[eric343]

For a week in April, my dad and I are going to run around the country and look at colleges... and, in the grand tradition of Head-Fi, I'm soliciting suggestions.

Vital stats:
SAT: 1420 (770V/650M)
GPA: Somewhere between 3.55 and 3.6 (all the honors I can take plus AP spanish)
An old revision of my resumé, but it has all the big stuff.

What I'm looking for:
A good engineering program is a must, as is a sane (non-fascist) IT department, and preferably as little religion as possible. Bonus points if it's on the west coast, and/or the female/male ratio is balanced

The list so far (it is entirely possible that some of these may violate one of the conditions I'm looking for because I'm a lazy bum who hasn't spoken to people who go there. If so, let me know!), in *no particular order*:

- Northwestern
- University of Illinois/Urbana-Champaign
- Harvey Mudd
- University of Southern California
- Princeton
- Purdue
- Stanford

 

[smokey]

Eric,

Since you'll be in the area, how about Cal Tech in Pasadena?

 

[eric343]

Can't believe I forgot that one

(shame I can't exactly bring my HE90s/KGSS for a mini-meet. If only I had about three weeks and didn't have to worry about the fact that it looks rather like a high-fidelity bomb...

)

 

[SunByrne]

Northwestern's engineering and CS departments are not of the caliber of the other schools on your list. USC's price/peformance ratio doesn't impress me much (don't get me wrong, it's a good school, but it's expensive out of proportion to its quality, and it's in a war zone part of LA).

Other schools you might consider are Michigan, Carnegie Mellon, Rice, Texas, Purdue, Wisconsin, and RPI (though RPI might fail on the gender ratio thing). Also, your local big state school (Univ. of Washington) is actually a pretty good school, and very affordable if you're in-state.

CalTech is also a good suggestion, but I suspect like RPI it may fail on the gender ratio criterion.

 

[smokey]

USC = University of Spoiled Children

USC is in a bad part of the city, no doubt about that. But it does offer a lot of opportunity for community service. I understand they have made an effort to improve their acedemic standing over the last several years, and have hired some top flight professors.

Cal Tech might be a little male oriented, but I would suspect that might be true of any engineering heavy college. The nice thing about So. Cal. schools is there are about 20 million people within a short distance. I understand that many of these people are women. On your days off, go to the beach, get a tan, and pick up a few.

There is also a nice community of head-fiers here. We won't laugh when you talk about your 'cans, like some other folks might.

 

[princeclassic]

how bout Cornell or MIT?

edit: MIT has more girls than you might think. i think more than 40%.

 

[eric343]

Nobody laughs at my cans. Nobody.

Anyway, from what I've heard USC has done a lot recently to make their campus safer, though I'll have to see when I visit.

Sunbyrne- Thanks for the warning re: NWU. It's on my list for a few reasons - for one, it's a major research institution with some awesome facilities, two, it has a very very nice theater program (theater and stage crew work are one of my interests), three, it's right next to Chicago with all its attendant culture, and four (I lied)... well, a guy named Kevin.

 

[eric343]

MIT is a "not sure" - I do like to have some free time

Will have to look up Cornell.

 

[hop ham]

price-wise : cooper union

i graduated from rutgers engineering and i had the same sat and roughly the same grades as you. all the schools you listed are good. urbana cham and michigan are very good choices.

i think it would be best to first start thinking about exactly what engineering you would like to do or at least narrow it down, and from there find a college for that specific major. there are books you can buy in borders or barnes and noble (or just sit at the cafe and read them which is what i did) and google will give you a couple lists that really aren't much help.

oh yeah, don't worry about girls if your an engineer...try to land a geeky pharmacy student, thats your best chance.

 

[EyEPoD]

In all honesty, get into the honors program at an instate school.

Save all your money and go to a good grad school.

Undergrad is such a joke, especially if you already know what you want to do.

 

[eric343]

Are you guys talking about University of Michigan or Michigan State U?

 

[hop ham]

U of M

 

[EyEPoD]

Also, have you taken the SAT IIs?

Almost all good Engineering schools require them these days.

If you've taken AP phys & AP chem you will be fine, otherwise just pick up a study guide at Barnes & Noble.

Most require phys, chem, and atleast math LCII i believe.

 

[Douglas256]

As blasphemous a this may sound, I'd suggest going in-state for your undergraduate and then going on to one of the big name schools for your Masters or Ph.D.

If you go in-state, you may even turn a profit on your undergraduate -- I cleared three to ten thousand a year (thanks to scholarships and grant funded reseach projects). If I went out of state, I'd probably be $30-90k in debt instead of sitting here with $30k in the bank trying to decide between Ph.D. programs.

Which ever school you decide on, try and find NSF projects you can work on during the summers (specifically, REU {Research Experience for Undergraduate} programs which are basically free money from the NSF). These research projects (besides paying well), give you the chance to co-author papers in top journals with your advisors.

 

[smokey]

Eric,

If theatre work is something you're interested in I don't think you need to look too much further than USC. From what I've heard a lot of the pros from Hollyweird teach there when they're not actually working in the biz. You want to find women, go no further.