humanities degrees curve to a 3.3/4 (or higher).

In my experience, the open book exams were both much much harder and also fairer than closed book. People who are good at short-term memorization (cramming) usually will score higher on closed book exams. Open book is a better eval of one's conceptual understanding in my experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems like engineering schools are probably losing competent students just because the kids and their parents are used to inflated HS GPAs, believe a B is the equivalent of an F, and think a freshman year GPA of 3.0 means they’re “bad at engineering.”

I do wonder though if many good well rounded students wind up pursuing engineering just because they got good grades in HS math - I mean not everyone who can get an A in HS Calculus is ready to be an engineer. I guess the question is what does a parent do about a kid in engineering who can't manage a full course load and fails a fairly standard high level course...do they bail before its gets worse or try to grind through in the hopes that they can make it through and the actual career will be heavy on other skills?

This, I was good at math and science and parents directed me towards engineering for career and financial stability. I graduated, worked in the profession but only enjoyed the salary and not the career.

I did not do this to my kids, they studied what they were passionate about and love their career and have a great quality of life.

My kid loves math and science in HS. They do well in Eng/Humanities courses but do not enjoy them and hate writing (in those courses), so something STEM is their happy path. No desire to be premed or anything medical.
Chemistry was their favorite science and they were thinking it would be a good major (in Soph year HS) However, they hated labs and had no desire to get their PHD, so we guided them that being a Chem major may not be best fit for them because there is so much lab work with the degree and really the only jobs with just a BS are lab jobs---and those are low paying and more grunt work--you need MS/PHD to do the real fun work and get paid more. So we encouraged them to look at CS and engineering. In HS they took CS courses but said no, didn't want to major in it. They determined Chem Eng was interested and decided to major in that.

Well taking Orgo Fall fresh year in college was enough to determine that yes, they do NOT want to be a chem major and along with their intro to Chem Eng that yes they like Chem Eng. They also realized that they do like CS (and are good at it) and it is a good cross over with Chem Eng. So they are minoring in CS.
It's fun to watch them change their path as they take more courses and learn what tools they need to do what they want in their career

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems like engineering schools are probably losing competent students just because the kids and their parents are used to inflated HS GPAs, believe a B is the equivalent of an F, and think a freshman year GPA of 3.0 means they’re “bad at engineering.”

I do wonder though if many good well rounded students wind up pursuing engineering just because they got good grades in HS math - I mean not everyone who can get an A in HS Calculus is ready to be an engineer. I guess the question is what does a parent do about a kid in engineering who can't manage a full course load and fails a fairly standard high level course...do they bail before its gets worse or try to grind through in the hopes that they can make it through and the actual career will be heavy on other skills?

This, I was good at math and science and parents directed me towards engineering for career and financial stability. I graduated, worked in the profession but only enjoyed the salary and not the career.

I did not do this to my kids, they studied what they were passionate about and love their career and have a great quality of life.

IMO more students should be taking AP Physics C to experience the course rigor and be prepared for college physics.

+1

My kid did that. Got a 5 and went onto PHy 2 (E&M) in college---took the course as "self taught" so didn't have to attend lecture (just labs and discussion sections). Got an easy A. Now they are done with Physics but well prepared for their engineering courses.
College physics with only regular HS physics is very challenging....mainly because college entry level phsuyics courses are not known for having good professors---if you are lucky you get a Lecturer (not full prof) and that means a better teacher. Worst case you get an actual prof who doesn't want to teach entry level and is terrible

[Anonymous]

In my Eng Math 1 course (which was Differential Calculus), people with 50% received an A. People with 35% received a D. Note that almost every student already had taken Calc AB and most had received an AP teat score of 3 or higher out of 5.

I think 95% of those students graduated with an engineering degree in 4 years. So it was not really a weed-out course. It did separate some students who decided to switch to "easier" majors in Physics, Math, or Chemistry over in A&S.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Seems like engineering schools are probably losing competent students just because the kids and their parents are used to inflated HS GPAs, believe a B is the equivalent of an F, and think a freshman year GPA of 3.0 means they’re “bad at engineering.”

I do wonder though if many good well rounded students wind up pursuing engineering just because they got good grades in HS math - I mean not everyone who can get an A in HS Calculus is ready to be an engineer. I guess the question is what does a parent do about a kid in engineering who can't manage a full course load and fails a fairly standard high level course...do they bail before its gets worse or try to grind through in the hopes that they can make it through and the actual career will be heavy on other skills?

