The UC's or Embry-Riddle?

[DragonSharp]

Hey people, let me first say that this forum is awesome and I would wish that I taken this prep before I took the TPR SAT prep.......

Anyway, I have a tough decision ahead of me whether to go to UC's school such as UCI, UCLA, and UCD or get on a plane and head over to Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University thats in Arizona or Florida. I'm extremely interested in Aerospace Engineering and I want to work for the companies like Boeing and Lockheed-Martin. Mainly working on military aircraft. I'm currently a senior in my high school as a California resident. My GPA is bewteen 3.83 and 4.00. I'm keeping up with my EC such as Academic Decathlon and few clubs. Unfortuately I was in Civil Air Patrol for 11 weeks because my dad was forcing me to study heavily on the SATs. But my SATs aren't that great: 630 in Math, 500 both in Critical Reading and Writing. And I'm planning to take another SAT test on Oct. 6th along with TPR's "Advance Course"(that is free).

As for the colleges, I don't know which school should I go to.

The UC's are pretty much broad on the majors and it is pretty much hard to get into them. But they are affordable for my family and closer to my home.

But Embry-Riddle is the opposite of them. This univsersity is much easier to get in that their admission rate was around 89%! Plus they specificaly teach aerospace and I want the best course work when I'm out into the job field. However, this is a private school which means its way too expensive and far away from my home. I was planning to solve that by joining the Air Force ROTC or other scholarships that I may find. Loans can be another option.

What do you guys think?

[Erin]

Wow, that's a tough one. I don't really know anything about your major myself. You might want to check out the graduate admissions forums and ask about Aerospace Engineering; I wouldn't be surprised if some people there could give you some invaluable advice.

[Borderline PD]

Originally Posted by DragonSharp

Hey people, let me first say that this forum is awesome and I would wish that I taken this prep before I took the TPR SAT prep.......

Anyway, I have a tough decision ahead of me whether to go to UC's school such as UCI, UCLA, and UCD or get on a plane and head over to Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University thats in Arizona or Florida. I'm extremely interested in Aerospace Engineering and I want to work for the companies like Boeing and Lockheed-Martin. Mainly working on military aircraft. I'm currently a senior in my high school as a California resident. My GPA is bewteen 3.83 and 4.00. I'm keeping up with my EC such as Academic Decathlon and few clubs. Unfortuately I was in Civil Air Patrol for 11 weeks because my dad was forcing me to study heavily on the SATs. But my SATs aren't that great: 630 in Math, 500 both in Critical Reading and Writing. And I'm planning to take another SAT test on Oct. 6th along with TPR's "Advance Course"(that is free).

As for the colleges, I don't know which school should I go to.

The UC's are pretty much broad on the majors and it is pretty much hard to get into them. But they are affordable for my family and closer to my home.

But Embry-Riddle is the opposite of them. This univsersity is much easier to get in that their admission rate was around 89%! Plus they specificaly teach aerospace and I want the best course work when I'm out into the job field. However, this is a private school which means its way too expensive and far away from my home. I was planning to solve that by joining the Air Force ROTC or other scholarships that I may find. Loans can be another option.

What do you guys think?

The UC system is, IMHO, overrated for education, and many schools, most notable UCD, flatly refuse to assist in any way, shape or form on careers. People respect the system because it has a lot of quality researchers, but the teaching quality and career assistance is generally awful.

I have never heard of Embry-Riddle. I would avoid a school with an 89% acceptance rate; better to start at a community college and transfer than go to a 4 year program that is basically a JC anyways.

[macroeconomicus]

Originally Posted by Borderline PD

The UC system is, IMHO, overrated for education, and many schools, most notable UCD, flatly refuse to assist in any way, shape or form on careers. People respect the system because it has a lot of quality researchers, but the teaching quality and career assistance is generally awful.

I might be biased being UCB alum... But still, if UC is overrated, then most public research universities and also many private ones are also overrated. This is the reality of a modern American research university. No UC professor is being paid for being a great instructor and no one is going to feed you with a spoon there. However, the academic coursework is very tough, rigorous, and demanding. For many subject area (including engineering) when you graduate, you will be a head above people who went to smaller state universities or many private ones.

Regarding finding jobs, it depends on the major. The engineering and business departments from the top UCs for these specialties (Berkeley, LA, and probably UCSD and UCI) have their own career placement services that frequently hold career fairs and generally place their students very well. My friends who studied CS and engineering at UCB for the most part got very good entry-level jobs at at the top companies with seemingly little effort. Of course, those who wanted to work at startups or say go to graduate school were also usually able to take that route. Many of those who did not study business/cs/engineering also usually get decent job offers. For example, as an econ major, I think the prospects for math, economics, statistics, and many other liberal arts majors are very good, but those departments will do relatively little to help you find a job.

The most important thing is to do a lot of research about careers and develop a vision for your own career goals some time during freshman/sophomore years. Once you have such vision, you will be able to make the optimal use of the university resources to achieve your goals. I think the people who have toughest time finding jobs are those who fail to develop a such vision for their post-college career paths early enough, and so they fail to make the best use of their college experience.

