How come its so easy to get into some top ranking engg. colleges??

[sakky]

<p>

Yea, but if you can design a fast computer algorithm, wouldn’t creating a GUI interface be pretty much of a joke?

</p>

<p>You’d think so, right? But not really. In fact, not at all. For several reasons.</p>

<h1>1 - You have to be familiar with the particular development environment that the firm is using. Just to take one, let’s say that the prospective employer is using Ruby on Rails. Now, you can be the greatest algorithm coder in C in the world, but if you’ve never actually used RoR, you’re probably not going to be hired. Now, granted, it probably wouldn’t take you much time to * learn * RoR. But employers don’t really care about that. Whether we like it or not, CS employers want to hire people who can hit the ground running. This is incidentally why a lot of otherwise good CS grads don’t get hired, because the specific skills they learned in school are often times not the most useful and practical ones.</h1>

<h1>2 - Design is a skill unto itself. Just because you’re a great technical engineer doesn’t mean that you know how to design well. Look at the history of Apple. Was the Macintosh the technically best computer in the world? Of course not - IBM had been building mainframes for decades before that. What made Mac successful was that it was * well designed . Apple didn’t have the most technically savvy computer engineers in the world (as most of them were probably working at IBM). What Apple had were engineers who knew how to * design well. Similarly with the Ipod - the Ipod was not the most technically advanced MP3 player in the world, nor was it the first. MP3 players had existed for years before the Ipod came out. What the Ipod offered was top-notch design. The Ipod defeated all of the other MP3 players because it was designed to look cool and was designed to be easy to use in the way that the other players were not.</h1>

<p>Speaking to the specific example, good algorithm design basically requires deep mathematical insight and savvy. But good design work requires an intuitive understanding of what customers will like. Those are 2 entirely different skills. Other companies, like Apple, seem to have a knack of figuring out what customers really want. Other companies (i.e. all of the other MP3 player manufacturers) do not have this knack. </p>

<p>

To an extent. I believe having both aspects are important to a strong program. It doesn’t have to be one or the other.

</p>

<p>No doubt, and I never said that it did. But that’s not the point. Sure, if you can have both, it’s great to have both. But at the end of the day, as a student, you care about a school that is going to help you get the job that you actually want to get. Most engineering students have no intention of becoming researchers. </p>

<p>

Florida does very well with recruiting and that’s all that really matters, to me at least.

</p>

<p>Exactly. So you agree with me that what really matters to you as a student is getting the job that you want. Hence, you cannot conclude that just because Yale may not offer extensive engineering research opportunities, that it is not a good school. If the Yale engineering students are getting the jobs they want, then that should be the end of the story. </p>

<p>

You do, but I think there are plenty of MIT professors who care about the education they give to their students. I have a friend from hs who is at MIT and he feels the professors put a lot of effort in course materials and the way they present the material to the class. It all comes down to the professor’s willingness to teach, regardless of the attitudes of the larger university.

</p>

<p>Nobody has ever argued that there are some MIT profs who do care about teaching. Of course there are. But the point is, many other MIT profs do not care, and just want to spend their time on research. If you’re fighting for tenure, such an attitude is perfectly understandable (albeit sad), because research will get you tenure, but good teaching will not. </p>

<p>

But regardless, most of the professors I’ve had have degrees from the superelites. Now of course that automatically doesn’t make them great research professors, but I know I am getting a great education.