What do you think of kids who like math and very good at it but don't really enjoy physics? I see this in my DD and her friends group and they are interested in Engineering majors. They are still in 10th grade and so far they have been taking AP physics 1, getting good grades though. They show an interest in biomedical engineering since they like biology and chemistry too. Do you think kids who don't enjoy physics would be miserable in an engineering school?

Definately not. Unless they want to be a MEchE major or BioMedE with a focus on biomechanics. Then they should enjoy physics a bit because the advanced engineering courses will heavily utilize it. And BIoMedE with focus on biosignals will use E&M.

[Anonymous]

Prospective engineering students might find it interesting to read more about Feynman's school life. He might have been the only student in his era who found MIT's math sequence to be not so difficult.

Mind, he received the Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on QED, and discovered Quantum Computing, so he was an official genius.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
If you don't mind, I am a humanities major with engineering-type kids. From what I hear, a lot of courses are not only difficult but are graded differently than humanities.

That much is true. Also, engineering often curves to a 3.0/4 (or lower) while many humanities degrees curve to a 3.3/4 (or higher).

In my experience, the open book exams were both much much harder and also fairer than closed book. People who are good at short-term memorization (cramming) usually will score higher on closed book exams. Open book is a better eval of one's conceptual understanding in my experience.

+1

in the real world, an engineer will simply be looking up formulas if they don't remember them. They will be using software/writing it to crank out the results. It's the conceptual understading that they need that will make them valuable to a job

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yeah, but how many actually come out w/ engg degree?

Not too many. I actually am an engineer (Aero undergrad and EE masters) and I can tell you that TONS of people dropped out when I was in school. I'm old, so was often the only woman. That was....interesting.

I guess you thought you were Cindy Crawford at some point?

I asked a female friend what it was like to be at CalTech with all those guys, and she said something to the effect of "They won't leave me alone!"

My sister was at CalTech. It’s like being Cindy Crawford except all the guys giving you attention are creepy awkward incels. She was very glad to get out of there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Great thread. I am wondering if the Engineering curriculum is needlessly being made hard?

You want it to be hard to be the person who designs planes, buildings, bridges, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a great thread, very interesting. Any advice from the engineers here on your thoughts between a mechanical engineering focus vs an aero focus? My son will soon begin his second semester and will need to make this decision somewhat soon. He’s in a general first-year engineering program now, which is where all Eng students start at his school. He’s really unsure which way to go. Both are very popular and hard to get into at his school, but he should have a shot at either hopefully. And he’s interested in both, so he’s trying to weigh the pros, cons, etc and will spend some time talking to his Advisor. But I thought I’d throw the question out here.

And a note to those asking about engineering and difficulty - it’s tough. My son did really well his first semester (he’s at Purdue), but it was with A LOT of work. I assume it will only get more difficult! One thing I will say is that he felt very prepared and felt his NoVA HS did a good job getting him ready.

I am an ME who worked (briefly) in the aero industry. In general, I recommend sticking to one of the main branches of engineering for undergraduate: civil, mechanical, electrical, materials/metallurgy and maybe chemical and industrial, and specialize in a more niche discipline (e.g., aero, nuclear, petroleum, ocean) for masters. The aero industry is extremely dependent on the government expenditures, which results in boom-and-bust cycles (more bust than boom). I joined the aero industry in late 1980s, and there was a massive contraction in employment in 1991-1992 ("the peace dividend"). A lot of mid- to late-career engineers were laid off. Having a ME degree allowed me to pivot to a different industry.

Now, if the degree is officially in mechanical engineering with an aero focus, that is OK. That usually means taking a few electives in aero senior year. If the degree is in aero, then there won't be room to cover all the foundational ME disciplines. Compare the mechanical versus aero curricula in schools with both majors (e.g., MIT, Texas A&M and UT Austin are the ones I am familiar with). People will say an aero can do most of what an ME does, which is true; however, I believe that having the ME designation helped me 1991-1992 when there were a lot of out-of-work engineers. I know of a few non-aero employers who do not like hiring aeros because they think, rightly or wrongly, that the aeros will go back to their industry when the times pick up.

I’m in aero and the 1990s bust was because the USSR went away. Nobody in my company thinks China is going to go away like that. We are expecting 20 years or more of strong demand. Only wild card would be if the US collapses like the USSR did.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a great thread, very interesting. Any advice from the engineers here on your thoughts between a mechanical engineering focus vs an aero focus? My son will soon begin his second semester and will need to make this decision somewhat soon. He’s in a general first-year engineering program now, which is where all Eng students start at his school. He’s really unsure which way to go. Both are very popular and hard to get into at his school, but he should have a shot at either hopefully. And he’s interested in both, so he’s trying to weigh the pros, cons, etc and will spend some time talking to his Advisor. But I thought I’d throw the question out here.