[macroeconomicus]

DragonSharp, since you're considering out of state schools, have you considered applying to some of the well known out of state public universities and specially the land grant universities? One thing that many of land grant universities have in common is that,

1. They have a relatively high acceptance rate. For example, around 70-80% at Arizona State, Texas A&M, Purdue, Michigan State University, and Virginia Tech. (they also usually have a high drop out rate..) The acceptance rates even for second-tier UCs seem brutal in comparison.

2. They tend to have good engineering programs.

3. Costs are low (without out of state tuition).

4. They're relatively well-known.

[moomber123]

I am also quite familiar with UC. I agree with macroeconomicus that top UCs would give you a solid undergraduate education. But I also agree that UC education is indeed overrated in the sense that the graduate programs' reputation tend to diffuse to the entire school, but if you look at the graduate students in top programs at Cal, you'd find mostly other elite schools (MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Yale, etc) than UC's own graduates. Carrying a Berkeley undergrad degree sometimes seems to impress people a lot, but I would argue the strength of top UCs is at its graduate research.

This is generally true for good research, public land grant schools. You tend to find their graduate students much better prepared and much brighter than their undergrad students. But it is no accident, either. Those schools are public for a reason, and as public research schools, they have a dual responsibilities of research and education. I think it's a good combo to expose "commoners" to academic research so if they so choose to advance their education further, they have the benefits of being close and exposed to great graduate programs to at least have a better understanding.

Private schools, on the other hand, at least for the top private schools, have huge prestige associated with it. Except the "my daddy is the senator" admissions, they tend to attract the most elite students. The students tend to come from top socio-economic families. MIT/Caltech stand out as the exception of the "elite" impression. And their undergrads are arguably as strong as their grads.

I would suggest a broad exposure at the undergrad level. Whether the reputation is overrated or not, having a broad undergrad experience buys you options. Who knows, perhaps few years down the road, aeronautic engineering won't seem so great to you? I don't recall Berkeley having an aeronautic engineering program specifically. It might be an option under mechanical engineering. But I seem to remember UCLA has a major for you. Another suggestion is Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. Its reputation is nowhere near as good as top UCs, especially when you get out of California. But its reputation in engineering is solid in California. In fact, the more practical orientation of Cal Poly makes its graduates more desirable in job market than even Berkeley grads. I've come to know a few Cal Poly CS gradutes who find better paying entry-level jobs than my friends from Berkeley CS. In particular, I know Cal Poly has a very good aeronautic engineering program. It's a Cal State school, so admissions is not going to be as hard, and the cost is probably less than half of UC.

I am not sure if you are familiar with the legendary aircraft designer Burt Rutan who designed the first successful civilian space craft in recent years. He is a Cal Poly grad. Look him up at wikipedia and you might find relevant info about Cal Poly's program of interest to you. I am also not sure if you are interested into spacecraft, but I know Cal Poly used to have a "pico satellite" program in which undergrads have the opportunity to construct micro-scale, but fully functional satellites, which are actually launched into space. How cool is that! You won't find similar opportunity even at famous engineering schools like Berkeley. But the drawback is that Cal Poly is not research/theory oriented, so if you eventually want to get into academic research, you are at a disadvantage. But it doesn't sound like you are into that. By the way, the guy I know from Cal Poly building satellite is also in air force ROTC. Perhaps you can check out their program as well.

[riser25]

DragonSharp,

If you are still looking reading this thread take this advice to heart. DO NOT GO TO EMBRY RIDDLE. This is coming from someone who actually went to the school for a year and let me tell you why you shouldn't go:

First it is indeed overated and your suspicions on the high acceptance rate are true. It is not a selective school like they say they are and they are willing to take anyone who is willing to cough up the money, doesn't matter how much of an idiot you are.

Second they say the undergraduate program is great here and it is not. You will not get the education you pay for. Now granted there are a few good professors who are very accesible and are willing to help you if you are willing to study, buit they are far and few between. Every time we registered for classes it was a Charlie Foxtrot to get the good professors. I was very unhappy with my last physics professor, who had no idea what he was teaching.

Third is you will not get the college experience you would at a school in California. There are no women at either of Embry-Riddles campuses, Daytona or Prescott. It's about 85 % male and 15% female in Daytona, Prescott is worse. The food is horrible, and my dorm was about the size of a prison cell.

Fourth is the field is narrow and not doing so well. The only thing worth going after here is aviation/aerospace related. However, I have doubts about how good it is here. The pilots in the flight program have grovels with it, and I already showed you my perspective on the engineering side of it.

Also think twice about having the Air Force pay for school. It's a good deal if the experience you get in return from your school is good, but you will end up with an eight year MSO (military service obligation) four years active, four in the inactive or ready reserve. Also, Air Force engineers don't make near the money that their civilian counterparts do, and you will more or less be a consultant reperesenting and presenting Air Force specifications for a project. It can help getting the security clearance though. The civilians are the ones who actually design and build the cool stuff. Either way you will be doing something good for your country even as a civilian.

If you applied to Riddle and got your acceptance letter think twice about going. You have the best schools in California and you are close to home, that is not a bad deal. In fact I almost wish I were still living in California so I could take advantage of the in-state tuition. I am looking at going to school at University of Nevada next semester.

I know this may just seem like one disgruntled person's views on this school, but many of my friends there had the same view on the school and that they weren't getting what they payed for.