BordomBeThyName

So, I'm currently a Freshman at Lafayette College (Easton, PA) and I'm not exactly liking this place as much as I'd hoped, so I'm thinking of transferring.

My big complaint about here is the huge lack of eccentricity. Every student is an athlete, and everyone is very... normal.

So, what I'm looking for is really overly specific, but maybe it exists.

I'm looking for an east coast school that offers Mechanical Engineering as a major, but has an eccentric student population, like an East Coast Berkeley. There's a lot of schools with the right mentality, like Oberlin and Grinnell and Reed, but they're in the middle of nowhere and don't offer engineering.

The best school I've found so far is Carnegie Mellon. (Which I was rejected from last year)

So, any suggestions?

Statistics:

HS GPA:
3.8 (weighted)
3.6 (unweighted)

SAT:
Math: 780
Writing: 690
CR: 690

ACT:
32

Extra curriculars:
Founder and president of a FIRST robotics team (for 3 years), and started a program to teach young students engineering principles.

College GPA:
3.8 (ish, so far)

College activities:
Tech work for a charity theater organization.
Joining Engineering Without Borders soon
Working on a piece of kinetic sculpture

monydad

Engineers tend to cluster in two types: a)the "conventional, regular guy" type you are describing, sort of like kindred spirits to undergrad business majors but better in science; and b) the "nerdy" type. A proportional tilt towards b) might be correlated with the highest stat/ most selective schools. A tilt towards c) other, or none of the above, with truly more diverse personalities, would most likely be found at schools with higher percentages of arts & sciences college majors and relatively smaller percentages of engineering and business majors.

vossron

Residents of Portland, OR, would likely disagree that Reed (within the city limits) is in the middle of nowhere. Reed has a 3/2 engineering program with Caltech, Columbia and Rensselaer, so you could get the best of both worlds, quirkiness and engineering.

dwhite

Not sure how "quirky" the student body is, but the U of Maryland has an excellent engineering program and a diverse and large student body.

yabeyabe2

No reason not to try CM again--your college GPA is strong.

Do any of the quiry liberal arts schools have strong ME progrmas--Union; Skidmore, Juniata, Bard?

CaliforniaDancer

Swarthmore, though it's not as math/science/engineering focused as some of the others you mentioned, and is of course very hard to get into. But it's known for a sort of academic quirkiness; you definitely won't find that everyone is an athlete.

Why not try CMU again?

Also, look into Case Western Reserve U in Ohio if you're willing to move inland a little.

OHKID

Try for U Michigan, and maybe even WPI, Stevens, or NYU-Poly would fit the bill, although NYC would be where your social life is for the latter two.

I would also say that U Rochester may fit your criteria well.

Sam Lee

I am biased but Northwestern engineering has strong emphasis on creativity and design. That said, engineers tend to be more "normal", a bit more conservative, or nerdy. But the music and communications schools have plenty of those creative or artsy types and there's a dorm that's filled with these students.

monydad

"But the music and communications schools have plenty of those creative or artsy types and there's a dorm that's filled with these students."

That evokes a related issue, even where these different "types" coexist in the same university, the degree to which they actually interact may vary considerably. I've read about schools that have good engineering prgrams, and good art or theater programs, and the people in these two camps have virtually nothing to do with each other.

Left to their own devices, the various groups tend to self-segregate. A situation where the self-segregation is actually institutionalized, such that the colleges actually have separate dorms, would be least likely to meet OPs desire to actually interact with these other types to a greater, not lesser, extent. The OP would probably prefer a situation where there is true integration of majors in the dorms, not segregation by college. I know of one such university, but I imagine there are many.

BordomBeThyName

@monydad:
I know that engineers tend to be fairly normal, but I'm looking for schools that are strong in other programs as well, to balance out the monotony. I'm fully willing to go outside my major to find more quirky students. They're usually easy to find (brightly colored) and pretty friendly. Even if all I could find were a pile of nerdy engineers, I'd be content with that. The people here are just all very average.

You said you know of "one such university", which one is that?

@Vossron
Oops, I think Reed got thrown in there is because it's somewhere I don't particularly want to go. I've lived on the west coast (although much further south) my whole life, and want to get away from it. I AM starting to seriously look at some 3/2 programs though, there are some really cool ones.

@dwight
U Maryland is an excellent school, but it just seems really centered around sports and greek life to me, which is largely what I'm trying to escape.

@yabeyabe2
I'm definitely applying to CMU again. It was my dream school back then, and I haven't given up on it quite yet.
Union has an ME program, but (like U Mich) seems to be pretty sports/greek to me.
Skidmore, Juniata, and Bard all have 3/2 programs which look pretty cool, and I'm definitely looking further into them, thanks!

@CaliforniaDancer
Swarthmore is a bit above my level, but I'll be looking into Case Western more.

@OHKID
Let's see... U Mich looks sports/greek-ey
I turned down WPI for my current school for the lack of artists (although that might have been a mistake)
I toured Stevens and didn't like it because students weren't allowed to use the machine shop... ever.
NYU is certainly under consideration
I'm not really sure what it is about Rochester, it really just doesn't scream out at me.
Thanks though!

@Sam Lee
Right now I'm looking at those more artsy schools that offer 3/2 programs, hopefully a couple will call out at me.

RML

OP, why do you want to be in the EAst Coast? Why won't you do down South where UT-Austin and Rice are. They're excellent for engineering and have campus culture similar to Berkeley's. There are plenty of jobs for engineers in Texas as well. Better yet, apply to Berkeley or UCLA. These are pretty tough schools to get into but who knows!

BordomBeThyName

RML, Berkely and UCLA are just too close to home for me. I was really considering Rice, but I don't think that Texas and I would agree politically (although I suppose I could give Rice a try). I haven't looked into UT-Austin.

monydad

"You said you know of "one such university", which one is that?"
I was thinking specifically of Cornell, but I wasn't offering it up since I don't know that it is truly your best-fit school. There are all sorts of people there, but to best experience its true student diversity requires living in the dorms as a freshman. Most of the upperclassmen there live off campus.

Re: 3/2 programs, before you go that route talk to people at the prospective college and find out how many students actually complete this program there. With nobody at your college to help you guide your way in engineering, no courses there,and with the need to disrupt your life and studies after three years (2 in your case?) to go study at a different college, it would be no surprise if at most schools few people if any actually wind up completing such a program.
Also find out, in detail, what the entrance process and requirements are for getting into the named "partner" engineering schools subsequently. At some I looked at, the process seemed little different than applying to the engineering school as a transfer, acceptance was by no means automatic. Frankly, IMO if you go that route the odds that you will actually wind up being an engineer are not very high.

jessiehl

What what WHAT? I know my experience isn't everybody's, but that statement sounds about the same in my head as "I know that water tends to be fairly dry."

I quickly polled a few friends (MIT-alum engineers) explaining what you were looking for. They suggested RPI and Virginia Tech. I might add WPI - a safer bet than RPI - to that list. I know some WPI people, and their presence there suggests that the school is eccentric-friendly. CMU is the obvious choice, but you already have that down.

Also, yeah, UT-Austin. If it's politics you're worried about, from what I understand, Austin is sort of the great liberal oasis of Texas.

vossron

If you complete the 3/2 program, you end up with two degrees; transferring gets you one.

I agree with monydad that 3/2 completions are low; many decide that they don't want to leave their "3" and their friends, or that, like many matriculants, they change majors, no longer wanting to be an engineer.