WPI gives credits for PLTW classes
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Thanks…corrected!
I think WPI, Stevens, RPI, and Rose-Hulman are all about the same level of likelihood and I’d say they are all likely for admittance, the real question is more about how much merit aid they give you (which might make one more likely for him to attend than another).
Similarly, I think Case and Lehigh are about the same likelihood of admittance, and I’d guess both are in the toss up category (provided you do at least virtual tours and info sessions at CWRU, as they definitely track demonstrated interest).
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Here are the CSUs with electrical engineering, based on APS .
- San Luis Obispo (impacted for all majors)
- Pomona (impacted for electrical engineering major)
- Bakersfield
- Chico
- Fresno
- Fullerton (impacted for all majors)
- Long Beach (impacted for all majors)
- Los Angeles
- Northridge
- Sacramento
- San Marcos (impacted for electrical engineering major)
- San Diego (impacted for all majors)
- San Francisco
- San Jose (impacted for all majors)
- Sonoma
Impaction is from https://www.calstate.edu/attend/degrees-certificates-credentials/Pages/impacted-degrees.aspx . Where the campus or major is impacted, admission thresholds are determined competitively. Where neither the campus nor major is impacted, applicants meeting the CSU minimum should be admitted. Note that some campuses not listed as impacted above may be impacted for other majors.
Here is a list of WUE schools with electrical engineering bachelor’s programs, although there seem to be some bugs in the search tool, since some community colleges with only associates programs show up in the list: https://www.wiche.edu/tuition-savings/wue/wue-savings-finder/?degreetypes=Bachelor’s&majors=Electrical+and+Computer+Engineering%2CElectrical+and+Electronics+Engineering
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Thank you for this, super helpful! My son likes to see all the options and then narrow them down himself, so this is perfect.
I would add Auburn to your list. Yes, it’s an SEC school but it feels much smaller of a community. Their Engineering program is good and the environment within the actual School of Engineering seemed very collaborative.
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No need to double up on any core courses. I was just saying generally PLTW courses are seen as electives in the admissions process. If a student is interested and has room to do those classes in addition to the five core courses each year, they can/should absolutely take them.
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I feel like we have a good handle on the CA schools, but don’t really have a good approach to look at OOS schools. So I sat down with S27 today and talked about what he is looking for in a college.
Size: Medium to Large-ish. Definitely something larger than his high school (700+)
Location(s): Pacific Coast, Rocky Mountain, Midwestern
Suburban preferred, with access to a city
Academics: Balance between academics and social side
Would like smaller classes, discussion-oriented, accessible teachers
Also looking for: internships/work experience, freedom in choosing courses, applying learning to real world problems, hands-on learning
Diversity: Ideally diverse in both gender and race
Student Life: Residential, with good food, sense of community, lots of clubs especially if some are outdoors/camping/backpacking, likes the idea of intramural sports
Student Body: adventurous, caring/compassionate, friendly, social, interested in learning for learning’s sake
(Side Note: We used a free PDF from Schoolbuff.com to guide our discussion, super helpful!)
Any other schools he should consider adding to the list?
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I realized that we took off a couple of the UCs too early, those would probably be better fits for him than some of the non-impacted CSUs that are more commuter type schools. Here’s the updated list with some of the recommendations and corrections on chances:
Assured: UC Merced (statewide guarantee for top 9%)
Extremely Likely: UC Riverside, Cal Poly Pomona (local area), University of Alabama (will probably remove this one)
Likely: UC Santa Cruz, Rose-Hulman, RPI, Colorado School of Mines, University of San Diego, WPI, Pitt (? Not sure if I’m categorizing this one correctly)
Toss-up: SJSU (depending on impaction index), Santa Clara, Bucknell, Lafayette, Stevens, LMU, University of Minnesota Twin Cities, Virginia Tech, Case Western, Lehigh
Lower Probability: UC Davis, UC Irvine, Purdue, Cal Poly SLO
Low Probability: UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara, UCLA, UC Berkeley, Harvey Mudd, USC, Georgia Tech, UW Seattle
I will also have him look into the WUE schools @AustenNut recommended. An initial pass through Claude shows that those are all under Extremely Likely? After that we should probably start distilling the list down, unless there are other schools that strongly fit what he is looking for.
Has he considered Oregon State U? I feel like it checks off a lot of the boxes but I’m not sure about merit/cost there.
Just a note that Bucknell is in the middle of nowhere and quite small, preppy and very Greek life dominated. When we toured, we were told it was also difficult to take some engineering classes outside your major because they were reserved for students only in that major. Not sure if that is the still the case.
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I mentioned University of New Mexico previously on this thread. Is that a possible consideration?
@WayOutWestMom can elaborate on the excellent engineering opportunities, as well as the outdoor year round recreation things there. And I believe this will come in at your budget…if this student is eligible for the Amigo Scholarship.
Because the Cal Poly Pomona local area points are not published, and the EE threshold for admission last year was high, it may be risky to assume that it is “extremely likely”.
For UC Merced, check on whether the EE major is seeking ABET accreditation. ABET accreditation would not be completed before the first students have graduated (the program is new as of fall 2023, so probably no earlier than spring 2027), but would be retroactive to those students.
University of Alabama and Bucknell undergraduates are over 70% the same race group (White). Lafayette and Colorado School of Mines undergraduates are over 65% the same race group (White). Would those meet the diversity preference?
For gender, small engineering focused schools tend to be skewed (male-heavy), as are engineering majors at larger schools.
