<p>There’s a poster here named smithiegr who is an engineering major, she can answer most of these questions better than anyone, maybe you should send her a PM (or just wait for her response). </p>
<p>The only two I can really answer are: Yes! top graduate programs recognize and respect a Smith degree. In fact, I think the program has automatic acceptance agreements with some of the top engineering graduate schools (as in if you maintain good grades at Smith, you’re garaunteed acceptance to such and such graduate school) and grads from the engineering program have gone on to MIT, Johns Hopkins, Stanford, and lots of other great grad programs. </p>
<p>And 2, engineering majors are actually not allowed to be isolated. It’s the only major at Smith that requires its students to take classes in every liberal arts discipline, so even though you have a demanding engineering schedule, you have to take a set number of credits in the humanities, and other math and science classes too, so you’re mixed in with the other students a lot. Yes, you have to spend a lot of time in lab (or at least my friends who were engineers did!) but you’re no more isolated than an art major who has to spend a lot of time in studio, or a history major who’s often holed up in the library. </p>
<p>That’s all I really know about the program first hand. Except that Smith just built a huge new science facility specifically for engineering (it houses other science departments too, but Ford Motor company gave the money so that the women engineers from Smith would have the best facility to work in).</p>