<p>We hired a physics major to do engineering work a few years ago. He stayed with us for about a year and then went to work for a High-Frequency-Trading company. So some can not only switch, but jump around.</p>
<p>I was pretty surprised on the Georgetown numbers on the difference that graduate school makes. Grad school had significantly lower unemployment compared to undergrad and undergrad + a few years of experience. This was across the board I believe. I had believed that a few years of experience was comparable to a graduate degree but it appears that the graduate degree is worth more than a few years of experience.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>+1</p>
<p>But the problem with engineering is not education. It’s finding employment in an environment where everyone is looking for purple squirrels…</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>This mentality is not too far removed from how some midwest state universities used to deal with much more liberal admission requirements for in-state students who were given near-free/free tuition subsidy by the state. Admit practically all in-staters who wanted to attend…but implement weed-out policies across the board so only the most serious and intellectually capable among the in-staters are allowed to graduate 4 years later. </p>
<p>According to some Profs who witnessed this as undergrads…around half of the entering instate freshman would end up being weeded out within the first two years. </p>
<p>Some justifications I heard for such weedout policies in STEM courses included desire to weed-out unserious or woefully unprepared incoming students, greater expense of providing STEM education due to labs/equipment costs, and need to minimize the possibility someone graduates without having met a minimum expected standard among potential employers/grad schools/licensing(I.e. Professional Engineering Exam). </p>
<p>From what I and HS classmates have seen in our STEM intro courses…the Profs don’t really have to go all out to weed out at least a third or more of the incoming students. Many/most prospective STEM majors end up falling by the wayside because they’re not willing to put in the time/effort to do the work, woefully un/underprepared for the rigor/workload due to inadequate high school preparation, and most never bother to go to the Prof’s/TA’s office hours to seek help…especially at the large research universities.</p>
<p>This also isn’t limited to public universities as several HS classmates and a former roommate experienced the same things as STEM majors at respectable/elite private universities such as Tufts, NYU, etc.</p>
<p>The TopEnd level keeps getting higher. The profs are doing everyone a favor in maintaining a minimum standard, … And producing qualified engineers. </p>
<p>DS an MechE and Human-Computer Interface (product design), dual grad, left ME as soon as he could for HCI work. It was not because he didn’t like ME, it was because he like HCI better. ME was a way for him to get to the end. We don’t know yet if he will do more ME hobby projects.
.
Anyway, less than minimum graduates will have a hard time competing and should leave the engineering for other fields.</p>
<p>+100 for DS, LongPrime… Few people appreciate good HCI design these days and fewer yet practice it!!!. It’s an exciting, relatively easy (compared to EE :-)), very entertaining, and very hip field to get in and out.</p>
<p>thx. Now if could only recognize a good designed woman. :)</p>
<p>I would love to hear more about the HCI degree and field. Is that part of a computer science degree? </p>
<p>As far as weed-outs, yes there are students that are unprepared for the rigor. However, if there is some degree of aptitude and interest, it should be nurtured and encouraged, rather than seen as the strongest survive. </p>
<p>Countless studies have shown that, for example, it is not GPA or the MCAT that determines success as a physician. That is why more and more med schools are looking at ‘alternative’ routes to med school, when they review apps. It absolutely does not lower standards, it just broadens the pool of prospective future docs.</p>
<p>Don’t we want to encourage ALL kids to succeed? Is it really true that straight As guarantee success in a field? Can’t a C student be just as successful in a career as an A student?</p>
<p>The state schools have limited resource (and they keep shrinking) - they generally are more sink-or-swim instead of being nurturing. The thing about getting through one of these known tough programs is that a prospective employer knows that they’re are getting someone that won’t need a lot of nurturing when they come on board.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>What is the alternative “light” route in engineering? Calc-free physics and math? There are already some engineering degrees with dubious pedigree, especially BA degrees as opposed to BS degrees. They are not accredited and are not especially valued by employers. </p>
<p>Engineering is just plain tough and there are no easy shortcuts. The Harvard Crimson recently reported that over 75% of engineering majors at Harvard switched majors before graduation, mostly because of the heavy workload and fewer electives. At MIT next door, hardly anybody drops out of engineering because the other majors are just as brutal. If anything, departments such as EE see an inflow in students between sophomore and senior year.</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>Engineering tech.</p>
<p>"Why Students Leave the Engineering Track "</p>
<p>-Primarily because they lack math background. They are very behind in comparison to HS graduates in other countries. The gap is huge, simply not comparable. Teh same goes for background in physics.</p>
<p>A former co-worker that went to school in East Germany told me that his undergraduate education was comparable to that of the US undergrad + masters degrees. They used a tracking system and the prerequisite science and math and humanities was taken care of in secondary school.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Depends on the specialty. One “alternative program” I read about in the NYT does allow doctors without the traditional science-heavy background…but they end up being limited in the specialties they could get into due to their tendency to perform at a much lower level on certain parts of the board exams than their traditional pre-med counterparts. </p>
<p>Moreover, the issue isn’t really a doctor shortage so much as a severe shortage of doctors willing to practice family/primary care/children’s care…especially in traditionally underserved inner-city or rural areas where pay and associated lifestyle are far lower than what they could get as specialists* working in urban areas. </p>
<p>It also doesn’t help that family/primary care/children’s care areas are considered some of the least prestigious areas within the larger profession judging by what I’ve heard from medical doctor friends. </p>
<ul>
<li>Cardiologists, surgeons, radiologists, etc.</li>
</ul>
<p>
ABET accredited BSET programs typically require some sort of calculus, although they may offer a more application oriented version which some would consider calc “light.” See curriculum.</p>
<p>[ABET</a> - Criteria for Accrediting Engineering Technology Programs, 2012 - 2013](<a href=“http://www.abet.org/criteria-engineering-technology-2012-2013/]ABET”>http://www.abet.org/criteria-engineering-technology-2012-2013/)</p>
<p>cobrat,
“Depends on the specialty.”
