Length of engineering degree

ucbalumnus
Thu, 22 Jun 2017 06:10:58 +0000

Most schools structure their engineering majors as four academic year plans (8 semesters or 12 quarters). However:

Many require credit overloads (i.e. more credits than typically taken), which may be difficult for some students, who may require an extra semester or few if they take normal credit loads (e.g. the engineering major may specify an average of 17-18 credits per semester, but if the student takes the normal 15-16 credits per semester, s/he will need an extra semester unless AP or other transfer credit earned in high school covers some of the courses). Examples: http://flowcharts.calpoly.edu/downloads/mymap/15-17.52MEBSU.GENMEU.pdf http://me.eng.ua.edu/files/2017/01/ME-Flowchart-Updated-Spring-2017.pdf

A student who takes a semester or quarter off to do co-op will extend calendar time to graduation, although s/he may only take 8 semesters or 12 quarters of school. Some schools build their curricula around co-ops, such as Northeastern, Drexel, and Cincinnati.

A few schools structure their engineering majors for more than four academic years. Florida public schools' summer session requirement causes many students to take 8.5 semesters to graduate (counting the summer as 0.5 semester), though some may use AP or other transfer credit in conjunction with the required summer courses to graduate in 7.5 semesters. Dartmouth typically needs more than 12 quarters to complete the ABET-accredited BE degree, and limits the number of quarters that one can take overload schedules.

Note that all ABET-accredited engineering majors are required to have some general education requirements, though they may vary by school. For example, Brown has no general education requirements for most majors, but requires four humanities and/or social studies courses for students in ABET-accredited engineering majors (this is still fewer than at some other schools like MIT and Harvey Mudd).