Hello, I am interested in applying to engineering graduate schools. I am currently wrapping up my junior year and so far I have not done as much as I would like. I plan on applying the fall term after my senior year and hope that I can improve my admission chances during that time.
What I currently am:
4.0 CC graduate
3.4 Umich GPA
I have two national scholarships that I have been awarded and an award for the best mathematics student at my CC.
I have worked in a mathematics study lab, a student success center, a GED preparation service, and, this year, I have been working as a research assistant.
I am majoring in Mathematics and hope to strive for a good-decent engineering school, with my reach schools including Brown University and Dartmouth.
Any tips for preparing would be greatly appreciated!
Thank you for your time!
Have you discussed your goals with the faculty in your department? They are likely to be able to advise you about this.
I have a couple of comments:
[ol]
[]Why, if you are looking to study engineering in graduate school, are Brown and Dartmouth your “reach” schools?
[]In graduate admissions, the whole “match/reach” paradigm that is so popular on this site is a lot more nebulous. Admissions vary wildly by department and current funding level and from year to year in most cases.
[li]Do you have any idea what sort of research area you hope to enter? If not, you really need to think about that before diving into a graduate program, then select the best programs for you based on that.[/li][/ol]
I was hoping to go for a masters, and both Dartmouth and Brown have programs I am interested in. I expect I will have to pay out of pocket, so I am preparing for that. These schools have good recruitment from top companies, and that is why I aim for them.
Thank you for your post!
It just seems very odd because neither school is typically considered to be an engineering powerhouse in any way.
It sounds like you’re doing well so far, just focus on getting good GRE scores, strong letters of rec.
If you live in Michigan, you would save a ton of money staying at Michigan for graduate school and it’s a much better engineering school than either Dartmouth or Brown. Why pay $50,000 per year to go to schools that are not ranked in the top-50 for engineering graduate programs? If you can’t get into Michigan, Michigan State is as good as Dartmouth or Brown for graduate engineering.
If you are not a Michigan resident, there are many state universities that you could attend with better engineering programs and pay far less, even for an OOS student. Most of the Big 10 universities have excellent engineering programs and would be $25-35,000 for tuition. Georgia Tech and the U Cal universities are also in that range. Texas and Texas A&M are outstanding engineering schools and cost around $20,000.
With a 3.4 or better GPA, good GREs, and recommendations, you should have an excellent chance of getting into most top-50 masters programs.
Thank you for all of your replies! I greatly appreciate it. That makes me feel a bit better. I thought my chances at a top 30+ was slim, so I focused on the lower ranked, yet still good, schools.
@BrendanRM - I think your chances for engineering graduate school, especially if you’re applying for a master’s degree and not a PhD, are much better than you’d expect! I can tell you that my stats (at least GPA-wise) were not as strong as yours, and so far I have been accepted to master’s programs in electrical engineering at UC Santa Barbara and Duke (both of which are ranked in the top 30 or so), and Duke even gave me a small merit scholarship! So assuming you have good GRE scores, strong recommendations, and a well written statement of purpose, your chances of admission should be very good.