My S27 will apply to schools as an engineering major (probably but not definitely mechanical), and we have been touring engineering departments. Both BU & Northeastern have good scholarships earmarked for local students (which he is). He likes both schools, but his high school will only nominate him for one of those big scholarships; that means he needs to figure out which he prefers by the fall. He has the stats to be competitive, but doesn’t have any real engineering or robotics experience yet, so he doesn’t have a niche interest that his college needs to support. We have toured the engineering departments at both places, but frankly aren’t sure how to evaluate what we’re looking at or what questions we should be asking. He thinks he likes both. Obviously the co-op program at Northeastern is a significant difference (although he could still apply for summer internships as a BU student).
Anyone have any insight into how these 2 engineering programs differ? Pedagogical approach, resources, vibe, student body, extracurricular opportunities, research opportunities, job placement, anything else that matters. I’ve read everything on their websites. I’d love to hear any views from engineers, parents of engineering majors, & anyone who has compared these 2 schools directly.
Have him talk to students at each - both will have student ambassadors.
Look at career outcomes.
Obviously, at BU you are more likely to be on campus a contiguous four years - how does the socialization part work there with NU kids coming and going, etc.
Is there an opportunity to double major (not easy with engineering) or minor. Does either make it easier?
Same with abroad - not easy with engineering. Is he interested - does it matter?
What sub areas of MechE does each have?
BU is ABET accredited in four areas - BIomedical, Computer, Electrical and Mechanical
NU is ABET accredited in more - Bio, Chem, Civil, Computer, Electrical, Environmental, Industrial and Mechanical.
If he’s not sold on Mechanical, might one of the additional areas NU has that BU doesn’t interest him? Might be another consideration.
Both universities offer large, robust Colleges of Engineering with Northeastern Engineering being about twice as large as BU’s (3800 students vs 1900). Mechanical Engineering is NU’s Engineering College’s largest engineering department although that department is combined with Industrial Engineering. Both bring ample resources, faculty, course selection.
Northeastern’s College of Engineering is more than a century old and throughout that history has built it as a co-op program, valuing real world experience for its engineers. BU’s program dates back 60-70 years to when they acquired the New England Aircraft School. Their website emphasizes an approach which they call Societal Engineering, which involves partnering with other departments in the university. ( Academics | College of Engineering ) Both seem to have their own distinct approach to training their engineers. I would look into this more closely, including visiting and asking questions to see which is a better fit for your son.
No insight into BU, but our daughter graduated last year from Northeastern as an Electrical Engineer. She had a great experience at Northeastern, 2 great co-ops and a full time job upon graduation with her second co-op.
I can’t speak specifically to these two schools but in the current job market I would give Northeastern a very strong look. Co-op programs do give a leg up in finding full time work.
My daughter was a co-op engineering student at another school and did a three term co-op which was an entire year with one company (one summer session, one Fall semester and one Spring), plus three summer internships, and one year of working at a lab on campus related to her major senior year. She had her co-op offer winter of freshman year and her company told her before her first semester junior year that they were going to extend her a full time offer on graduation. This was also during covid when companies were cancelling internships right and left.
And to clarify, you are still only paying for 8 semesters of college. And at Northeastern, where nearly everyone co-ops, the cohort will be coming and going with your child so the socialization piece is pretty seamless.
The job experience that comes with co-oping will be a big leg up for post graduation employment.
Here’s BU career outcomes. They have a high knowledge rate - so they’re capturing 4 of 5 kids. Lots going to grad school. Surprised the salaries are as low as they are given their location - but they’ve done well success wise. They don’t boil into the major level and perhaps that’s why the salaries are a bit lower - for example, if they have a big bio program, that would lower salaries.
NU doesn’t show a knowledge rate so you don’t know what % they are reporting on - i.e. do they truly know where kids are ending up en masse. Interesting, whereas BU has a third going to grad school, NU only has 1 of less than 5 - so that might be an insight worth investigating. Are NU kids just more work focused or are BU kids not finding jobs so then sliding into grad school? Other students will tell you.
NU doesn’t give average salaries but they look similar to BU. They band them with $70-79 the most common and then $80-89. Again, look a bit low to me but…..
Their database is interactive so you can play with it.
One thing to consider is what majors are available and how often they’re taken by students. Looks like BU doesn’t have some of the big, traditional majors like CivE or ChemE. They do have a lot of students that do biomedical and computer engineering.
Northeastern has more overall engineering students and offers a lot of the traditional engineering majors. If your son is undecided, Northeastern probably provides more overall engineering options.
Sorry, missed this. I would take this into consideration if he’s not 100% on ME.
BU is research based IE more students going into graduate school and lower yearly pay per job. vs the coop based NE. But it’s not just any coop school. It’s probably one of the best.
This is a big difference to me. The more chances to work in the industry the better chances to get a job after graduation in this current economy as @momofboiler1 said.
Roughly similar overall content for a given major (although some engineering majors have a larger major core relative to in-major electives than others), but there can be differences in:
Curricular organization (e.g. how early is design course work introduced).
Where an engineering major has in-major electives, which subareas are offered.
General education requirements.
However, the most obvious difference between NEU and BU is the curriculum designed around co-ops at NEU.
He does not need to have a well defined niche interest first. My D26 still does not know if she wants to do engineering or biology, but she talked to engineering clubs at every school she visited. She just went to the clubs listing and chose a few clubs that interested her, and sent email to the contact person on each club’s web site. In almost every case they were very responsive, and were happy to spend a lot of time with her talking about what it’s like to be a student there, etc. When she talked to students directly, she heard things that she didn’t get on official visits.
