Good Engineering schools that I could run at

So there is no difference between MIT and Directional State U?

a new low! wrote:

So there is no difference between MIT and Directional State U?

Do the laws of physics change between Boston and wherever Directional State U is?

They don't. But which university is more likely to get you a good career? If you're a shut-in who wants to study physics for "personal fulfillment" rather than a job, you really don't need ANY university to do that. Honestly, the material for nearly any course in the world is freely available if you look for it. People don't spend 50 grand a year for that. If you have career goals that involve interacting with other people, a top-tier school such as MIT will get you farther than Directional State U would.

a new low! wrote:No there is no difference between MIT and Directional State U?

There is certainly a difference, but it isn't in the material covered. The difference is in the standards the professors hold you to and the quality of your classmates. Mr. Average at MIT is certainly going to be Mr. Exceptional at Directional State U, but the body of knowledge covered by the professor at Directional State U and MIT is the same. Again our hypothetical student will have to work harder to get an A at MIT than at Directional State U, but if he wants, he can still learn the same material, still do undergraduate research with his professors and still become a quality engineer, research scientist, or whatever it was he wants to be. He will simply have to hold himself to higher standards than his classmates hold themselves. You sir (or ma'am or previous poster) have bought into the marketing by all the "elite" schools that nobody except themselves do any quality work and it simply isn't true.

I have 3 degrees from 3 schools. Two of them are top 25 national universities and the other one was somewhere around 120. The difference was night and day in terms of depth and breadth of material covered, standards, quality of peers, etc. Anyone who says that things are "equivalent" across all schools simply does not know what he or she is talking about.

CorpulentCruiser wrote:

They don't. But which university is more likely to get you a good career? If you're a shut-in who wants to study physics for "personal fulfillment" rather than a job, you really don't need ANY university to do that. Honestly, the material for nearly any course in the world is freely available if you look for it. People don't spend 50 grand a year for that. If you have career goals that involve interacting with other people, a top-tier school such as MIT will get you farther than Directional State U would.

Where you get your terminal degree is important (depending on what you want to do) because of the reputation it confers and the networks you develop. My uncle points out that getting his degree from MIT opened doors for him, but no mater what you do, you have to do quality work. The heart of my argument is that 1.) going to directional state u isn't a career killer and 2.) many people coming from directional state u still perform quality work.

I don't think anyone is arguing against these two points. However, ON AVERAGE, more people are going to be doing higher quality work at the better schools. If you had to invest in 100 start-up companies out of Stanford or 100 from Wichita State, which would you choose?

It isn't just "connections and networks" either.

MIT, RIT, RPI, Tufts, Johns Hopkins, Carnegie Mellon

The depth of material covered at an elite engineering school compared to an average school is like night and day. Compare the material covered on the Physics B AP, the Physical C AP and the freshman physics class at a school like SUNY Albany and one like RPI (never mind a school like MIT).

There difference is like night and day. That is why people from the great schools often take the harder classes during the summer at their local college - the course is easier, the level of understanding required is lower, and there is less material covered

UB

world's best coffee drinker wrote:

I don't think anyone is arguing against these two points. However, ON AVERAGE, more people are going to be doing higher quality work at the better schools. If you had to invest in 100 start-up companies out of Stanford or 100 from Wichita State, which would you choose?

It isn't just "connections and networks" either.

"On average" based on what? Where are you getting this from? If I had to invest in startup companies, I would invest in the ones that make sense. It would have nothing to do with where they went to school. No sensible investor would pick a startup just because of their school.

jdjd wrote:

world's best coffee drinker wrote:

I don't think anyone is arguing against these two points. However, ON AVERAGE, more people are going to be doing higher quality work at the better schools. If you had to invest in 100 start-up companies out of Stanford or 100 from Wichita State, which would you choose?

It isn't just "connections and networks" either.

"On average" based on what? Where are you getting this from? If I had to invest in startup companies, I would invest in the ones that make sense. It would have nothing to do with where they went to school. No sensible investor would pick a startup just because of their school.

Of course you wouldn't pick based on that alone. What I proposed is something called a thought experiment. Thought experiments are hypothetical situations that allow you to reach some sort of insight. Pretend (to clarify what this means, you aren't actually going to do this...it is just make-believe and you have to follow the constraints) that you HAVE to invest your entire life savings in a fund that holds stake in 100 start up companies. You can either invest in fund A, where the 100 companies were founded by (or originated from labs at) Stanford or you can invest in fund B where the companies were founded by grads of (or originated from labs at) Wichita State. Because this is a hypothetical situation (that means it is just pretend), you have no other information. Which fund would you invest in and why?

