<p>As a chemical engineer, I’ll concur that you don’t understand why chem-e is hard until you’ve done it. </p>
<p>Sophomore year, fall: organic chem, differential equations, intro electrical engineering, materials science, poetry, thermodynamics, orgo lab, and I think I’m forgetting the other one. That was rough. </p>
<p>Actually, the best answer I can give you is that chemical engineering requires sythesizing huge amounts of upper-level knowledge. For example, a chemistry major needs to take ten chem courses, and then they are done. Chemical engineers need to take seven as background for their engineering courses, in addition to physics, a lot of math, and some programming. So, when you take reactor design, it’s expected that you’ll know MathCAD, differential equations, chemical kinetics, thermo, and a bunch of engineering pre-reqs. Contrast with something like an English majour: you don’t need to take Shakespeare and Chaucer to understand Jane Eyre. The courses in chem-e are very cumulative - you end up taking difficult courses as background for other stuff.</p>
<p>Aries the idea of courses building up on one other, isn’t for just Chem-E majors, I think thats true for the most part of Life Science major, Physical science major, Math, and Statistics majors as well</p>
<p>All of you keep talking about how easy or hard the majors are. If that’s your reason for picking your major, I might as well start taking bets on when you’ll flunk out.</p>
<p>I am an electrical engineer. In my opinion, if you don’t have an engineering-related hobby (such as amateur radio, electronics building, model airplanes, robotics, etc.), then you have a serious impairment. The schools won’t tell you this, perhaps because they’re out-of-touch or have a vested interest. If you can relate to what you are studying, you’ll learn better. If it’s all just mumbo-jumbo you have to plow through to earn your diploma, you’ll look like George W. Bush at the first debate. In this case, even if you do pass all your classes and earn your diploma, you won’t like your job, and you’ll be an underperformer.</p>
<p>I’ll be going to Rensselaer most likely next year as an undeclared engineering major. I’m not sure what to do. I’m thinking of Biomedical, Electrical, and Mechanical. I’m not sure if I’m bright enough to do the first two of that group. 7 hours of studying a night seems a tad… oh… I’d say extreme… I realize engineering is a very difficult major, and I’m willing to accept a challenge… but is it really THAT brutal?</p>
<p>Easy
Materials Science (less than 30 undergrads, the professors want you to do well)
Civil & Environmental
Mining & Minerals (small department, same case as Materials)
Biological Systems (small department, same case as Materials)
INDUSTRIAL SYSTEMS & ENGIEERING (It’s So Easy)</p>
<p>People say chemical is hard because physical chemistry kills them (if they get through organic) and the math gets to the point where it doesn’t make sense anymore. CPE and CS are outrightly impossible if you never took computer science in high school but are easy for those life-long computer nerds. Aerospace may not be harder than mechanical but mechanical doesn’t let anyone in with less than a 2.5 GPA/QCA.</p>
<p>The person above me makes a good point though. If you like what you study then you will do better than the next guy who’s only there to earn a degree that will make a lot of money.</p>
<p>“Hardest programs are very often two that are not much discussed but are accredited programs at many top engineering schools: Engineering Physics and Engineering Mechanics”</p>
<p>Are the job prospects good for those degrees or would you have to get a graduate degree in a more specific field?</p>
<p>Btw, Caltech and Cornell seem to be the only top engineering schools that have accredited Engineering Physics degrees. I don’t see MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, UIUC, UMich and others on ABET’s website.</p>
<p>Does it really matter if the program at your school. I notice my school has engineering programs that are not accredited by ABET. Just wondering.</p>
<p>In Berkeley, Stanford, Caltech, MIT, Cornell: Computer Engineering is much harder than any other engineering field</p>
<p>Thats your opinion, and one that is wrong. It is not the hardest at those schools, and that is a fact. For example at CalTech Chemical Engineering is by far the hardest one. They must take many more classes than CE majors.</p>
<p>You can’t criticize someone else’s views because they are not the same as yours because yours is “fact” and theirs is “opinion.” Yours is obviously opinion also; I’m sure some think CompE is hardest and some think ChemE is the hardest. Just don’t try to make it out that everything you say is fact. Or else you’ll be sadly dissapointed.</p>
<p>Sorry, you’re wrong, at Caltech, EE is the hardest major where students must take 5 - 6 classes every term, along with CDS Engineering students. Chemical is one of the hardest too, but their coursework is slightly less than EE. Now if you can tell me the name of the building of chemical engineering at Caltech, then you may judge my opinion. For example, EE building is Moore Lab and CDS building is Steele Lab.</p>
<p>rtkysg, I check CalTech website, the ChemE Major requires more units than the EE Major. A great deal more units. ChemE requires 405 units from the 2nd to the 4th year, but EE only requires 372 Units. The ChemE is in Eudora Hull Spalding Laboratory of Engineering.</p>
<p>Chem Engineering has more units because they have many lab works which take a lot of units, but ask anyone at Caltech, they will tell you that EE students take at least as many classes as Chem Engineering student. Although course units are generally much smaller than lab work units, in reality at Caltech, they are more difficult. Hence at Caltech, units itself is not a good measure. You will know it if you study at that school.</p>
<p>EE is not all about building things. The people in EE who build things are the people that aren’t good at math. Signal processing and information theory for instance.</p>
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