Where to take an engineering degree?

September 12, 2007 5:41 AM

I'm about to finish my first year of an engineering degree, and am unsure about the direction to take it in.

Next year we're required to begin specialising our degrees: so far I've just taken a general stream of engineering and math courses. I don't particularly enjoy / have any affinity with software / computer / electronic engineering, but am open to pretty much everything else: mech, mining, materials, chem, civil, aero, whatever.

I suppose what I'm most worried about is that I'll pick a specialisation that sounds interesting, but for which the reality of most jobs in the field is killing drudgery. Ideally I'd like to get into R&D, or at least some kind of work that's consistently interesting. Money isn't an issue, nor are my marks. Any engineers out there who really love their jobs?

posted by nicolas léonard sadi carnot to education (18 comments total)

Probably stay away from civil.

A very big factor should be the quality of each department at your school. Try to find a sense of which departments' students are the most interested in and satisfied with their major. If you go to class with good professors and intelligent students it will be much better.

EE, CE, ChemE, and MechE are the four "big" ones in the sense that things like aero or mining are much more niche. Nothing wrong with that either way.

So far, no piece of software has convinced me that there's anything that deserves to be called "software engineering" in wide practice anywhere.
posted by TheOnlyCoolTim at 6:22 AM on September 12, 2007

There will always be drudgery in a job, that is why it's called "work". School is drudgery.

For R&D type work you are probably better off in mechanical or chemical engineering. Plan on at least getting a master's degree and keep your grades high. If you do this, you will have a better chance on getting into the more interesting companies.
posted by JJ86 at 6:22 AM on September 12, 2007

chemical engineering
Avoid this.
posted by yoyo_nyc at 6:33 AM on September 12, 2007

I'm an EE (practicing systems engineering) with a job I love, but I think materials science is pretty cool, too -- get into failure analysis and break shit! We're seeing a glut of MEs at the moment, both at my company (lots of ME applicants, few openings) and where I went to school (lots of MEs emailing me to ask if we have openings because they haven't found anything else). However, your spelling indicates non-US, so YJobMarketMV.

Can you think of something you might want to work on (robots? Space? Teeny tiny things no one can see? Giant farm equipment? Macaroni and cheese?)? "R&D" is very vague, though I know you are only starting your second year, so I don't expect you to know the exact answer.
posted by olinerd at 6:42 AM on September 12, 2007

I work in sales/purchasing for a small OEM and we have "sales engineers." These "engineers" are people who become very familiar with a product or product line and have the technical know-how to sell it to engineers, buyers and heads of corporations. If you're an engineer, you may do better by selling your knowledge instead of "actual" engineering.
posted by winks007 at 6:45 AM on September 12, 2007

Materials is actually to where I was leaning - we've got a pretty solid traditional materials faculty, as well as some interesting allied stuff happening - an ARC centre for functional nanomaterials, lots of work in biomaterials, lots of stuff happening in minerals processing.

As far as I know, every flavour of engineer is in demand here - Australia, that is - with mining most of all.
posted by nicolas léonard sadi carnot at 6:50 AM on September 12, 2007

In my five years as a civil engineer I have designed several miles of road, a few taxiways, completed a bathymetric survey, designed miles and miles of water/sewer/stormwater piping, reconfigured a reverse osmosis plant, done long-range water supply planning for my city, and too many other jobs to list. I have traveled across America and a little outside. Sometimes I sit in my office for weeks trying to solve a problem on paper. Other times I am in the field on construction sites telling workers where to dig. Civil engineering is all the stuff that the other engineers don't do. It certainly hasn't been drudgery for me.
posted by Uncle Jimmy at 7:01 AM on September 12, 2007 [2 favorites]

Someplace I recall reading that half of the engineering grads in the US are no longer paid to do any engineering five years down the road. I finished undergrad as a ME in 1980 and have been doing engineering ever since.

The way I got into R&D is by studying broadly, avoiding specialization, working with people who had something to teach me, and remaining with mostly small companies. No job I have ever had has been a love fest. They've all had enough fun stuff to do that probably 80% of the time I'm glad to go in to work.

There will always be a shortage of -good- engineers though there are plenty of people who have engineering degrees. You can generally tell who's into the work and who's into the money after a few minutes' conversation.

You can pick up a lot of whatever interests you by working with people who can already do it; therefore, I would take a few years before getting my MS. It's entirely conceivable you'll develop interest in something you don't like or can't stand now, and want to take that up. My MS is in physics, which I thought was a little too abstract early on, but I really liked optics and needed background.
posted by jet_silver at 8:53 AM on September 12, 2007

Uncle Jimmy: I have a friend who's really considering Civil Engineering, but he's concerned that he won't get to do any design if he takes that route. When you get some free time, would you mind contacting me through email? It's in my profile.
posted by DMan at 8:59 AM on September 12, 2007

I am a Mechanical Engineer working in the Oil & Gas industry.

I can't comment on the appeal of other disciplines but in my experience the biggest factor for me in terms of job satisfaction has been the company I've been working for and my colleagues. Different companies have had me bored or energised, all doing substantially the same work. Whatever discipline you decide on, vet the companies you join carefully and the rest will hopefully follow.

The other thing is this: if money is important to you, try to choose a lucrative speciality now - competition will be fierce if you decide to jump to another area of expertise once you have been working for a few years.

