ABET vs non-ABET majors at UC Berkeley

[SouthYankie]

The only EEs I know where ABET accreditation has mattered are in the power generation/transmission field.

[Rivet2000]

Same here. BTW is it’s over 3.3 Vdc I don’t want to know about it

[ucbalumnus]

@tamagotchi

It seems that UCB is consistently ranked very high in EE on all lists of both graduate and undergraduate programs… but apparently makes a deliberate choice not to continue / pursue ABET for its EECS major in order to retain a high level of curriculum flexibility.

Or that the vast majority of EECS majors are emphasizing CS these days…

@tamagotchi

What sort of career outcomes in EE would be limited (or more of a hassle) because of this program being non-ABET? Specific information would be helpful.

Career paths that would need Professional Engineer licensing (mainly those where one signs off on designs used by the general public, so PE licensing is most common in civil engineering), where having an ABET accredited degree is helpful or necessary, and those which involve taking the patent exam, where either an ABET accredited degree or fulfilling specific course work requirements is necessary.

In electrical engineering, PE licensing appears to be most likely useful in power systems or where electrical aspects of construction projects are being designed.

@tamagotchi

For program planning, should he try to take all the core courses that would be included in a normal ABET EE program (going for breadth over depth)? Or does that not really matter and he can indulge himself taking just the prereqs for those things he likes best, then the advanced courses in whatever his favorite specialty turns out to be?

Back when EECS was ABET-accredited, it did allow considerable choice in what upper level courses the student could choose, within the minimum of 45 units of engineering courses (not including CS 70 which is counted as math or non-technical courses like CS 195, BioE 100, etc.).