Which college?

There's a big difference between chemistry and chemical engineering. You should investigate the curricula for these two programs so you have a feel for what they constitute. You will not lose much by not making the final decision until completion of your freshman year, however.

What do you envision yourself doing (i.e., work) after you get these degree(s)? This should heavily influence your choice of Chem vs Ch. E.

I'm skeptical of the cost/benefit ratio for the English degree. Do practice writing whenever possible, however.

You are going to have to work your ass off no matter which school you choose. Competition will be stiffer at the better school, however.

If you have any extra money left over, give it back to those who earned it.

One more thing I forgot to put this in the my first post: college B (the hard one) has a 5-year MS program. I don't know if that's worth considering in my decision. What do you guys think?

The harder college of the two is the less competitive in this case. It has a cooperative environment, not a competitive one. These are rare at the top so I probably gave away which college it is right there. Ah hell, it's the California Institute of Technology.

What kind of math do chemical engineers work with? I took a year of AP BC [college level] calculus so far and found it quite easy. Got a very high score on the practice AP exam, so I'm not the kind to be scared off by a few integrals, esp. armed with my trusty TI-89. Polar area integrals? I call those breakfast.

As for working my ass off, yes. A and B have different standards of this, though. A's standard = more hours a week spent studying than boozing. B's standard = 27 hours of work a day. Sleep is on your time.

Like I said before, I can handle this. I only use these adjectives because they really are accurate. If official sugar-coated tour guide info and independent college guide descriptions agree, I'd call it accurate. They also say their admissions comitee never makes a mistake, so I have good odds of surviving there. Still, I understand your point.

I got some clarification on grad school from a teacher. He says it's mostly free if you do research and TA work, which most people do anyways. I guess that price isn't so important after all. Still, it's a factor.

Truth be told, this is a difficult question to consider for many scholars who have worked tenaciously for acceptance into a great school. It is my personal opinion that where you go for your undergraduate is not as important as where you get your masters and respective doctorate. However, I've heard from people that have been in both scenarios (same as you: some went to a Harvard or a Princeton, others went to a Purdue for undergrad.), some claim that going to a top name school gives you the edge in getting selected for a highly competitive/prestigious masters program at another school. Still, I know people that went to say, a state school, but then ended up going to a top name school to do their advanced degrees anyways. To distill the essence of it for you (again, my opinion/understanding), is that if you distinguish yourself in a small to medium state or private school (while saving money) then you can easily attend an even better school. Much depends on your grades and test scores, also, a good portion is how well liked/supported/respected you are by your professors. If they see your dedication and knowledge reflected in high marks and independent study, you in turn will see it when you go to grad school. Always remember that your intelligence is by no means unique, plenty of people score near perfects on their SAT: better to be the big fish in the small pond.


Oh, as an aside: I do love my Ti-89 calculator too! I've had it for about 6 years and it has served me well; in fact, I'll never buy another type of calculator again. I particularly like graphing (x,y,z) on it Saved my butt on several occasions late at night when I remembered with disdain that I don't have Excel on my laptop but needed to integrate GC/MS results. Mathematically speaking, I'm lazy. I'm familiar with BC calculus which, if I remember correctly, is the harder version, and if you can pull out a 5 on your test, then you'll be fine.



Ultimately, it's not where you go at first, it's where you end up and the perseverance you possess. Since you've done well enough to get accepted into the colleges, then feel confident that you can handle the work load, just remember, they will have high expectations (although that depends on professors again ).

As a chemical engineer (depending what you aim to do in it) you will work with calculus (integrals and differentials in all their myriad varieties), but you'll still work with calculus as a chemist too! Again, you'll be fine with that since you obviously like math. Just remember as BetaBee pointed out, you may plan on being a chemist at first, but don't be suprised if you end up something else....like a neurosurgeon (16 year investment but it's a good one) or maybe a sanitation engineer. Who knows where you'll end up? Just another facet to the mystery that is life.

[Edited on 28-4-2006 by Fleaker]

Near-perfect SATs? Nope. I was actually at the lower end of the spectrum here. Okay, but not <i>that</i> good.

Turns out I was wrong about the 5-year MS program. It is 4 years, but I think it can also be done in 5. Some programs have it, some don't. But a 4 year MS at that place...wow.

After talking to an undergrad at Caltech I feel less terrified of going there. Some of the harder courses I took in high school should have prepared me. And trust me, I took some hard classes.

Caltech will give me more flexibility. The honors program at the other place is only for people majoring in the hard sciences, so if I take chemical engineering or the like, I loose my status and become no better than the average [drunken] student.

B isn't a small state school. It is a large state school with 14k undergrads. Could I distinguish myself in a place that big?

It's possible, I've got a madscientist reputation coming along quite well, and I am in a rather large university.

I don't know if it is like this everywhere, but in all of my calculus courses no sort of calculator is allowed.

Exactly the way it should be (and is, in all math courses I've taken to date ). How can you expect to get an instinctive grasp of the subject when you use a calculator that just gives you the answers?

Tim

EPIC BUMP!!!

I don't know how the University of Wisconsin stands today but if you would have asked me back when I was getting my BSChE in the '60s I would have said that it was the center of the ChE universe. Professors Hougen, Watson, & Ragatz wrote "Chemical Process Principles," (vols, I, II, & III), a very good text book series, IMO. Hougen & Ragatz were at U of W. The standard text, "Transport Phenomena," was also written by U of W professors, Bird, Stewart, & Lightfoot.

I would suspect that the U of W girls could also stack up well against any "Cal girls."

Quote: Originally posted by zoombafu

Seeing as there already was a thread that mentioned cal tech, i figured id keep the forums cleaner by just adding on to this post. Im looking at Cal Tech, UC Berkley, and Stanford for a degree in chemical engineering. Ultimately I want a doctorate/phd and would like to work as a research chemist developing pharmaceuticals or something similar to that. Has anyone on this forum had any experience with these schools? (Or suggestions for others)

Its idiotism not using calculator i university you learning higer mathematic not 2+2 and how can you calculate logarithms wihtout it do you use table or slide rule for it .