My DD was in the same boat. Ended up double majoring. It was possible at her college. Perhaps it’s possible at one of these colleges. As an FYI, you are not required to co-op at Northeastern.
He will reach out to the student leaders of engineering clubs at both schools & ask to hear more about their experiences. He’s already talked to a few older friends at both places; both the BU & Northeastern engineers he’s spoken to seem satisfied with their engineering education overall, which is great but doesn’t help him choose. He will also spend some time this summer looking more closely at which engineering majors NEU has that BU doesn’t, so he better understands what paths he might be closing at BU.
Right now he’s leaning BU, mostly because the Northeastern campus seems so, so crowded (he’s there a lot for one of his extracurriculars). He works with several NEU grads who talk a lot about not being able to find a seat at the library or the dining hall, not being able to access the gym, etc. I get the frustration there, but I’m not sure that’s a good enough reason to pass up NEU’s co-op programs & extensive engineering majors. We’ll do some more research & see where he lands at the end of the summer.
I agree that the crowds are not a good basis on which to make a decision. It’s hard for high school students to see that college is not a destination; rather, it is some place that they are passing through with the goal of getting an education which will serve them well in life. It’s the rest of their lives that’s the destination, not college. It’s hard for a teenager to see that.
BU has only 5 engineering majors. On the other hand, they seem to make a myriad of combination majors, concentrations, minors, and double majors which provide interesting options. Both universities have mechanical, which is good. Ultimately I think that the most meaningful difference between the two is their approach to engineering education. Bu is quite clear in saying that they put a lot of thought into “reinventing engineering education”. What does that mean? I can read the website, but I’d want to no more. Have they really come up with something special? Or is it old wine in new bottles. Meanwhile we know what Northeastern does and they’ve been doing it for a long time. My neighbor’s son is an engineer who got his first job off his co-op. Comparing those two approaches is the basis on which I’d want to make that decision.
If time allows, here’s something you might try. Sometimes we can get more perspective from a distance. So, it might be worth a tour of a couple of other engineering colleges who’ve tried to do the same thing as these two to gain some perspective and to see if there’s something they’re missing. Fortunately you have two of the best in the area. Like BU, Olin College of Engineering also tried to “reinvent engineering education”. While there are many differences between them and BU, I’d find it interesting to see how they conceptually compare and what you might learn by looking at things from that angle. With regard to Northeastern, it might be interesting to visit another engineering co-or college like WPI for the same kind of conceptual comparison which might shine some light on what Northeastern is doing well or what they’re missing. . . Just a thought.
I like @Bill_Marsh 's idea about touring a couple of other engineering schools in your area. Maybe Tufts and Olin? As neither is a frontrunner for your DS, it’s an opportunity to listen critically and ask questions. (Guessing that you’re st a point in the process where this may elicit a groan, but…)
Figuring out what turns you off and why can sometimes produce those aha moments as much as hearing about what excites you.
I don’t totally agree with viewing college as “not a destination”. Not a final destination, sure, but these are 4 years of your life. If every day feels like a little bit of a battle because of crowds and it bothers you, that can wear you down. So while it shouldn’t be THE decider, it’s fair to consider how he feels about the overall environment. There are folks who move to NYC and hate everything about it - the noise, the cost, the crowds. And there are others who immediately feel they’ve found home. This is an individual choice.
Thank you, that’s a great suggestion. We have already visited WPI; on that tour, even I as an engineering novice could see how WPI was different from the other engineering programs we had seen (extensive hands-on, project-based learning & assessments baked into most classes beginning in year 1, the deliberate progression of Great Problems Seminar to IQP to MQP). I could clearly see how my kid would be taught there & how the actual education was distinctive. I LOVED WPI, but they are not as generous with merit as some of their peers & we might not be able to afford it. He’ll apply, though.
The Northeastern engineering visit focused heavily on co-op experiences, & actual courses were not discussed much; doesn’t mean the instruction isn’t good, but Northeastern positioned the co-op learning as the real differentiator (which, to be fair, it probably is). One of my son’s acquaintances at NEU feels that he didn’t get very much makerspace/lab access until he started his capstone, but he still thinks he got a good engineering education overall.
The BU engineering tour was also pedagogically clear–I don’t know if they’re “reinventing engineering education,” but I could see how the first-year classes help students uncover areas of interest & build lab/design skills, & the courses had a hands-on/makerspace focus that wasn’t as visible at NEU. Because NEU didn’t talk about coursework that much, it’s hard to compare directly.
Visiting Olin & Tufts is a good idea. We probably won’t, though, because neither school is affordable for us (their NPCs return a yearly cost that is $20-30k more than other area meets-full-need engineering schools). Olin has reduced its scholarship-for-all to $10k, and Tufts doesn’t give merit scholarships except for ROTC, which he won’t do. I don’t want him to fall in love with schools he definitely can’t have, and he’d see those visits as a waste of time since he’s not applying. But I see how those tours could be helpful info-gathering; I’ll suggest it to him. We will visit UMass Amherst soon, so he’ll have that as another point of comparison.
I do think the 4 years of college matter for themselves, not just as preparation for their next destination. But also I think young people are more likely to engage & take full advantage of opportunities when they feel comfortable in the environment; if my kid is overwhelmed by the crowds at NEU & can’t find his space, he might not be as ready for his post-college destination. I don’t mind if he decides to prioritize BU over Northeastern or vice versa (he’d be lucky to get a scholarship to either); I just want to make sure his choice is as informed as it can be. Thanks for all the suggestions.
Just adding that while many students do benefit from a co-op program, it is not for everyone. Some students do not do as well with taking semesters off campus to work, having friends come and go different semesters for co-ops, etc. When considering Northeastern your student should research, consider, and evaluate if the co-op model is a good fit.
