Purdue vs Wisconsin vs USC vs Bucknell -- computer engineering

mikemac
Tue, 16 Jan 2018 20:38:39 +0000

1. ignore the rankings. All are good schools perfectly capable of instructing an undergrad student in engineering. The difference in outcomes among students will be determined by their gpa and work experience such as internships. This is true for grad school or direct employment.

2. since you ask about job opportunities, computer engineering has been a declining field for years. Most of the ASIC vendors have left the business or are quickly consolidating. There are a relative handful of large ompanies hiring digital engineers (Apple, Intel, Nvidia, Cisco, etc) because the costs of producing custom or semi-custom semiconductors is in the tens of millions for most applications, a cost only large companies can bear and justify. Although to be fair there has been a surge in hardware related to AI according to a recent article https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/14/technology/artificial-intelligence-chip-start-ups.html

I don’t have a crystal ball. Maybe HW is turning around, or maybe this is just a temporary spike. But the longterm trend has been down for quite a while. https://www.computerworld.com/article/2896721/electrical-engineering-employment-declines-nearly-10-but-developers-up-12.html

The sister field, so to speak, of computer science has been booming. It is possible for someone with a CE background to look for a job in CS but the CE degree requires so many math/science/engineering classes that few programs offer the exposure to software topics that a CS degree does.