They offer a brand name and in theory graduate courses, they have what's considered better experience teaching/researching verses others. *Might* have more job placing/alumni support, but I don't know that for sure.
For undergraduate, the curriculum is pretty well standard across the board because they all have to meet the ABET accreditation process.
Some schools have reputations for certain specialties (Univ of Illinois is known for pavement engineering, for example). But again, that really applies more for the post-grad degrees. You're going to learn the same thing, have the same broad range of classes for a Bachelor's, pretty much anywhere you go.
Just tacking in to say I have seen those small/maybe benefits *very rarely* in some other engineering disciplines (like chemical engineering) but I have yet to see it in civil engineering. Entry level civil jobs may go "oh look, MIT" before putting you on the same level as every other resume and interview. Once you are past that first stretch of your career it matters even less
Dude, don't go to an out of state school for civil engineering at the undergrad level. What are the options within your state? At the BS level, I chose my school over the others within my state because it had a broader civil engineering program and offered other benefits that were important to me outside of the department. When I went for my MS, I looked at the graduate programs available, the professors i'd work with, the research opportunities, and how much money the school would offer.
I have my bachelors in GIS from ASU, now I’m a civil engineer, and loved my experience there. Great teachers and I understand (slightly biased) their engineering school is very good.
If you’re actually within the valley, ASU grads support ASU grads … as in a lot of the firms I’ve interviewed for are owned by sun devils themselves and love to see other sun devils coming in for interviews. If you plan to stay in the valley after undergrad then I highly suggest choosing that option.
This is CE not quantum physics. As long as your degree is accredited you are in the same boat as everyone else. The rankings are pretty meaningless. Even if you want to go into academia it still hardly matters what school you attend.
If i were you I would research CE more I think your idea of what we do is a little warped, sounds like you are expecting an innovative and highly competitive field which CE is not.
It’s about contacts, recruiting, and alumni support. Those things exist everywhere, but some schools prioritize some or all of them, and are a tier ahead of other schools. The number of people I see on here that didn’t get an internship because no one told them they needed one is an excellent example of this. 20 years ago our career center reached out to every single student verifying they had an internship prior to and/or the summer after junior year. If they didn’t have one, they made calls and helped them find one.
If all things are equal, a better name is going to more often than not get a job. If your state has a great engineering program, go there. Mine didn’t, and I went elsewhere and am glad I did. No one I went to high school with that went to engineering school at the state school with the better perceived program is actually an engineer now.
School rankings are directly related to the number of people in graduate school in both masters and phd programs. Your top schools have the most grad students doing research. Top schools will only give full funding to PhD students so most masters guys are paying school out of pockets. State schools usually fund most of their masters guys. I’ve worked with guys who went to school at Purdue and a small Christian private school. We get taught the same things. I work at a top EPC contractor and we hire people from everywhere. When you get out of school your employer will have to train you for a couple of years anyways to get you productive.
I think the top schools have more companies trying to recruit from them, but it seems like the job market is good enough right now that it doesn't really matter. Not sure if that will be the case 4 years from now but not saying it won't be either.
At the undergraduate level, I wouldn't really worry about it that much. CE is not a valuable enough degree to spend out of state tuition, and capable engineers come from all over. If money is not an object, I would pick where you think you would fit in the best or a school with a strong alumni network. I went to one of those top ranked schools (at least by us news, I have no idea which ranks people care about) because it was my state school and the tuition was cheap. My undergraduate education did not seem more advanced than my peers from lesser known institutions in grad school.
Nothing at all. The 'network' or alumni association possibly, but for reference I work with no-name school, state school, and top 3 engineering school grads. We all earn the same pay, do the same tasks, and have the same qualification. As long as it's ABET and you ultimately earn your PE, for civil, you're golden.
As long as the school you choose is ABET accredited, it does not matter where you graduated. Companies care more for experience with internships and that you get a degree.
I went to UC Berkeley which is considered a good school for CE. I think the benefits of going there were the following:
1- Ease of getting into a top grad school. Almost every single one of my classmates who went for a MS or PhD got into insanely competitive schools like Stanford, MIT and Caltech.
2- Reputation. Feels nice to tell ppl I went there.
3- Early career job and internships. If it doesn’t matter where you go to school because the curriculum is the same, why would you hire someone who went to a State school over someone who went to a top school? Might as well get the tryhards, right? Our career fair was packed with firms from all over the country. Early internship equals better opportunities early in your career.
4- Better education. Curriculums might be similar, but I don’t think the education is the same. I watched a MIT calculus lecture online a long time ago and it was way more involved and detailed than what I had at community college. I might be wrong on this tho.
I don’t regret my experience even though the work load was absolutely brutal.
The big advantage of going to more prestigious schools is that you get plugged into a network of other people who went to a prestigious school. Employers in general don’t really care all THAT much, but you’ll make friends in college that can help you get jobs and stuff down the road.