You really do not get it do you. They do physics in high school; does that mean when you take mechanics at CalTech it will be the same as when you take it at CalStat3e DH? Now, you (I think) have acceded that those top few schools are different but the same applies throughout the curriculum. Just repeating the statement does not make it correct. You are providing no facts, just an assertion that it makes no difference who your lab partner is, who your TA is, which programs they link up with for grad school, who the recommendation letters are from and what they say.

Take UW-Platteville, a reasonable school with engineering as a specialty. You will not the same students in your classes as if you went to UW-Madison.

Your peers make for a big portion of the educational process. Take a look at the UC schools, so now we are talking about the same university with a common application. There is a very definite peeking order from Berkeley to UCLA, UCSD, UC-Davis/UCSB, ... UC-RIverside, UC Merced (guessing based on entry scores, acceptance scores etc.

Now, if you go to a school like Oregon State, there will be a big difference if you are in the Honors College rather than a regular student, and you will take many of the classes with this differentiated subset and it will make a significant difference.

Now, a bit counter to my comments in your direction, but only a bit is this issue. Do you want to be the big fish in a small pond, a small fish in a big pond, etc. I think that you do not want to be the borderline admit if there is a wide range, but you do not want to be too far above or below because you will be bored/under-educated (relative to potential) or you will be scrambling and always on the edge. I ended up being above the level enough to stand out but got academic late enough that the mid-level state school worked ok because I went to a decent grad school with funding.

It's a really dumb hypothetical question. It's like saying do I want to be kicked in the face or kicked in the stomach. I don't want to be kicked anywhere.

Again, it's a really poor question and I can't answer it without more information unless I'm flipping a coin. It's like me asking you, would you rather invest in people named Charles or people named William. There's no rational explanation for your choice if there's no more information. It's just flipping a coin or deciding that you like Ws better than Cs.

Now, if I had more information like what industry is the startup in, then I could offer an answer. There are plenty of reasons to pick Wichita start ups over Stanford startups.

And if you're about to repeat that this is a hypothetical question, then that's dumb because it in no way contributes to the subject that we're talking about. I know you think that you're making a point, but you're not.

What you have said is true, if you believe that there is absolutely no difference between Wichita and Stanford. Do you really believe that? If, so just come out and say it instead of playing dumb and saying "Gee golly...there is no way I could ever answer this question."

The question is not stupid and is answerable if you believe that there is even a modicum of difference between these kinds of schools.

Actually, you know what...my question is DEFINITIVELY answerable based on ONLY the information I gave. It is called probabilistic thinking. That is why I said 100 companies instead of 1....hell we could make it 10,000 companies.

world's best coffee drinker wrote:

Actually, you know what...my question is DEFINITIVELY answerable based on ONLY the information I gave. It is called probabilistic thinking. That is why I said 100 companies instead of 1....hell we could make it 10,000 companies.

Sure, your question is answerable, but not in any way that supports your viewpoint. Your question is purely a cointoss without knowing more information.

You want me to say that I'd rather pick the Stanford startups because it's Stanford. But the problem is I don't agree with that. There are industries and types of companies that I would never (well at least not before Wichita) invest in from Stanford.

So again your hypothetical question is irrelevant and silly. Without more information, it's 50/50.

Iwant2run wrote:

I have done a lot of research on good schools with teams that I could make, but I want to know if anyone has an suggestions of schools I haven't heard of or researched yet? Thanks!

What schools have you looked at?

jdjd wrote:

world's best coffee drinker wrote:

Actually, you know what...my question is DEFINITIVELY answerable based on ONLY the information I gave. It is called probabilistic thinking. That is why I said 100 companies instead of 1....hell we could make it 10,000 companies.

Sure, your question is answerable, but not in any way that supports your viewpoint. Your question is purely a cointoss without knowing more information.

You want me to say that I'd rather pick the Stanford startups because it's Stanford. But the problem is I don't agree with that. There are industries and types of companies that I would never (well at least not before Wichita) invest in from Stanford.

So again your hypothetical question is irrelevant and silly. Without more information, it's 50/50.

You never answered my question: do you believe that there is a difference in education between schools?