</p>

<p>Well, I don’t know, are you? It seems that you are judging an education based on whether it can get you a job. Well, if that is your metric, I highly doubt that Yalies are complaining. </p>

<p>

But sakky, didn’t you say that engineering jobs are mostly just production-level? Engineers from a no-name university (I don’t like that terminology, but w/e), although are not as great as well-known engineering schools, should be able to handle such a job. Or are you saying that they are so bad that they can’t even do this regular, common engineering work? I think you may be pushing it a bit there

</p>

<p>What I am saying is, if the employer has the choice, why would an employer take the chance of hiring somebody who comes from a school that is known to be mediocre, if you can hire somebody else? </p>

<p>Surely you know how the world works - that one bad apple can ruin the perception of the entire bunch. For example, let’s say that a new manager hires somebody from school X, and that guy turns out to be bad. You know what’s going to happen - that manager is not going to want to hire anybody from that school again. Not only that, but that manager is going to talk to his friends (i.e. his network) about his bad experience and as a result others are not going to want to hire graduates from that school either. Even if it was bad luck, the fact remains that that guy made the whole school look bad to the manager and his whole network. Fair or not fair, that’s how the world works.</p>

<p>That’s why it’s better to have no reputation at all than to have a bad reputation. Yes, most jobs are relatively easy such that even a mediocre grad will probably not be found out. But sometimes they do get found out, and when they do, they make their whole school look bad. Fair or not fair, that’s how it is.</p>

[sakky]

<p>

are you surprised? sakky is an elitist MIT/stanford/berkeley graduate(don’t know or care where he graduated from) who is relentless in his pursuit to convince the world that ONLY students from the aforementioned schools(the ‘smartest’,‘most brilliant’ kids in the country) can rule the world, the rest of us are mere mortals…

</p>

<p>As GatorEng23 said, if you don’t like my posts, don’t read them. Nobody has a gun to your head.</p>

<p>Secondly, when have I ever said that only the smartest kids can rule the world? Point me to the quote where I specifically said that? Oh, can’t do it, can you? That’s what I thought.</p>

[racnna]

<p><a href=“http://youtube.com/watch?v=dVhDL9uaf1o[/url]”>http://youtube.com/watch?v=dVhDL9uaf1o&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

[Oiram]

<p>Sakky, racnna didn’t state whether he/she didn’t like you’re post or not. So, don’t put words in the user message. The user expresses an opinion, which can be inferred from variety of your post. In your post you constantly used NO NAME SCHOOL, which may be taken for as a form of elitism…</p>

[GatorEng23]

<p>

You’d think so, right? But not really. In fact, not at all. For several reasons.</p>

<h1>1 - You have to be familiar with the particular development environment that the firm is using. Just to take one, let’s say that the prospective employer is using Ruby on Rails. Now, you can be the greatest algorithm coder in C in the world, but if you’ve never actually used RoR, you’re probably not going to be hired. Now, granted, it probably wouldn’t take you much time to learn RoR. But employers don’t really care about that. Whether we like it or not, CS employers want to hire people who can hit the ground running. This is incidentally why a lot of otherwise good CS grads don’t get hired, because the specific skills they learned in school are often times not the most useful and practical ones.

</h1>

<p>Well, that’s why it’s nice to have at least one research experience and one internship/co-op experience. This is what employers have told me they like to see in applicants when I spoke with many in career fairs this past 2 years. You can’t convince me that employers don’t value research experience, I have been told otherwise right from the mouth of the source. </p>

<p>

#2 - Design is a skill unto itself. Just because you’re a great technical engineer doesn’t mean that you know how to design well. Look at the history of Apple. Was the Macintosh the technically best computer in the world? Of course not - IBM had been building mainframes for decades before that. What made Mac successful was that it was well designed . Apple didn’t have the most technically savvy computer engineers in the world (as most of them were probably working at IBM). What Apple had were engineers who knew how to design well. Similarly with the Ipod - the Ipod was not the most technically advanced MP3 player in the world, nor was it the first. MP3 players had existed for years before the Ipod came out. What the Ipod offered was top-notch design. The Ipod defeated all of the other MP3 players because it was designed to look cool and was designed to be easy to use in the way that the other players were not.

</p>

<p>Well, I’m not sure that a university could do anything about this. As you said, design is an intuitive skill, an art almost. That’s something you’re just born with imo, one can’t educate you to do those things.</p>

<p>

No doubt, and I never said that it did. But that’s not the point. Sure, if you can have both, it’s great to have both. But at the end of the day, as a student, you care about a school that is going to help you get the job that you actually want to get. Most engineering students have no intention of becoming researchers.

