Engineering Major

[Anonymous]

I have heard that VA Tech engineering students select their major based off of GPA after sophomore year which means they may not get the major they want or even get to stay in engineering. Is this common? DC is interested in VA Tech, Duke, Carnegie Mellon and UMD

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have heard that VA Tech engineering students select their major based off of GPA after sophomore year which means they may not get the major they want or even get to stay in engineering. Is this common? DC is interested in VA Tech, Duke, Carnegie Mellon and UMD

Yes, this is correct. My DC is at Purdue and they have a similar thing, except that it is after freshman year. In practice, if your DC cannot get into the major because of a poor GPA, then it is better for him to find a major in which he can be more successful.

[Anonymous]

I don't know about specifics for those schools in particular but there is a relatively high attrition rate out of math based majors like engineering in most schools.
Engineering majors really need to hit the books hard. Competition is tough.

[Anonymous]

Here's the way it works. All 1st year COE students take a general eng curriculum. The students will then select (apply) to their major of choice during the 2nd semester. If the student's GPA is below 3.0 (I think it's 3.0, someone keep me honest here) then they are not guaranteed their choice.

If a student has below a 3.0 during their first year, then they really need to re-think why they want to be an engineer. Are they in the right major?

To me, the big downside to this is for someone who wants to major in CS. Because CS is in COE, a student interested in CS may not have another option if they do not have the grades after their first year (although VT offers other majors similar to CS). At UVA for example, they have a BA and BS in CS.

I was a Computer Engineering major at VT, but at the time, CS was in the College of Arts and Sciences. Even though I was mostly interested in the CS side of CpE, if I just wanted to focus on CS, I would have an option to not be in the COE. Now, students must be in the COE to major in CS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have heard that VA Tech engineering students select their major based off of GPA after sophomore year which means they may not get the major they want or even get to stay in engineering. Is this common? DC is interested in VA Tech, Duke, Carnegie Mellon and UMD

Yes, this is correct. My DC is at Purdue and they have a similar thing, except that it is after freshman year. In practice, if your DC cannot get into the major because of a poor GPA, then it is better for him to find a major in which he can be more successful.

Schools do this at different rates. As far as the "in practice" part goes: NOT TRUE.

Yes, some kids should move on (engineering isn't for everyone), but sometimes schools use the GPA as a gate keeping strategy and the GPA is above the threshold of what makes for a good engineer.

They also differs in how they treat kids that don't get into their major.

OP, time to do some research. You will find a difference in how the privates handle this versus the publics. You will also see a ton of variation among the public schools. For what its worth, VT has a reputation for this. Purdue does weed people out, but when we called and asked, the percentages who don't land where they want were fairly reasonable.

[Anonymous]

^^ I should add, that "poor GPA" for some majors at some schools might mean 3.5 which is really high for an engineering student.

[Anonymous]

So at VT, the CS majors take the same classes as the engineering students now? are you sure?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So at VT, the CS majors take the same classes as the engineering students now? are you sure?

There is quite possibly a BA option, which would not. Any major in the engineering school would need to meet the requirements of the engineering school.

(Thus, at my son's school, a BA in CS requires 2 years of foreign language while a BS requires a year of physics, and a semester each of biology and chem plus some more stemmy things.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here's the way it works. All 1st year COE students take a general eng curriculum. The students will then select (apply) to their major of choice during the 2nd semester. If the student's GPA is below 3.0 (I think it's 3.0, someone keep me honest here) then they are not guaranteed their choice.

How does this work at VT for students who are entering with a full load of say 10-15 AP credits and dual enrollment behind them? Won't they already have fulfilled a 1st year general eng. curriculum?

[Anonymous]

Not all schools weed out like VT. Pitt for example is more accommodating and doesn’t have quotas per discipline within the engineering school.

[Anonymous]

Engineering at UMD is very flexible and supportive. Direct admits to the engineering school can choose any engineering major since there is no limit to the number of students who can declare a major in any particular engineering department. And since all engineering students take basically the same classes for the first year, they can easily change their major within engineering during that first year. Students can stay in engineering as long as they keep a 2.0 in all required classes. (if they are not direct admits to the engineering school, students can apply internally but will need at least a 3.0 in all gateway classes). They offer lots of tutoring and support for engineering students, especially for the intro engineering classes in their Keystone program.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Engineering at UMD is very flexible and supportive. Direct admits to the engineering school can choose any engineering major since there is no limit to the number of students who can declare a major in any particular engineering department. And since all engineering students take basically the same classes for the first year, they can easily change their major within engineering during that first year. Students can stay in engineering as long as they keep a 2.0 in all required classes. (if they are not direct admits to the engineering school, students can apply internally but will need at least a 3.0 in all gateway classes). They offer lots of tutoring and support for engineering students, especially for the intro engineering classes in their Keystone program.

In contrast...
One of the schools my child rejected required a 3.2 to continue in her intended major and a 3.5 for some of the others. If you don't cut it, you get one more semester to bring your grades up and if you don't, you are off to liberal arts. This is despite an admissions letter that said "direct admit" but it really wasn't. She chose a school that was more like UMD.

It isn't easy to maintain a 3.2 when the mean for some of your classes is below a 3.0 - all it takes is one stumble. Some kids obviously can do this, but there are plenty of kids who don't thrive in a 300 person class (like all the intro engineering classes) or who take a little longer to make the transition to college. I personally didn't want my kid to go a school where middling wasn't good enough to get past freshman year. I know too many people who are successful professionals who stumbled at the beginning of college for me to believe that this requirement screens out the right kids. Didn't seem like a good investment to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not all schools weed out like VT. Pitt for example is more accommodating and doesn’t have quotas per discipline within the engineering school.

For some kids, this might be reason enough to go OOS.

[Anonymous]

This does not happen at UMD. They can major in whatever they want.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This does not happen at UMD. They can major in whatever they want.

No they have a good number of limited entry majors including Engineering.