Good luck!
posted by SpacemanRed at 9:05 AM on September 12, 2007

Avoid civil? Avoid chemical? Um, why?

There's lots of amazing research going on in any engineering field. THe way to discover this is to talk to professors, try to get research assistant jobs over the summer, go out for co-op jobs, and so-on. But you can get a feel for what kind of research is going on just by browsing the websites of each department. You may find that some specialization speaks to you more than others.

Think carefully about what you believe is important. If, for example, it's environment and sustainability, there are probably more opportunities in chemical and civil than there would be in ,say, mechanical
posted by PercussivePaul at 9:05 AM on September 12, 2007

To expand on what PercussivePaul is talking about: you have to make some level of decision between corporate R&D and academic research, not that it's impossible or unlikely to switch or anything. But getting a master's and working for some company will be different than going for your Ph.D. and becoming a professor. Also you'll find that there are thesis-based master's and class-based ones, all schools don't necessarily offer both, and you probably want a thesis-based master's if you want research experience. If you decide by senior year that you want your Ph.D., you can generally apply for direct admission to that program and not have to pay for a master's, though getting in that way is harder. (If you didn't know, engineering Ph.D. students tend to get paid a little bit to go to school, not the other way around.)
posted by TheOnlyCoolTim at 9:53 AM on September 12, 2007

I'm a fourth year mechanical engineering undergrad in Canada. I have four months of school left (Jan-Apr 2008) and between now and Christmas I'm rounding out my sixth and final co-op work term. I work at Toyota this term. In my 5 other internships I have worked in France, at Research In Motion, at my university doing superconductor research, and at a US Navy defense contractor.

Two main points that I will expand on if you like (e-mail in profile):
1) Try your best to do co-op internships to decide in a general sense between academic-type research (often called primary research) and application, which is more hands-on. A little more specifically on the application side you have to decide (in mech eng anyway) between design, manufacturing, project management, and consulting. For that matter, do you want to work for a company, or consulting at many?

And how do you decide on all of this?

2) Get some experience (co-op type experience) in every field. As tempting as it may be to return to an employer for a second internship, unless it's a really big company you won't get the diversified first-hand experience you need to make the decisions in (1).

I don't want to seem too self-serving here, but I wrote a synopsis of the mechanical engineering program at my university (other programs at UW, fyi). I believe from the accounts of my colleagues at other universities that this is sufficiently general to be of use to you.

To summarize: mech is anything that moves. Planes, trains, cars, guns, farm equipment, windmills. You name it, a mechanical engineer has had their hand in it. If you start in civil, or chemical you will have transferrable skills and the experience won't hurt you, in my experience.

Good luck, and as I said my e-mail is in my profile if you want more information.
posted by KevCed at 10:14 AM on September 12, 2007

One key point that I want to stress but didn't think of until after I clicked post:

It is crucial you pick something you are passionate about. It is far easier to find a way to make money doing something you are passionate about than it is to find a way to be passionate with something you make money at.

Don't chase money in high dollar fields. Every field goes through rich and poor.
posted by KevCed at 10:16 AM on September 12, 2007

If you want to do R&D, I'd highly recommend an engineering science. I've just started second year mechanical engineering, but I have friends doing engineering chemistry, engineering physics and applied mathematics engineering. They are all going to have vastly more theoretical knowledge than I am at the end of our degrees. (These are the people that get the ridiculously cool research summer jobs).

Personally I would prefer to have more practical knowledge, but I have no doubt that these are the people that will be the "consistently interesting" stuff.

Nanotech, environmental and nuclear sound like the easy way to make sure you are doing something innovative.
posted by Ctrl_Alt_ep at 1:21 PM on September 12, 2007

Someplace I recall reading that half of the engineering grads in the US are no longer paid to do any engineering five years down the road.

To expand on this with some reasons:

Most companies still don't have any sort of technical ladder. If you are going to get promoted, you will (often) end up leaving engineering and move into management.

For now, there is a lot of money and a lot of jobs in consulting and banking. Many of these go to people trained in engineering because of the way you will learn how to think.

There are a lot of self-starters and entrepreneurs that don't fall into the "paid to be engineers" box.

As for your more immediate question, if you want to do R&D, look at the fields where there is (and will be 3-10 years from now) money for R&D in the private sector or for the government. Right now, it's biotech, nanotech, and somuch health-related stuff. Those draw heavily on materials and chemical engineering, as well as mechanical and electrical.

posted by whatzit at 3:17 PM on September 12, 2007

I am a Mechanical Engineer working at a metal castings facility. I think your best bet is talk with a career counselor or interview people who are in engineering jobs/fields that you are interested in. Since you are a student find time to call engineers at companies that seem intersting to you or are involved in diverse fields. Even in a large single company you can have many engineers of the same type doing vastly different jobs. In my experience good engineers can adapt between industries, so I wouldn't worry too much about picking exactly the right specialty.

I persoanlly have worked in electrical utilities, manufacturing, aerospace, and now in the casting industry. Each one has its drudgery, but each one aslo has its interests. Take the courses and specialization you enjoy the most now. In five years you may want to do something different, but a good engineer is always marketable.
posted by senador at 4:05 PM on September 12, 2007

I missed whatzit's comments. Engineering does teach you the problem solving skills that are very adapatble. Research , problem solving, and learning, are all things engineers have to excel at by virtue of the profession.
posted by senador at 4:08 PM on September 12, 2007