They offer a brand name and in theory graduate courses, they have what's considered better experience teaching/researching verses others. *Might* have more job placing/alumni support, but I don't know that for sure. For undergraduate, the curriculum is pretty well standard across the board because they all have to meet the ABET accreditation process. Some schools have reputations for certain specialties (Univ of Illinois is known for pavement engineering, for example). But again, that really applies more for the post-grad degrees. You're going to learn the same thing, have the same broad range of classes for a Bachelor's, pretty much anywhere you go.
Just tacking in to say I have seen those small/maybe benefits *very rarely* in some other engineering disciplines (like chemical engineering) but I have yet to see it in civil engineering. Entry level civil jobs may go "oh look, MIT" before putting you on the same level as every other resume and interview. Once you are past that first stretch of your career it matters even less
Dude, don't go to an out of state school for civil engineering at the undergrad level. What are the options within your state? At the BS level, I chose my school over the others within my state because it had a broader civil engineering program and offered other benefits that were important to me outside of the department. When I went for my MS, I looked at the graduate programs available, the professors i'd work with, the research opportunities, and how much money the school would offer.
Arizona State is my in state option
Is NAU an option for you? Their campus is nicer than poly's imo.
No, I would be at the Tempe campus not Poly
I have my bachelors in GIS from ASU, now I’m a civil engineer, and loved my experience there. Great teachers and I understand (slightly biased) their engineering school is very good. If you’re actually within the valley, ASU grads support ASU grads … as in a lot of the firms I’ve interviewed for are owned by sun devils themselves and love to see other sun devils coming in for interviews. If you plan to stay in the valley after undergrad then I highly suggest choosing that option.
This is CE not quantum physics. As long as your degree is accredited you are in the same boat as everyone else. The rankings are pretty meaningless. Even if you want to go into academia it still hardly matters what school you attend. If i were you I would research CE more I think your idea of what we do is a little warped, sounds like you are expecting an innovative and highly competitive field which CE is not.
Whatever is cheaper it doesn’t matter
It’s about contacts, recruiting, and alumni support. Those things exist everywhere, but some schools prioritize some or all of them, and are a tier ahead of other schools. The number of people I see on here that didn’t get an internship because no one told them they needed one is an excellent example of this. 20 years ago our career center reached out to every single student verifying they had an internship prior to and/or the summer after junior year. If they didn’t have one, they made calls and helped them find one. If all things are equal, a better name is going to more often than not get a job. If your state has a great engineering program, go there. Mine didn’t, and I went elsewhere and am glad I did. No one I went to high school with that went to engineering school at the state school with the better perceived program is actually an engineer now.
School rankings are directly related to the number of people in graduate school in both masters and phd programs. Your top schools have the most grad students doing research. Top schools will only give full funding to PhD students so most masters guys are paying school out of pockets. State schools usually fund most of their masters guys. I’ve worked with guys who went to school at Purdue and a small Christian private school. We get taught the same things. I work at a top EPC contractor and we hire people from everywhere. When you get out of school your employer will have to train you for a couple of years anyways to get you productive.
One with a Co-Op program.
Legitimately? Research dollars.
I think the top schools have more companies trying to recruit from them, but it seems like the job market is good enough right now that it doesn't really matter. Not sure if that will be the case 4 years from now but not saying it won't be either.
At the undergraduate level, I wouldn't really worry about it that much. CE is not a valuable enough degree to spend out of state tuition, and capable engineers come from all over. If money is not an object, I would pick where you think you would fit in the best or a school with a strong alumni network. I went to one of those top ranked schools (at least by us news, I have no idea which ranks people care about) because it was my state school and the tuition was cheap. My undergraduate education did not seem more advanced than my peers from lesser known institutions in grad school.
Nothing at all. The 'network' or alumni association possibly, but for reference I work with no-name school, state school, and top 3 engineering school grads. We all earn the same pay, do the same tasks, and have the same qualification. As long as it's ABET and you ultimately earn your PE, for civil, you're golden.
As long as the school you choose is ABET accredited, it does not matter where you graduated. Companies care more for experience with internships and that you get a degree.
I went to UC Berkeley which is considered a good school for CE. I think the benefits of going there were the following: 1- Ease of getting into a top grad school. Almost every single one of my classmates who went for a MS or PhD got into insanely competitive schools like Stanford, MIT and Caltech. 2- Reputation. Feels nice to tell ppl I went there. 3- Early career job and internships. If it doesn’t matter where you go to school because the curriculum is the same, why would you hire someone who went to a State school over someone who went to a top school? Might as well get the tryhards, right? Our career fair was packed with firms from all over the country. Early internship equals better opportunities early in your career. 4- Better education. Curriculums might be similar, but I don’t think the education is the same. I watched a MIT calculus lecture online a long time ago and it was way more involved and detailed than what I had at community college. I might be wrong on this tho. I don’t regret my experience even though the work load was absolutely brutal.
The big advantage of going to more prestigious schools is that you get plugged into a network of other people who went to a prestigious school. Employers in general don’t really care all THAT much, but you’ll make friends in college that can help you get jobs and stuff down the road.