That is your opinion, which you are certainly entitled to. Not everyone agrees. It is in the best interest of the OP to understand when statements made are opinions vs facts.
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Kettering University in Flint, Michigan has a well-known automotive engineering design concentration under their major of mechanical engineering. Flint is also known for automotive manufacturing.
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Someone always posts that they have the biggest engineering career fair W of the Mississippi (Iowa State - not sure if true but itās been mentioned on here).
@Momofthree24 yes lots of people have different opinions and thatās fine. I welcome all opinions - In this case Iāve seen it and I live it. While Iām not an engineer, Iāve worked with many and itās my industry. I appreciate your opinion (and have no issue that you feel differently) but Iād like to see others suggest schools as that could help OP. What schools would you suggest ?
The young man has stats that are not going to get him into the schools listed on the original post and Iāve offered up alternatives and he can do very well from those. In fact he can do just as well.
@bigelmom absolutely Kettering for a specialized school. The industry is loaded with grads.
Good luck to OP.
There are tons of great schools for MechE if youāre interested in some aspect of automotive engineering. There are great ABET-accredited schools at every level of the selectivity spectrum, so donāt worry! You will simply want to build a balanced list when you have a better idea of your final junior year GPA and AP scores, SAT retake if any, etc.
As some have mentioned, you may want to participate in college in some kind of competition project team such as Formula SAE. You can do research on each schoolās project teams, and this can be an ideal way to learn about what each school has to offer its MechE students. When my son was investigating schools, he contacted these teams before each school visit, and found that team members were happy to meet with him, show him around, and give him lots of inside information about each schoolās MechE program, facilities and support for project teams, and which companies are recruiting interns and new grads.
That list is funny! I see that it places UC Berkeley #2, and although this is a great school in general (and good for engineering students interested in high level research), my son (who attends UCB for other reasons) does not think of it as a great school for training working automotive engineers, due to lack of support for hands-on MechE projects such as Formula SAE. (They do have teams, but the teams are not well supported.) My son would place many other schools much higher than UCB for a student whose goal was to work in automotive engineering. I guess it just goes to show that a ranking based on research papers isnāt everything.
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Hereās the Formula SAE results for EV and ICE - only listing where the student can get in.
EV
Kennesaw State (#15)
Akron (#17)
Iāll add #21 Oregon State because I know @tamagotchi is supportive of the school.
ICE
UNCC (#2)
Kansas State (#10)
Hope College (#11)
Cal State Northridge (#12)
Alabama (#13)
Oakland (#14)
Temple (#15)
Miss State (#17)
Kennesaw (#18)
Then if you look at the 15 schools that offer ecoCAR - sponsored by GM (who recruits from these) - only 15 are selected and you can get into these 5 I believe (not the other 10).
Embry Riddle
Illinois Inst of Technology
MS State
Alabama
WVU
But you can get into automotive from anywhere.
Not only are there manufacturers but suppliers galore.
Honestly, a school like UNCC would be great for your desires - but also Bama, WVU, and Ms State as they have industry tie ins (Bama with Benz for example as the plant is 15 minutes away - and Michelin (local supplier plant) hires interns and grads).
Good luck.
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Although itās always entertaining to look at these, if it does turn out that the OP is interested in Formula SAE, itās important for them to remember that competition results arenāt a ranking of ābest Formula SAE / auto engineering programs.ā Competition results vary from year to year. The main purpose of looking at these results is to get a sense of which schools participate. A student would then want to look into each schoolās actual program to determine quality and fit.
For example, the cars built by these teams vary in tech level, and some teams (like Oregon State) have much more advanced technology. From a studentās perspective, there can be both positive and negative aspects to this. Advanced technology is interesting, but can also have the consequence that only the most advanced students can meaningfully contribute to design work. A more basic car might offer valuable leadership and design opportunities for a wider range of students. Teams also vary in other factors such as how they recruit and train new students, how they assign leadership roles, what sort of facilities does the school make available, which competitions do they participate in (some teams go to Europe and compete against the amazing German teams), etc, etc.
If the OP is interested in Formula SAE, they can contact teams at each school of interest, and get lots more inside information from the students.
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Even though I linked it, I totally agree!
I was looking for a quick way to verify my understanding the MechE Department at Iowa State was active in Automotive, and for that limited purpose I think this serves.
In terms of the overall undergrad experience, though, this is far from a complete answer.
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I just did a quick linked in search of 5 OEMs - you have Iowa State engineers at all five but not all in engineering jobs - but also product planning, etc.
Iām sure most big name schools are represented. These companies have loads of people.
Both my employers (past and present) have engineers from Michigan but mainly non pedigree schools. ABET is the ticket.
Automotive systems are mechanical and each operates in their own way so a MechE will be fine for any auto OEMs.
If so, then there are hundreds of colleges that offer ABET-accredited mechanical engineering that are not highly selective. Not all of them are expensive.
However, the study of engineering tends to be rigorous and high workload, so you likely need to have better study habits than those that produced a 3.1 high school GPA in order to succeed as an engineering student.
Look up both who Kettering was and (even more obviously) the schoolās former name to note its historical ties to the automotive industry.
Note that Kettering is also co-op-focused (Cincinnati, Drexel, and Northeastern are other examples of this that are better known on these forums).
The heavy weighting may be helpful at colleges that take weighted GPA at face value from your high school transcript, but otherwise is not very useful.
Another option to consider is a guaranteed tranfer program. Clemsonās is called bridge:
Could you consider starting at UMBC and transferring to UMCP?
Iām not here to suggest other schools for MechE/AutoE that is not in my area of knowledge. But when I am reading through posts and see other posters presenting their opinions as facts, I feel that telling a hs kid and others reading that it is not factual is appropriate. Itās really not that hard to write, āIn my opinion, rankings do not matter.ā
My opinion on that is that rankings do matter to some people. And some of those people can and do include students, parents, future employers, and graduate school admissions officers.
Thanks.
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Opinions have previously been stated and debate is against ToS. Time to move on to another thread or directly address this OP. Thank you for your understanding
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FYI for the OP: Clemsonās bridge isnt a separate application process - its an acceptance option on the regular application. Students check all options that they would accept: traditional fall start, summer start, and bridge.
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Thank you all! Does anyone know any northern schools i should consider? I have RIT right now.
I donāt really want to transfer as I think it is better to stay in one place and build up.
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Define Northern - again. It depends on what you seek in a school environmentally but hereās some (non religious) - and I took Northern to mean NE
CT
U Hartford
ME
U Maine
MA
Umass Lowell
Wentworth
Western New England
NH
UNH
NJ
TCNJ
NY
Buffalo
Clarkson
Manhattan
PA
Drexel
Temple
RI
URI
VM
UVM
Iād really look at WVU given your auto interests. They have both Formula SAE and they are one of 15 ecoCAR schools. Itās a well known school in the industry.
If you are looking to go further West both Western Michigan and Michigan State would be solid options, in addition to Kettering mentioned by several of us previously (more specialized).
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