Applying for M.S. in Nuclear Engineering

Brendank
Fri, 09 Nov 2007 11:22:10 +0000

I’m also studying Mechanical Engineering at a decently ranked university with a 3.86 GPA, graduating at the same time, taking the GRE at about the same time, and wanting to earn a M.S. Nuclear Engineering along the way to a PhD. However though, I’ve already had one year of work experience at a national laboratory.

In perspective, the schools so far that interest me are MIT, Purdue, University Michigan Ann Arbor, UC Berkley, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and Ohio State.

I think publications would certainly be a major plus but probably not as important as GPA and the personal statement. Taking the graduate courses probably wont effect the admissions chances very much. Last weekend, I meet with a professor at the MIT department of nuclear science and engineering and the impression that I got was that taking courses as an undergraduate that you would be retaking anyways as a graduate didn’t matter to them very much if at all; therefore, at the cost of several hundredths of a GPA, it’s probably not worth it. It would be more valuable taking courses that fill in gaps in the math and general science backgrounds such as additional courses in differential equations, electro-magnetism and energy science as well as quantum mechanics if you could get it in.