And a note to those asking about engineering and difficulty - it’s tough. My son did really well his first semester (he’s at Purdue), but it was with A LOT of work. I assume it will only get more difficult! One thing I will say is that he felt very prepared and felt his NoVA HS did a good job getting him ready.

I am an ME who worked (briefly) in the aero industry. In general, I recommend sticking to one of the main branches of engineering for undergraduate: civil, mechanical, electrical, materials/metallurgy and maybe chemical and industrial, and specialize in a more niche discipline (e.g., aero, nuclear, petroleum, ocean) for masters. The aero industry is extremely dependent on the government expenditures, which results in boom-and-bust cycles (more bust than boom). I joined the aero industry in late 1980s, and there was a massive contraction in employment in 1991-1992 ("the peace dividend"). A lot of mid- to late-career engineers were laid off. Having a ME degree allowed me to pivot to a different industry.

Now, if the degree is officially in mechanical engineering with an aero focus, that is OK. That usually means taking a few electives in aero senior year. If the degree is in aero, then there won't be room to cover all the foundational ME disciplines. Compare the mechanical versus aero curricula in schools with both majors (e.g., MIT, Texas A&M and UT Austin are the ones I am familiar with). People will say an aero can do most of what an ME does, which is true; however, I believe that having the ME designation helped me 1991-1992 when there were a lot of out-of-work engineers. I know of a few non-aero employers who do not like hiring aeros because they think, rightly or wrongly, that the aeros will go back to their industry when the times pick up.

I’m in aero and the 1990s bust was because the USSR went away. Nobody in my company thinks China is going to go away like that. We are expecting 20 years or more of strong demand. Only wild card would be if the US collapses like the USSR did.

Then again, no one thought in 1988 that USSR was going to go away either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a great thread, very interesting. Any advice from the engineers here on your thoughts between a mechanical engineering focus vs an aero focus? My son will soon begin his second semester and will need to make this decision somewhat soon. He’s in a general first-year engineering program now, which is where all Eng students start at his school. He’s really unsure which way to go. Both are very popular and hard to get into at his school, but he should have a shot at either hopefully. And he’s interested in both, so he’s trying to weigh the pros, cons, etc and will spend some time talking to his Advisor. But I thought I’d throw the question out here.

And a note to those asking about engineering and difficulty - it’s tough. My son did really well his first semester (he’s at Purdue), but it was with A LOT of work. I assume it will only get more difficult! One thing I will say is that he felt very prepared and felt his NoVA HS did a good job getting him ready.

I am an ME who worked (briefly) in the aero industry. In general, I recommend sticking to one of the main branches of engineering for undergraduate: civil, mechanical, electrical, materials/metallurgy and maybe chemical and industrial, and specialize in a more niche discipline (e.g., aero, nuclear, petroleum, ocean) for masters. The aero industry is extremely dependent on the government expenditures, which results in boom-and-bust cycles (more bust than boom). I joined the aero industry in late 1980s, and there was a massive contraction in employment in 1991-1992 ("the peace dividend"). A lot of mid- to late-career engineers were laid off. Having a ME degree allowed me to pivot to a different industry.

Now, if the degree is officially in mechanical engineering with an aero focus, that is OK. That usually means taking a few electives in aero senior year. If the degree is in aero, then there won't be room to cover all the foundational ME disciplines. Compare the mechanical versus aero curricula in schools with both majors (e.g., MIT, Texas A&M and UT Austin are the ones I am familiar with). People will say an aero can do most of what an ME does, which is true; however, I believe that having the ME designation helped me 1991-1992 when there were a lot of out-of-work engineers. I know of a few non-aero employers who do not like hiring aeros because they think, rightly or wrongly, that the aeros will go back to their industry when the times pick up.

I’m in aero and the 1990s bust was because the USSR went away. Nobody in my company thinks China is going to go away like that. We are expecting 20 years or more of strong demand. Only wild card would be if the US collapses like the USSR did.

Then again, no one thought in 1988 that USSR was going to go away either.

Some did. But mainly it was obvious that the USSR economy was very small compared to the US economy, was not well integrated into the world economy, could not produce much that the world wanted to buy, and was seriously behind in information technology. None of this is true for China.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Great thread. I am wondering if the Engineering curriculum is needlessly being made hard?

You want it to be hard to be the person who designs planes, buildings, bridges, etc.

This. Modern marvels like Starlink Internet requires top engineers in multiple disciplines. MechEs for spacecraft passive thermals, EEs for the radio links and antennas, ECEs for on-board computing and storage, AeroEs for overall spacecraft design.