<p>Many good schools offer merit for OOS students. The test scores are good enough…how was the PSAT? Is he a candidate for NMS? That opened a lot of doors for our future engineer.</p>
<p>Sure, in the main, university hiring by engineering firms may be regional. However, there are “national schools” that attract employers from all over. It’s well known that Illinois, Michigan, Georgia Tech, Purdue and Virginia Tech are such schools. But as MiamiDAP indicates, it’s likely no advantage to attend said “name brand” engineering colleges and spend a lot more in tuition if you already have a fine (and affordable) option in your home state.</p>
<p>Miami Dap, most engineers do not end up working for “engineering firms”. They work for large, global employers (airlines, pharmaceutical companies, consumer products companies, etc.) If this kid is interested in working for a local engineering firm then yes, where he goes to college won’t matter as long as the program is accredited. But many large employers have a list of “core schools” from which they hire for roles all over the country, and their hiring from “local colleges” will be for very specific roles at a plant or manufacturing facility.</p>
<p>Microsoft, GE, Pfizer, United Technologies, Siemens, Exxon-Mobile, Cisco, Apple, Procter and Gamble- these companies cannot recruit at the two or three colleges close to their headquarters and find anything close to the number of qualified candidates they need to staff their operations.</p>
<p>There are tens of thousands of electrical engineers working at companies which recruited them thousands of miles away from where they studied. Your husbands experience is well and good-- and I’m sure he’s had a fine career- but you continue to tell people that it doesn’t matter where you go to college for IT, for engineering, for medical school, and your perspective is somewhat one sided.</p>
<p>For SOME careers it matters where you go. You cannot compare a powerhouse school like Michigan for engineering with a small directional state college which may happen to have an engineering program. If a kid wants to design a build bridges for a small engineering firm in his or her home town than your advice is spot on. But there is a reason why UIUC, Michigan, MIT, Cal Tech (and lots of others) have national and international reputations in engineering. And their students typically do not end up at small, local engineering companies, your husband’s experience notwithstanding.</p>
<p>@blossom, those large firms you mention also accept engineering grads from small directional Us. It’s not all one way.</p>
<p>I learning so much through this thread. Once again, Thanks for the inputs.
His PSAT was 219 - 80(M) - 72(W) & CR(67). Did not make it to NMSQT as California cutoff was much higher.
We are ready to fund his education if he gets into public schools (4-5 years) and I keep my job. If there is compelling private school, then he will either have to earn some grants/tuition waivers or take loan for the costs over public school. That’s basically our financial situation.</p>
<p>He had shown a lot of interest in CalPoly. </p>
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<p>True, but the smaller companies are less likely to have the need or resources to recruit everywhere.</p>
<p>Also, even at big companies like Apple, local schools like San Jose State are somewhat overrepresented as alma maters of the employees.</p>
<p>Take a look at the [url=“<a href=“http://theaitu.org%22%5DAITU%5B/url”>http://theaitu.org”]AITU[/url</a>] schools as well. They are all private and have ABET accredited programs. The smaller ones offer significant merit aid to strong students. If you are in Illinois and Michigan, you can stop by IIT (Chicago), MSOE (Milwaukee), Rose Hulman (Indiana), and Kettering (Michigan).</p>