But nobody who apply to Med. School declares specialty. Med. Schools truly do not care about UG majors or whatever Grad. school degree applicant might posses which resulted in few lawyers in my D’s Med. School class. Although vast majority of applicants are coming from Bio or related majors, I personally knew Music major from selective Conservatory of Music, Latin major, definitely Business majors, Engineering (although the last one is not advised as GPA tends to be lower because of great challenges of engineering majors and apparent lack of required background for it).</p>
<p>It’s true that the real doctor shortage is in primary care, not specialists. If we do need more primary care docs and dentists, and NPs, etc, our society should be rewarding those that pursue this track and putting support behind those with an aptitude and desire to pursue STEM.</p>
<p>I’m all for having high standards, but also for creating an environment where those with aptitude and desire can be successful, rather than being ‘weeded out’. Instead of just letting those students fail, wouldn’t we gain as a society by helping them succeed? They obviously had to have some aptitude to be admitted into these programs.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I’m assuming, however, that all of your friends did the traditional pre-med curriculum per med school admissions requirements. I also wasn’t talking about undergrad majors…but whether they took a standard pre-med curriculum alongside their major or not. </p>
<p>I was referring to one example of “alternative med school admissions” where they admit folks who were allowed in without taking such requirements to encourage more humanities/social science majors. One big issue with them was that on average, they performed at a much lower level on certain parts of the board exams which meant doors to many specialties during internship/residency were closed off. </p>
<p>May not be a bad thing if their intention was not to be a specialist…but they’d be in a minority judging by what I’ve observed among pre-med friends and their classmates who ultimately became medical doctors. Moreover…the money and prestige in areas like Primary care were considered the pits compared to more prestigious and lucrative specialties. </p>
<p>Moreover, there’s the mentality that if one is going to enter a profession where one mistake could potentially be fatal to those being served…mediocrity or even being average should not be acceptable…much less encouraged. </p>
<p>One engineering Prof who was questioned about weeding out a large proportion of the class and not giving partial credit to a former supervisor’s classmate said, “There’s no partial credit given in the real world if you build a building or bridge and it collapses because you made a tiny error. If you want to be mediocre/average, this is not the profession for you.” I wouldn’t be surprised if some pre-med advisors expressed similar sentiments when pre-med students complained about the strict weed-out policies and strict grading.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Or that primary care doctors bear a higher insurance-paperwork burden from many small-cost office visits and procedures than specialists who do a smaller number of large-cost procedures.</p>
<p>Former engineer here (BS & MS, professional license, the whole 9). Only quickly skimmed the earlier parts of this thread, but nonetheless felt the need to weigh in. Apologies in advance for if the majority of this has already been covered.</p>
<p>In my opinion there are two big reasons that we do not have more US citizens pursuing STEM careers:</p>
<p>1) Woefully poor secondary level preparation in math relative to the quantitative demands of the career. Really to have much change of succeeding in an undergraduate engineering program one needs to have, at a minimum, completed high school coursework in multivariate calculus with strong marks. Ideally one should also have preparation in linear algebra and differential equations prior to college. Its terribly unrealistic to expect a student to pull A’s (or even B’s) in thermodynamics (or other engineering courses) while they are struggling to learn how to do simple integrals at the same time. Only the best high schools push there students to develop the necessary quantitative skills.</p>
<p>2) Low pay and poor job security compared to other careers requiring similar level of intelligence and preparation. I well aware that anecdotes do not constitute evidence, but nonetheless I believe my experience is illustrative (details have been altered/disguised to protect the innocent). </p>
<p>Engineering career: I graduated near the top of my class with both a BS and MS in engineering physics from a top engineering school (think MIT, Berkeley, Cornell, GeorgiaTech) in the late 90’s and shortly thereafter joined a prominent, R&D focused F500. After 5 years on the job my salary hovered around 80K with an end of the year bonus on the order of $5-10K. My compensation was near the top for my cohort. After surviving multiple rounds of layoff, and after going 2 years without even a COLA, I began receiving strong hints that I was “getting pretty old” for an engineer. I decided to leave engineering and pursue an MBA.</p>
<p>Post-MBA career: Following business school (where even at the top school I attended the curriculum was no more intellectually rigorous than high school social studies) I joined a prominent management consulting firm. My first years compensation was near as makes no difference twice my engineering salary. In my second year I received not one, but two 10% raises. By the end of my third year my total compensation was trending to exceeded 3X my engineering salary. By this point I was receiving calls from headhunters on a daily basis, and so was treated to numerous “retention” perks by my employer (profit sharing, paid training at nice resorts, etc). Similar stories abound for my former engineering classmates and coworkers who have applied there talents to the fields of patent law and medicine.</p>
<p>If our country is serious about promoting careers in engineering, we need to take a long hard look at how we fund and administer public education, at our immigration policy, and at our tax code (as the GOP primaries have made public, one of the dirty little secrets of high finance how lightly those big pay packages are taxed).</p>