I was curious about how international universities decide their admissions. How do colleges such as:
Hong Kong University
Peking University
Tokyo University
University of Toronto
University of Waterloo
NYU Shanghai
Oxbridge
SUTD
ETH Zurich
(Intending to apply as an engineering major)
-Also, I picked these schools basically on a whim, but the countries’ language barrier won’t be an much of an issue.
Evaluate their international applicants? Based on how much they can pay? Their stats?
I’ve heard that Asian Universities aren’t as holistic as US colleges, and focus more on the aforementioned stats and ability to pay.
On the other hand, European Universities seem to have levels like A-levels and other programs that differ greatly from that of the US as well. Does having an IB Diploma make any difference to these foreign universities? How are students from America viewed in these countries?
Please excuse my ignorance! Considering all the domestic colleges is already so challenging, and international admissions makes things seem even more complicated…
American applicants are generally considered underprepared for European universities, but an IB Diploma would alleviate that concern. (E.g. calculus is a high school graduation requirement in many European countries and not taught at the university level at all.)
Universities in the UK will have program-specific admission procedures. They will tell you which subjects you must have taken as an A-level or equivalent (IB HL courses, for example) for admission to each specific program. The program you are applying to may also conduct admission exams or interviews. If you get an offer of admission, it will be “conditional” on a set of grades you must achieve. (e.g. an overall score of 38 on the IB Diploma, with at least 6 points for HL Math) If you don’t meet the conditions, your offer gets rescinded.
I largely agree with @b@r!um, but will gently say that it is a bit of an overstatement to say that calculus is not taught at the university level at all, esp in any subject area that uses mathmatically modeling (eg, everything from econ to physics and a bunch of stuff in between). It is true, though, that you would typically be expected to have IB or AP calc for entry into those courses.
^ Fair. What I really meant was that universities don’t teach calculus from scratch. They may do a quick review of beginning calculus, and will most certainly teach advanced calculus beyond what’s taught in high school (such as multi-variable calculus).
Honestly, you need to do more research yourself first and answer the questions: What are you goals, what are you aiming for, and why. All these schools have websites and the ones I’ve seen explain their admissions process and requirements.
Some of them have very limited English-language majors, if at all, so why do you think the language barrier won’t be much of an issue? Are you fluent in all of Chinese, Japanese, and German/French?
And where do you intend to work? What work permissions do you have? Many companies who hire engineers in the US want an ABET school (some of those are foreign, though).
BTW, many American colleges have study-abroad programs, even for engineers.
PurpleTitan brings up a good point about credentialing in general. Many countries require their engineers - or at least a significant subset of them - to be licensed. It can be very difficult or impossible to obtain such licenses with a foreign engineering degree.
Are you confident enough that you know which country you want to live in, which engineering field you may want to work in and what the requirements in that field are in order to make informed decisions about getting a foreign degree?
Example USA. Infrastructure projects need to be overseen by a civil engineer with a PE license. One pre-requisite for the PE license is an engineering degree from an ABET-accredited school. While entry-level civil engineering jobs don’t require PE licensing, you are severely limiting your career potential by getting a civil engineering degree from a non-ABET university. But that’s just civil engineering. Nobody will ask for a license to let an electrical engineer design a micro-processor, and American companies do employ many foreign-educated electrical engineers. So, it really depends.
As a rule of thumb, when in doubt, it’s usually best to pursue your education in the country you wish to work in afterwards.