</p>

<p>Yes, but you also have to keep in mind the minority of students who want to go into research. They shouldn’t be left short changed. </p>

<p>

Exactly. So you agree with me that what really matters to you as a student is getting the job that you want. Hence, you cannot conclude that just because Yale may not offer extensive engineering research opportunities, that it is not a good school. If the Yale engineering students are getting the jobs they want, then that should be the end of the story.

</p>

<p>1.) When did I say Yale is not a good engineering school? Don’t confuse me with racnna.
2.) It wasn’t me complaining about Yale’s research opportunities, it was an actual Yale engineering student! I could care less about Yale’s opportunities, I don’t go there. I was just telling you what she told me, so don’t kill the messenger.
3.) I believe I have conceded that Yale students do well with employment, I just don’t believe they are significantly better than schools ranked around it in terms of their engineering strength minus recruiting success. That doesn’t mean I’m saying they’re bad. </p>

<p>

Nobody has ever argued that there are some MIT profs who do care about teaching. Of course there are. But the point is, many other MIT profs do not care, and just want to spend their time on research. If you’re fighting for tenure, such an attitude is perfectly understandable (albeit sad), because research will get you tenure, but good teaching will not.

</p>

<p>Agreed and it isn’t just a MSBC thing. ALL engineering professors at research universities face the same problems.</p>

<p>

Well, I don’t know, are you? It seems that you are judging an education based on whether it can get you a job. Well, if that is your metric, I highly doubt that Yalies are complaining.

</p>

<p>Yes, I am (although you probably don’t think so). Florida’s recruiting success is a product of the structure of the program that is designed to be compatible with what employers want. I’m not going to be hired because Florida won football and basketball championships in the same year, it seems you’re suggesting that education strength and recruiting success are independent of each other, specifically at Florida. </p>

<p>

What I am saying is, if the employer has the choice, why would an employer take the chance of hiring somebody who comes from a school that is known to be mediocre, if you can hire somebody else?</p>

<p>Surely you know how the world works - that one bad apple can ruin the perception of the entire bunch. For example, let’s say that a new manager hires somebody from school X, and that guy turns out to be bad. You know what’s going to happen - that manager is not going to want to hire anybody from that school again. Not only that, but that manager is going to talk to his friends (i.e. his network) about his bad experience and as a result others are not going to want to hire graduates from that school either. Even if it was bad luck, the fact remains that that guy made the whole school look bad to the manager and his whole network. Fair or not fair, that’s how the world works.</p>

<p>That’s why it’s better to have no reputation at all than to have a bad reputation. Yes, most jobs are relatively easy such that even a mediocre grad will probably not be found out. But sometimes they do get found out, and when they do, they make their whole school look bad. Fair or not fair, that’s how it is.

</p>

<p>I highly doubt the plausibility of your hypothetical.</p>

[sakky]

<p>

Sakky, racnna didn’t state whether he/she didn’t like you’re post or not. So, don’t put words in the user message.

</p>

<p>Oh, but he’s allowed to flame me, and you don’t say anything? How convenient of you. </p>

<p>

The user expresses an opinion, which can be inferred from variety of your post. In your post you constantly used NO NAME SCHOOL, which may be taken for as a form of elitism…

</p>

<p>Uh, isn’t this * whole thread * basically about elitism? After all, the OP asked why is it so easy to get into top-ranked engineering schools. To answer that question, we * inevitably* have to talk about top-ranked schools. Why care about getting into top-ranked schools if you don’t have some level of elitism in you? Why not just go to the average school?</p>

<p>If you don’t like the thread, take it up with the OP. I didn’t start this thread. </p>

<p>From what I can tell, there is a strong anti-Yale sentiment within this thread. Raccna himself stated that Yale “sucks horribly” (see post #115) and used other such colorful phraseology. You said nothing to that. Yet I say ‘no-name school’, and all of sudden, you have your danders up. Isn’t that interesting? </p>

<p>

Well, that’s why it’s nice to have at least one research experience and one internship/co-op experience. This is what employers have told me they like to see in applicants when I spoke with many in career fairs this past 2 years. You can’t convince me that employers don’t value research experience, I have been told otherwise right from the mouth of the source.

