Top 10 US Universities for Graduate Level

[cosmicfish]

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So in other words, you will settle for simply criticizing the ideas of others while offering no alternatives of your own. That’s quite the cop-out.

In order for me to offer alternatives I would have to consider this a problem requiring a solution (I don’t) and enough of a problem to be worth a noticable amount of my time (it isn’t). Pointing out errors in other people’s logic, however, gets filed under “entertainment”, which has much looser requirements.</p>

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Actually, it probably is hurting their own students. Or at least, hurting prospective students. The more students continue to linger for years on end accumulating multiple majors, the fewer other prospective students that UM can admit. What about them?

I am not seeing this - what resources are 5yr students using up that freshmen need? It isn’t class space, unless those extra-timers need to repeat English 101 or freshmen are now competing for space in senior technical electives. It probably isn’t dorms, and if they are that is easily and separately resolved. Administrative loads ought to be easy with the additional revenues from the extra-time students. So what is it?</p>

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I suspect that the taxpayer would respond that the subsidies for the completion of one major is enough.

Who says that double majors make up more than a small percentage of the >4 year crowd? And are ALL double majors unreasonable, and if not, how do we address that issue?</p>

<p>As a side note, at most schools (IME) you have to apply for graduation, so your hypothetical double major could certainly complete their initial major first, and then make the decision as to whether or not they would go on for a second major. I have an undergrad in my research group who is an EE/Aerospace double major. He completed the core curriculum for both majors in 3 years, is going to finish Aerospace this year and then spend his fifth year finishing EE. If at the end of the 4th year he decides that he is done, he can graduate with no obligation to take any more EE classes. Now that requires some planning, but there is no reason one cannot do it.</p>

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And like I said, those schools could easily offer an interim 4-year degree. Call it the “Bachelor’s in Architectural Studies” or whatnot. Sure, it wouldn’t be an accredited architectural degree. But at least it would be a 4-year degree.

1. This degree seems useless as anything other than a generic bachelors degree, and since most schools already offer a generic bachelors degree (often called “liberal arts and sciences” or some such), what advantage does this offer?
2. As a complete degree leading nowhere, what differences in curriculum must be implemented to make this degree “complete”? That is to say, I would not consider a 5yr BArch program truncated after the 4th year to offer a complete education, so some type of additional capstone courses or focus would be needed… which means that the 5yr BArch gets replaced by a useless 4yr BArchSt and a 5 1/2yr BArch. Who does this help?</p>

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Outrageous? Well, that’s what Dartmouth does with regards to its engineering program. They offer a 4-year unaccredited BA in engineering. Upon completion, students can stay for another year to complete an accredited BEng.

And again, what use is the BA? It isn’t accredited, offers little engineering coursework, and appears useless as anything other than a feeder to business school and the like. It appears that the primary purpose of this program is to serve as a vehicle for Dartmouth’s extremely high liberal arts requirements, not to serve the interest of ones engineering career or financial needs.</p>

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Actually, I think it is. After all, somebody with a single-majored bachelor’s degree is also employable, and any additional majors are extra.

I was talking about comparisons to 5yr programs that you want to truncate at 4yrs.</p>

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So perhaps you would like to redo your cost/benefit calculations of the typical UM student, aggregated across all majors, not just EE. I am certain that you will find a quite different result.

No I would not, because (a) Michigan, like many public schools, has different tuition rates for different majors, and because (b) I don’t think it will make a difference. I picked engineering because engineering salaries are widely reported, salaries of English majors not so much. FWIW, the one site that DID reference university wide salaries listed Harvard at $54,100 and Michigan at $50,100, and a <10% salary difference is not going to reverse ANYTHING in my prior calculations, not when there is a tuition differential of 200+%.</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.payscale.com/best-colleges/top-us-colleges-graduate-salary-statistics.asp[/url]”>http://www.payscale.com/best-colleges/top-us-colleges-graduate-salary-statistics.asp&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Feel free to run the numbers yourself, however.</p>