Engineering Help Please

[Guest]

I am considering majoring in engineering, particularly EE. I need some advice of what schools are best and more in depth of what each type does. Thanks

 

[turkey3_scratch]

Wait, you're asking on the systems tomshardware forum what school you should go to? This is a computer forum...

 

[tiny voices]

Moved to the work and education sub forum. I am a 5th year (graduate in December) Petroleum Geologist with a minor in GIS (take ALOT of engineering classes) at WVU. Feel free to PM me and ask me anything.

 

[Pinhedd]

I am considering majoring in engineering, particularly EE. I need some advice of what schools are best and more in depth of what each type does. Thanks

Engineer here, I did my undergraduate in Computer Engineering and Management (joint engineering and commerce degree).

In most jurisdictions, Engineering programs are heavily regulated by state/provincial authorities. This ensures a fair amount of uniformity between Engineering programs at various accredited institutions. An undergraduate engineering degree is a professional degree and is almost always a legal requirement for engineering licensure. Not all Engineering fields require licensure but professional practice does.
Non-accredited institutions (or institutions that lose accreditation) may lose the right to confer Engineering degrees or advertise a program as Engineering. Thus, it is absolutely crucial that any school that you consider attending for an Electrical Engineering program be fully accredited by the regional accreditation body. If the program is not accredited, you may lose out on the ability to pursue licensure after meeting the non-academic requirements.

What school you attend is not important, just that it be accredited. Thanks to accreditation, there's far less advantage to attending a prestigious school. You may wish to look for a school that offers a strong and large Electrical Engineering program though as some Engineering schools focus on some disciplines moreso than others. Even if the program is of top notch quality, a larger program generally means more resources and greater choice. You may also wish to look for a school with an established professional student group such as an IEEE Student Branch.

Anyway, moving on to the various branches of Engineering:

Electrical Engineering: A field of engineering that covers applications involving Electricity, electromagnetics, electronics, magnetism, power, communications, circuitry, control systems, etc... EE is a very broad field, so most students will chose electives that interest them.

Computer Engineering: A subfield of Electrical Engineering that focuses on digital and computational systems. Computer Engineering students and Electrical Engineering students will have many of the same classes as there is a tremendous amount of overlap. Computer Engineers have the rare ability to scoff at people who make silly posts on tech forums.

Chemical Engineering: A field of engineering that applies chemistry and biology to create processes for forming, transforming, storing, and transporting chemicals. It's a rather pure applied science. Some schools offer derived programs focusing on geology and petroleum engineering.

Nuclear Engineering: A subfield of Chemical Engineering or Physics Engineering that is concerned with the applications of fission and fusion. Rarely offered at the undergraduate level.

Materials Engineering: a field of engineering that is concerned with designing materials to meet certain applications. Materials Engineering is fairly new and is heavily grounded in pure science.

Mechanical Engineering: A field of engineering that applies principles of physics, material science, and chemistry to designing mechanical systems. Mechanical Engineering is the oldest Engineering field by far, and like Electrical Engineering it is very applied.

Aerospace Engineering: A subfield of Mechanical Engineering that focuses on the design of aircraft and spacecraft. Aerospace Engineering programs are usually offered at the graduate level, not the undergraduate level.

Civil Engineering: A field of engineering that is concerned with the design and construction of the environment that we live in. Some schools offer multiple CE programs focusing on urban construction as well as the natural environment. Bridges, buildings, dams, reservoirs, canals, ports, airports, etc... are all designed by Civil Engineers.

Software Engineering: A rather new (and somewhat controversial) field of engineering that is concerned with the application of computational and computer science to the design of software systems.

 

[MU_Engineer]

Pinhedd has very good information. He did leave off the field of engineering I did, which is biological engineering. That is a newer (but not all that new) engineering field which is essentially a smattering of civil, chemical, electrical, and materials engineering which gives the graduates a good basis to work for ethanol plants, agri-chemical firms, drug companies, and medical device firms such as Stryker, 3M, Medtronic, Bard, Johnson and Johnson, etc. You can get undergraduate and graduate degrees in the field. More than a few end up getting medically-related degrees later such as a master's in public health or become a medical practitioner such as a nurse practitioner, physician assistant, or even an actual physician.

As with all training, it's best to have an idea of what actual job you want (and how feasible it is to get said job) before you start any training as there are often more than one route to get there. Pick the shortest and least expensive one in nearly all cases. More training is simply that- more expense and more time you are racking up debt and not working. You can always do it later and in many cases an employer will subsidize if not outright pay for the added education. This is a carryover from Baby Boomer and WWII generation bosses who went to minimal or no college thinking it's something magical that will really improve what somebody can do as an employee. Gen X employees are largely ambivalent and Gen Y/Millenial employees largely (correctly) think college largely meaningless fluff and would likely never give a red cent of company money for anybody to get an added degree when they become managers.