Engineering GPA

[Anonymous]

hi engineering parents, DC goes to a T20 selective engineering program and we stopped monitoring his grades because it just leads to stress and angst. found that that GPA is very sub-par, just a tad below 3. so worried now. did get an internship for summer. said that gpa does not matter that much. but we are so worried. is this true?

[Anonymous]

I wouldn't hire someone fresh out of college with a GPA below 3.0. I'm a hiring manager in an engineering field. Others may feel differently.

[Anonymous]

That is a fine GPA for engineering. Do you and your co-parent have any experience with engineering higher ed? Grades skew quite a bit lower than other fields due to the difficulty.

[Anonymous]

Please back off your child with a “very sub par GPA”. Just a tad under 3.0 in engineering. What exactly would have met your expectations?

Save some money for therapy and inpatient care when your child goes over the stress cliff

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't hire someone fresh out of college with a GPA below 3.0. I'm a hiring manager in an engineering field. Others may feel differently.

+1

In any field, 3.0 is the threshold for getting an internship or interview for a full time job. Then there are jobs with a 3.5+ cutoff as well.
So while 3.0 is a decent gpa for even engineering, your kid will have a difficult time landing internships and jobs with a sub 3.0

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't hire someone fresh out of college with a GPA below 3.0. I'm a hiring manager in an engineering field. Others may feel differently.

This was the case for many decades. I had a 2.95 due to a disastrous freshman year. I couldn't even get interviews with some companies. Their filter removed me in the first cut.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:hi engineering parents, DC goes to a T20 selective engineering program and we stopped monitoring his grades because it just leads to stress and angst. found that that GPA is very sub-par, just a tad below 3. so worried now. did get an internship for summer. said that gpa does not matter that much. but we are so worried. is this true?

Also a parent of an engineering freshman at a T20. DC has never gotten a B in his life. But got two Bs first semester. And he grinds and works much harder than his sibling - also at a T20 - but with a softer major.

Engineering is hard. There are weed out classes. And everything is graded on a curve. And it's not like there are a bunch of dumb kids studying engineering at top schools that will help with the curve.

It's tough, particularly as a freshman.

But we apply zero pressure when it comes to grades. DC does his best. And you can't ask for anything more than that. My sense with engineering is that if you can manage to stay above 3.0 it's all good.

[Anonymous]

What kind of engineering? My kid is CS major at one of the top 3 for CS and GPA hovers right around 3.0. But got many internship interviews for the top tech companies and offers from a few.

[Anonymous]

DS graduated with a sub 3.0. It took him while to find a job but is now employed with a decent salary at a large firm. Some jobs did say they required a 3.0 but he would apply if interested and occasionally would still get an interview.

Obviously higher is better but there are jobs out there..

[Anonymous]

Isn’t the distribution of grades among the graduating class of engineers known? When I went to Virginia Tech a long time ago, a 3.0 GPA put you at the 66th percentile. One third finished above 3.0 and two thirds finished between 2.0 and 3.0.

[Anonymous]

Engineering is known to be difficult major so don’t fret it too much

[Anonymous]

Don’t get involved he has an internship

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Don’t get involved he has an internship

Thank you all. Yes, sophomore, did get a pretty good internship all on own. Did talk gently about the 3.0 optimum. Did not scold or diminish. Now is the time to make him a bit aware. No point doing this in junior year. Hopefully will pull it up by graduation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't hire someone fresh out of college with a GPA below 3.0. I'm a hiring manager in an engineering field. Others may feel differently.

+1

In any field, 3.0 is the threshold for getting an internship or interview for a full time job. Then there are jobs with a 3.5+ cutoff as well.
So while 3.0 is a decent gpa for even engineering, your kid will have a difficult time landing internships and jobs with a sub 3.0

+1

This is kind of well known, OP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't hire someone fresh out of college with a GPA below 3.0. I'm a hiring manager in an engineering field. Others may feel differently.

This was the case for many decades. I had a 2.95 due to a disastrous freshman year. I couldn't even get interviews with some companies. Their filter removed me in the first cut.

This is true across the board for most majors even today. Then there are cuts at 3.5/3.7 for some positions/companies. But without a 3.0+ most kids will have trouble making even the first simple cut to getting looked at today.