<p>Last night I had a hankering for a fresh waffle with the ice cream my girlfriend bought, so I made a big batch of waffles and froze the rest. Now we’ve got waffles to eat with all of the ice cream. :)</p>
<p>Waffles and ice cream is pretty much the best invention ever.</p>
<p>On the topic of CS majoring and other non-shenanigans… In my experience as well as what I’ve learned from my father and my uncle is that there are actually not a lot of people who are good at software engineering. Infact, if you can do your job well and efficiently, there is nowhere in the software engineering field that you won’t be able to find a job. I suppose this can be said for a lot of majors, but because of the normal demand for SE’s, this is especially important I think in times of recession.</p>
<p>Besides, CS majoring is just a great field to major in because it’s one of those fields where anyone will say ‘Oh look, there’s someone who can think.’ But you’re in a sticky situation OP, you’ll have to give some details. Are you willing to stay in school longer? Are your parents going to support you financially if you can’t get a job in CE? How interested in CE are you really?</p>
<p>RacinReaver, that’s a great idea! I will have to get my kids to make some waffles. If they can’t find employment as civil engineers, they should get some training as waffle makers.</p>
<p>If you liked Waffles and Ice Cream you will love pancakes with sweet yogurt smothered on top!</p>
<p>…oops, just noticed this thread was fairly old.</p>
<p>anyway, someone feel free to correct me on this if I’m wrong–</p>
<p>Saying civil is dead is too simplistic a way of thinking. You say construction is halted substantially and hence civil is dead. What is overlooked is that infrastructure in general is in awful condition, and so eventually civil is going to really pick up. And only about a fourth of civil is tied to the construction industry anyway. (BLS predicts 24% growth in civil engr. positions from 2008 to 2018). So yes, civil right now is in a pretty sad position, but that is only right now.</p>
<p>This thread has really resonated with me. I’m a civil/environmental engr. major (at my school it’s the same dept.) but I’ve had numerous occasions where I considered switching to CS (not because of concern over job prospects, but rather because I just love programming.) Frankly, I’m still kind of torn between civil and CS.</p>
<p>This might be a dumb response but isn’t all engineering kind of related ?
for example I am a chem Eng and the people I have talked to said that a chem e can do a lot of the jobs a mech e / Bio Eng can do, maybe its the same thing for Civ engr ?</p>
<p>No, it’s not a dumb question. All fields are related. Reality does not exist in a vacuum (if you can follow what string theorists are saying). For example, one may use Darwin’s theories to explain why some engineers may be hired and others are not hired.</p>
<p>They are related, however, a ChemE cannot do a lot of the same jobs an a MechE, who in turn can’t do a lot of the same jobs as a EE. There is a little overlap, but not to the point where they are redundant fields.</p>
<p>Uclacee, how did you come up with 1/4 of civil engineers being tied to the construction industry?</p>
<p>boneh3ad : ofcourse ! other wise there wouldn’t be a Mech E major if chem e’s did all of their jobs 
.</p>
<p>
agreed. There’s legit reason for separating them. although some are more similar than others. I think you could kind of “sort” them into categories:</p>
<p>1: CS, EE, hardware engineering
2: civil, enviro, process
3: chemE, mechanical, materials, aerospace
4: bioengineering</p>
<p>but chemE and mechanical I could have put in “2” or “3”. This is just my general thinking. of course these are broad generalizations. Point is–there’s overlap, but it depends on between what and what you’re talking about.</p>
<p>
@ken-- You would know better than me. 1/4 is something I read online (don’t even remember where). In the future I should use more caution when bringing up possibly slanted figures.</p>
<p>and of course, it depends on what you would include under the nebulous header of “civil.”</p>
<p>I’m more curious than anything else. I can see how some traffic engineers and environmental engineers are not tied to the construction industry, but what percentage of practicing civil engineers do they constitute? </p>
<p>It’d be nice to see a breakdown of the percentages of civil engineers by specialty.</p>
<p>@uclacee</p>
<p>wouldn’t process be in the same group as chemE, MechE, materials, aerospace ?
and idk about other schools but i heard that you can take some bio (lower div)/bioengr(upper div) courses at my school as electives so would that also be in the “3” group.</p>
<p>
Yeah, why not? I just have a bias to associate things with civil.
When you’re talking about the fundamental sciences–chem, physics, and bio–bio is by far the least relevant to most engineering disciplines. But certainly, its uses fit in where needed. I once interned at a water reclamation plant–sewage treatment is actually largely biological. In the phase called secondary treatment, microbes are used to ingest undesired particles, and large structures (“blowers”) are needed just to supply the necessary oxygen to the bacteria because they’re “so weak.”</p>
<p>
I should have thought of this before, but such a chart is actually in existence! </p>
<p>[Civil</a> Engineers](<a href=“Civil Engineers”>Civil Engineers)</p>
<p>Eh, I take that back. The chart seems pretty incomplete.</p>
<p>I found a much more complete chart (also from BLS), but the URL isn’t specific to it. If you’re curious, PM me your email address and I can send it to you.</p>
<p>This same question has been bugging me. I switched from my Biology major to Civil Engineering and am worried about the job market. Should I just do Mechanical engineering? I was trying to decide between the two.</p>
<p>^
(1) how far are you up to?
(2) Do you like CIVIL ENGINEERING in the first place?</p>