Originally Posted by berettafan (Post 11640666)

Choc GT was the reach school but didn't get in.

What i'm trying to understand is if any of the schools he was admitted to give a decided advantage on internships and job opportunities after. Thus far the read i get is 'not really unless its Stanford, MIT or GT'. And at that point are we just shopping price and location?

Originally Posted by MBAtarga (Post 11640357)

He should be a Yellow Jacket!

1. Best aerospace engineering schools in the US – US News Rankings 2021

California Institute of Technology (Caltech)
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Stanford University
Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech)
University of Michigan – Ann Arbor
Purdue University – West Lafayette
University of Illinois – Urbana Champaign
University of Texas – Austin
Texas A&M University – College Station
Cornell University

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11642039)

personally, id tell him to go mechanical over aerospace. aerospace is just a subsection of mechanical but you can hire a mechanical for aerospace, you can't hire an aerospace for mechanical.

Originally Posted by fintstone (Post 11640393)

This. I was once adjunct faculty at GT. But, engineering there is a very, very challenging program. They also have good Army, Navy, and AF ROTC Programs. Probably not the same college town atmosphere to enjoy as a lot of schools since it is in downtown Atlanta.

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11642039)

it doesnt matter which school you pick off that list. alma matter doesn't matter anymore. ive hired dozens of engineers in my career and if you judge them based on school, it doesn't work out. some of the best engineers ive hired were from no name schools.

personally, id tell him to go mechanical over aerospace. aerospace is just a subsection of mechanical but you can hire a mechanical for aerospace, you can't hire an aerospace for mechanical. also if hes interested in a masters, mechanical engineer could go into aero that way, but again, your not gonna get an aero doing a masters on mechanical.

Originally Posted by fintstone (Post 11640777)

As I noted, it was an excellent school when I worked there, but not a typical small town campus (where the school "is" the town). The students, professors and curriculum were first rate. We got the brightest and the best. It certainly was not a "party school." There were plenty of Co-op opportunities for engineers and plenty of opportunities for graduates.

As far as the atmosphere, the campus has expanded and experience may be a lot nicer today when I worked there (in the 90s), but it certainly was not then. I expect it has improved some due to the massive urban renewal in that area of Atlanta after the 1996 Olympics where it was Olympic village and fences/security were installed (Assuming they are still there). Also, a couple of the worst tenement housing projects were leveled for UGA dormitories (skyscrapers) at that time. When I worked there, it was in the middle of a ghetto and surrounded by housing projects and bordered by the interstate on one side. The homeless and drug dealers wandered the campus. Rapes and robberies were not uncommon. Movement on parts of campus after dark was considered "asking for it." Homeless people broke into my office more than once and slept there when it was cold. I had to deal with panhandlers daily and criminals attempted to mug me more than once. There was almost no parking or local (off campus) restaurants nearby). It is still in the middle of a large urban center with accompanying crime, parking, and traffic problems. If you compare it to Auburn/UGA or another school I worked at in GA and the difference in atmosphere was day and night. Auburn had cows grazing on campus and traffic was almost nonexistent.

Originally Posted by berettafan (Post 11642064)

Thanks, that is good advice.

Really do appreciate all the input here from industry folks and people who are just older and wiser with more experience sending kids through college.

Originally Posted by red-beard (Post 11641397)

It is hard to get a "bad" engineering degree. But he better plan on hitting the books because it is one of the more difficult degrees.

Originally Posted by berettafan (Post 11642353)

How often do ME or AE grads go on to a masters program? And is it done while working with employer support for cost?

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11642391)

unless you are planning on teaching, a phd is engineering is pretty worthless. a masters isnt super important either, experience is far more important to employers. but it depends on where you want your career to go.

the track from engineering into management is well documented, and sad really. by and large i think engineers make poor managers. i mean the world is ripe with poor management in general as most managers are about as bad at management as engineers are. MBAs are worth a lot of money with an engineering degree, but mostly the paper itself, MBAs in my experience are nonsense. worth a lot of money, but not because you are any better at business than anyone else.

just get the BSME, and let your career and interests take you.

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11642391)

...a masters isnt super important either, experience is far more important to employers. but it depends on where you want your career to go.

the track from engineering into management is well documented, and sad really. by and large i think engineers make poor managers. i mean the world is ripe with poor management in general as most managers are about as bad at management as engineers are. MBAs are worth a lot of money with an engineering degree, but mostly the paper itself, MBAs in my experience are nonsense.

just get the BSME, and let your career and interests take you.

Originally Posted by Seahawk (Post 11642402)

Perfect.

The key is get your feet wet and then figure it out.

My Father, two Masters degrees from MIT, one in Civil Engineering, one in Nuclear Physics, always lamented the disconnect between talented engineers that has no aptitude for management.