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My daughter attended a small(er) engineering school and yes, more males. Hers had a lot of international students so not heavily white, but that didn’t mean it was a big melting pot. Many of the Asian students socialized together because English wasn’t their first language and they felt more comfortable with others who spoke their language. When we were touring the school, we were sitting in the lobby of one of the classroom buildings and two students were speaking in Taiwanese. Then a few more joined them, then a few more until there were about 15 students who all left together for lunch. It was interesting watching the group form and that they’d all just been in classes taught in English and were happy to be back with their friends, relaxing, speaking their language.
I asked my D if she socialized with the Chinese students (she’s Chinese). She said no as the language barrier was hard to overcome in a social situation (she did work on projects with int’l students).
The school was about 2/3 male but that didn’t bother her (of course she was in the sought after minority). All students who wanted partners seemed to find them.
In the olden days when Colorado School of Mines was 90% male, there were parties where they invited women from nearby schools. Three of my sorority sisters from CU married guys from Mines.
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Thanks everyone for the feedback so far, and the helpful info re: diversity etc. He has removed the non-diverse schools from his list, decided Rose-Hulman is too small for him, and removed the Southern schools based on his location preferences. He still needs to consider U of New Mexico and WUE schools.
His current list:
Assured: UC Merced (statewide guarantee for top 9%)
Extremely Likely: UC Riverside, Cal Poly Pomona (local area)
Likely: UC Santa Cruz, RPI, University of San Diego, WPI, Pitt
Toss-up: SJSU (depending on impaction index), Santa Clara, Stevens, LMU, University of Minnesota Twin Cities, Virginia Tech, Case Western, Lehigh
Lower Probability: UC Davis, UC Irvine, Purdue, Cal Poly SLO, UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara
Low Probability: UCLA, UC Berkeley, Harvey Mudd, USC, UW Seattle
That’s still 27 schools 
although the UCs and CSUs won’t need separate applications each. (Just separate application fees. 
)
Unless there is a reason he likes Virginia Tech specifically, I would remove it from the list. It doesn’t add anything he doesn’t already have, cost isn’t going to be great for an OOS student, it’s fairly rural (Blacksburg and Roanoke are small cities, but very small) and it’s a huge PITA to get to if you have to fly. From CA you will either fly into a large airport a few hours a way and rent a car or you will need two flights to get to the small local airport. You have other schools on his list that will meet his needs as well or better.
That’s not to say that the Blue Ridge and Appalachians around VT aren’t beautiful - they are - and students are diverse and the engineering program is strong - also true. It just feels like if you are trying to slim your list down, this might not add anything you don’t already have.
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Also be aware that some of the schools on the list have secondary admission to major after starting as engineering undeclared, based on (or mostly based on) first year college record:
- Minnesota (3.2 automatic admission, EE not historically space limited: https://www.advising.cse.umn.edu/cgi-bin/courses/noauth/apply-major-statistics )
- Purdue (3.2 automatic admission: T2M - College of Engineering - Purdue University )
- Virginia Tech (3.0 automatic admission: Change of Major Policies and Deadlines | Engineering | Virginia Tech )
- Washington ( https://www.engr.washington.edu/current/placement/data )
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I mean, outcome wise these schools are by and large substitutional so Bama is your best value because it will be low 20s. But would your student be comfortable there.
My Bama grad works for an aero company in Irvine.
The others you mention won’t be close in price and that includes the UCs. Bucknell is far smaller.
From an outcome POV, I don’t see any above the rest and that includes Ga Tech, where they have a very high not employed rate (much higher than Bama) - but this student won’t get in there regardless.
I think your toss ups are likely reaches. Just my opinion.
I think there are other less expensive than these schools your student can get into as well - from a U Kansas to Miami Ohio and more
Good luck.
Thanks for your input. Yeah price wise Alabama works well because of the high merit scholarship. I don’t think he will be as comfortable there, based on the lack of diversity. When I sat down with him and discussed what he was looking for, diversity was one of the first things he mentioned.
It’s been helpful to see how the school name isn’t as important for engineering. My husband and I are both in healthcare, and it’s the same way (it matters some, but it’s not as important as we think as long as it’s accredited), but I’m not as familiar with the engineering industry.
For the toss-ups, were you referring to my initial list or this most recent one?
Define diversity - it doesn’t have the Asian and Hispanic population of California but there is diversity both in race and religion. But I made the comment based on your note about price because outcome wise it’s going to be similar.
If your budget goes higher, then of course, you have others on your list.
I’d also note your title says medium sized - and that’s not Bama but at that price more UAH and even Mississippi State - but again, there’s that word - diversity. Of course, that’s not your UCs either.
You have lots on your list. Have you looked at any WUE…for example UNR which is very diverse and will be low cost.
btw - at most, within engineering, you won’t find gender parity. You’ll find mostly males.
Good luck.
Seems that there is less of it (in terms of race/ethnicity) at universities in Alabama and Mississippi. SES diversity at the HWCUs in those states seems to skew high (about a third of undergraduates overall get Pell grants, although probably about half of newly graduated high school graduates would get Pell grants if they went to college).
| College | Percentage Largest Race/Ethnicity | Percentage Pell |
|---|---|---|
| University of Alabama | 71% | 19% |
| University of Alabama Huntsville | 67% | 25% |
| Alabama A&M University | 89% | 64% |
| University of Mississippi | 77% | 22% |
| Mississippi State University | 72% | 29% |
| UC Merced | 55% | 59% |
| UC Riverside | 40% | 47% |
| UC Santa Cruz | 31% | 32% |
| Cal Poly Pomona | 55% | 47% |
| San Jose State University | 38% | 37% |
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