DD at VT is having a good year. She isn’t really a party person, but she is maintaining a 3.7ish GPA and goes to Sunday brunch, Wednesday night dinners, Friday are a game night or hanging out, she has found a few weekends to go climbing with Venture Out or the climbing club, and she has recently found a friend with a car to go to the climbing gym in C-burg…there was an intense scavenger hunt this month that they completed, she does community service thru her LLC, and she has never, not once, called me in a panic or having a meltdown over the workload or a bad grade. HS was worse than this!
I think VT engineering (so far) seems very manageable and sane. Teachers are supportive, and there don’t seem to be “weed out” classes. One caveat, she started out in Calc 3, having been warned multiple times that it was NOT easier the second time, and probably the most time-consuming class in the entire engineering curriculum.
So I don’t think most engineers can party their way through 4 years like you might be able to get away with in other majors, but it definitely doesn’t have to be a misery.