</p>

<p>The question, again, is not whether they value research experience. Like I have always said, any experience is better than nothing at all.</p>

<p>The question is, do they value that research experience more so than other experience? The answer to that depends on what kind of job we’re talking about. If we’re talking about a research job, then of course they will. But the fact is, most engineering jobs out there are not research jobs. </p>

<p>

Well, I’m not sure that a university could do anything about this. As you said, design is an intuitive skill, an art almost. That’s something you’re just born with imo, one can’t educate you to do those things.

</p>

<p>I don’t know about that. Why even have design classes then, if you can’t teach design anyway? Why does, for example, MIT have the Media Lab that teaches a myriad of design courses and offers design-oriented degrees, if design can’t be taught? Why do design schools like RISD exist? Are you saying that all these organizations are engaged in a futile exercise? </p>

<p>

Yes, but you also have to keep in mind the minority of students who want to go into research. They shouldn’t be left short changed.

</p>

<p>The question then becomes which school is better for these students - Yale, or some of the other schools ranked lower than Yale. Yale may not have great research opportunities for engineering. But let’s face it - a lot of schools also don’t have great research opportunities either. </p>

<p>

1.) When did I say Yale is not a good engineering school? Don’t confuse me with racnna.
2.) It wasn’t me complaining about Yale’s research opportunities, it was an actual Yale engineering student! I could care less about Yale’s opportunities, I don’t go there. I was just telling you what she told me, so don’t kill the messenger.
3.) I believe I have conceded that Yale students do well with employment, I just don’t believe they are significantly better than schools ranked around it in terms of their engineering strength minus recruiting success. That doesn’t mean I’m saying they’re bad.

</p>

<p>So you must then agree with me that Yale, being ranked in the 40’s, is better than most other engineering programs out there (of which there are hundreds). </p>

<p>

Yes, I am (although you probably don’t think so). Florida’s recruiting success is a product of the structure of the program that is designed to be compatible with what employers want. I’m not going to be hired because Florida won football and basketball championships in the same year, it seems you’re suggesting that education strength and recruiting success are independent of each other, specifically at Florida.

</p>

<p>I don’t think I have ever suggested that educational strength and recruiting success are independent of each other. </p>

<p>In fact, what you have stated supports what I have stated - which is that Yale (which is higher ranked for engineering than most engineering schools out there) must enjoy relatively strong engineering recruiting. </p>

<p>

I highly doubt the plausibility of your hypothetical.

</p>

<p>Oh, you better believe that it happens. Back home (which shall remain unnamed), there is a public college that has a reputation that is mediocre at best. I know why too - there are people who I remember who barely graduated from high school who managed to graduate from this college. Trust me, I have heard * numerous * disparaging remarks from local employers regarding this school. In fact, one remarkable tidbit I heard is that one of the local business tycoons, who had * himself * studied at that school (but later transferred elsewhere), once remarked that he prefers not to hire graduates from his own alma mater (if given the choice of hiring from some other school) simply because he knows all about the work ethic of the graduates of that school.</p>

[Oiram]

<p>

"Sakky, racnna didn’t state whether he/she didn’t like you’re post or not. So, don’t put words in the user message.
Oh, but he’s allowed to flame me, and you don’t say anything? How convenient of you.

</p>

<p>What is “flame”? </p>

<p>

Uh, isn’t this whole thread basically about elitism? After all, the OP asked why is it so easy to get into top-ranked engineering schools. To answer that question, we inevitably have to talk about top-ranked schools. Why care about getting into top-ranked schools if you don’t have some level of elitism in you? Why not just go to the average school?