He did and was very successful and did his best to help bridge the divide.

I am the exact opposite. I had zero interest in any engineering discipline, you could not make me do it.

But I had an an aptitude for management of complex programs and learned enough about whom to trust in engineering to be successful.

My partner is a brilliant Aero Engineer. MS from Standford, the works. While he can build a project plan to great, accurate detail, knows all about project management, he just can't do it. It bores him and it shows.

We work well together.

Again, BF, great problem to have, congratulations. He has a great challenge ahead.

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11642429)

being a manager of a technical advancement program, or worse yet, a program requiring invention, is even harder. when you find a good one, oh boy is it good.

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11642429)

ive been contemplating a move to management instead of research like i do now. i fortunately work for a company that has a VP level technical job, so there is no point at which id be forced into a management job. i could stay technical my entire career. but ultimately my frustration with poor management has lead me to be VERY good at managing up, and i see programs fail for so many reasons that arnt engineering or technical. most programs fail because of human problems, not technical ones. and so that has lead my brain to spending more and more time on humans rather than machines.

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11642391)

.... a masters isnt super important either....(but)....the track from engineering into management is well documented....and.... by and large i think engineers make poor managers. ....(and)... MBAs in my experience are nonsense. worth a lot of money, but not because you are any better at business than anyone else.....

Originally Posted by Superman (Post 11642645)

Sometimes I think your perspective is right on target. Like your suggestion to add a business master's to an engineering BS. And then at other times you seem to be thinking with a different brain. There are more reasons to study business than just bragging rights or a piece of paper. Someone said, and perhaps you, that business is its own specialty and this is true.

And someone bemoaned the tendency for employers to make managers out of engineers, and this thinking is common. For example, health care companies seem often to imagine that only doctors can administer an organization that employs doctors. That's not far from imagining that business analysts should advise patients on health care matters.

All in all, I agree that an MBA atop an engineering BS is a smart plan. There were several engineering graduates in my MBA program.

Originally Posted by Superman (Post 11642645)

Sometimes I think your perspective is right on target. Like your suggestion to add a business master's to an engineering BS. And then at other times you seem to be thinking with a different brain. There are more reasons to study business than just bragging rights or a piece of paper. Someone said, and perhaps you, that business is its own specialty and this is true.

And someone bemoaned the tendency for employers to make managers out of engineers, and this thinking is common. For example, health care companies seem often to imagine that only doctors can administer an organization that employs doctors. That's not far from imagining that business analysts should advise patients on health care matters.

All in all, I agree that an MBA atop an engineering BS is a smart plan. There were several engineering graduates in my MBA program.

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11643380)

my point was that MBAs in my experience seem to be no better at business than anyone else.

in fact, by and large, MBAs in my experience are fantastic at destroying businesses. and often they justify it with "i have an MBA, you don't"

my personal take is that MBAs often misunderstand what value means to the customer and why they want it. tend to treat it the same on everything and fail to understand that each market is inherently different, with small details that vastly effect outcomes. YMMV.

Originally Posted by beatnavy (Post 11643446)

Me thinks you're generalizing quite a bit. You've really personally seen lots of businesses destroyed by MBA's? To me that sounds more like a cliche than reality. There's a reason businesses seek them out.

It's like any other discipline -- if you show up somewhere and think your degree, and only your degree, makes you foolproof or smarter than everyone else then you are likely to fail.

I have an MBA, thought it was highly useful to my line of work, and made me a better businessperson and consultant. I personally would recommend doing an MBA after a couple of years actually working, however.

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11643560)

i have seen us ruin some pretty mind blowing opportunities (100 million+ stuff) and product lines because of MBA's not understanding what they are doing and why we did what we did.

goes to the point made about listening before.

Originally Posted by beatnavy (Post 11643635)

Seems like that's true in any profession, no?

I guess I hope the next time I'm in surgery my doctor didn't go to medical school, because, you know, all the surgeons that screw up went to medical school. ;)

Originally Posted by MBAtarga (Post 11644378)

I offer this link as another differing opinion as to the "usefulness" of an MBA. I know the counter arguments,etc. and there are always outliers- but collectively, the evidence shows an MBA is respected and rewarded in the job marketplace. The article has more information that what I pasted below

Originally Posted by cockerpunk (Post 11643560)

i have seen us ruin some pretty mind blowing opportunities (100 million+ stuff) and product lines because of MBA's not understanding what they are doing and why we did what we did.

goes to the point made about listening before.

Originally Posted by 944 S2 (Post 11640390)

Unless he’s been accepted to MIT or Harvard it doesn't matter much where he goes to school as long as he graduates with decent (above 3.0) GPA. I hired lots of Mechanical engineers, where they graduated from didn’t matter. Good grades and a good interview is enough. All that said it would depend on where he sees himself working. My two cents worth.