</p>

<p>I give you this agrument…</p>

<p>

If you don’t like the thread, take it up with the OP. I didn’t start this thread."

</p>

<p>I didn’t say I didn’t like the thread or I like the thread. But, yes you, Sakky didnt start this thread. This point is irrelevant </p>

<p>

“From what I can tell, there is a strong anti-Yale sentiment within this thread. Raccna himself stated that Yale “sucks horribly” (see post #115) and used other such colorful phraseology. You said nothing to that. Yet I say ‘no-name school’, and all of sudden, you have your danders up. Isn’t that interesting?”

</p>

<p>No, when I made my statement about the usage of “no-name school” becasue the phrase is incorrect. You have used this statement in a myrid of post on CC. Not just only in this thread… Also, stop trying to change the subject of what I was adressing. What do the expresion of “Yale sucks” have to do with NO NAME SCHOOL…</p>

[waldo_pepper]

<p>Sakky, you’ve spent like 5 pages arguing that a Yale engineer has better opportunities than someone who went to a school that’s even worse in engineering. We all know this; it’s transparently obvious, and frankly, not something that needs to be discussed.</p>

<p>The thread was interesting when people were actually discussing the educational atmosphere of the big publics that are so well known for engineering, vs. some of the more generally famous privates. Can we please go back to that topic?</p>

[hinmanCEO]

<p>i got into cornell with a 1380/1600 sat score and a 3.9 and 4.71 gpa</p>

<p>but i hear cornell is the easiest ivy to get into and the hardest to get out of. </p>

<p>getting in an awesome school is cool, but graduating is more satisfying.</p>

<p>im at UMCP now. i love it. i still think about “what if…” from time to time though :p</p>

[westsidewolf1989]

<p>hinmanceo i’ve also heard that about cornell what exactly makes it so hard to get out or do u not kno since u decided to go to maryland</p>

[sakky]

<p>

What is “flame”?

</p>

<p>Are you asking for a definition of ‘flame’, or one of racnna’s examples of flaming? </p>

<p>

I didn’t say I didn’t like the thread or I like the thread. But, yes you, Sakky didnt start this thread. This point is irrelevant

</p>

<p>It’s 100% completely relevant. The OP is the one who wanted to talk about “top” schools. So if you want to accuse anybody of elitism, you should accuse the OP. </p>

<p>

No, when I made my statement about the usage of “no-name school” becasue the phrase is incorrect. You have used this statement in a myrid of post on CC. Not just only in this thread

</p>

<p>And I’m going to continue to use the term. Why? Because I have freedom of speech. </p>

<p>

… Also, stop trying to change the subject of what I was adressing. What do the expresion of “Yale sucks” have to do with NO NAME SCHOOL…

</p>

<p>You’re the one who seems to be so sensitive about the insulting of schools. I don’t mean any disrespect of schools when I call them “no-name” schools, rather I am simply pointing out that some schools do not have an established prestigious brand name. On the other hand, if you want to say that “Yale sucks horribly”, I would say that that is nothing more than an insult. </p>

<p>

Sakky, you’ve spent like 5 pages arguing that a Yale engineer has better opportunities than someone who went to a school that’s even worse in engineering. We all know this; it’s transparently obvious, and frankly, not something that needs to be discussed.

</p>

<p>If it’s really so transparently obvious, then why did I have to “spend like 5 pages” to argue about it. I’m not arguing with myself here, you know. My posts are always responses to other people. Apparently there were indeed people who did not find this point to be transparently obvious, otherwise they wouldn’t have argued the point. Why don’t you take it up with them and tell them how transparently obvious it is?</p>

[Oiram]

<p>Nevermind, I just goolged what is flame; but I didn’t see the person post. So I don’t know if the person did or didn’t flame Sakky. </p>

<p>To say “Yale sucks horribly” is also someone choice of words and their expression; it is exactly what you stated:

And [they are] going to continue to use the [expression]. Why? Because [they] have freedom of speech.

</p>