Engineers!

Hey All,

As you may know I am an economics major. However a lot of you who are reading this may be looking into other majors, especially engineering. I personally do not know a lot about the engineering program, but my good friend here at Drexel is a Mechanical Engineering Major and is very involved in her major. Here is her Drexel experience thus far:

Hello all.
I’m a freshman mechanical engineering major in the five-year program. I hail from somewhere near the backwoods of New York State. When I was in your shoes last year, I had offers to attendDrexel, Stevens, RPI, RIT and WPI. Obviously, I choose Drexel, and I’m happy with that decision and want to convince you to come here too.
I’m taking calculus, physics, chemistry, bio, basic computer science, and English courses this year. What is so impressive about Drexel is what is offered outside the classroom. There are so many opportunities for academic, personal, and career growth here that is phenomenal. The first one that always gets brought up is co-op. By this point you might have some idea about how that works. But you may not be aware that there are very few schools that have a Co-op program integrated into the curriculum. At Drexel, most people do at least one, in a very well-organized system that offers a huge variety of companies and positions.
But Drexel has more than just co-op. We have the city of Philadelphia, a learning experience if I ever saw one. For any of you who, like me, are not from an urban home, its a huge adjustment, but one that will benefit you. More engineering jobs are in the city than the country. Not to mention the culture (museums, shows, orchestra, etc.) that you can find just outside your door.
We also have another rarity in an engineering school – a great study abroad program. Not many engineering schools even offer one country to study abroad in. Drexel is part of a global exchange where you can study abroad in over a dozen different countries. I’m planning on going to Hong Kong, and someone else I know is going to Turkey. For both of us, classes will be taught in English.
And for hands-on experience, we have ENGR-101, a three term course with projects and modules that give you an introduction to engineering. If that’s not enough for you, you can seek out faculty and ask to assist them with their research. Not all professors need assistants or take on freshmen as assistants, but no one can stop you from participating in engineering competitions. There are a few competitions Drexel participates in as a school and even more that various organizations participate in as Drexel’s representative. For example, I am in ASME, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, who recently sent a team to SPDC, an engineering competition held up in New York City. So if you want to be involved in engineering early on, I would join the organization for your major. Those groups do competitions, and the older members could answer questions you may have about approaching faculty to be a research assistant.

I don’t know how many of you are what major, but I can’t do something like this without promoting my own department. Mechanical engineering is a very large department with truly top-notch faculty. But there’s still an individual attention to students, because those professors, PhD’s doing amazing research, really do care about the students, and are willing to help them out if you just ask. I’m not just throwing generic reassurances out either. I do work-study in the Mechanical Engineering and Mechanics (MEM) department office. So I see first-hand the professors I won’t have until third year and the way they interact with students even outside class. And it makes me excited to me an MEM student.
When I came to visit Drexel as an Accepted Student, I was Undecided Engineering. The department head of Mechanical Engineering & Mechanics, Dr. Mun Choi, noticed that and spoke with me about MEM (which I was considering). He also told me about a scholarship offered by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers that I could apply for. He gave me his card and still remembers my name. After that, I switched major, applied for and got the scholarship. I also became an active member of ASME (which is free for freshmen to join, so you should do it when you get here- meet people and have fun). I went to weekly meetings, the Christmas party, some fun and/or informative events, and was nominated for and elected as secretary of ASME for next year. So that worked out really great for me.


If you have any questions feel free to ask me, if I can't answer them I will forward them to my friend and see if she can answer them for you.

-Mary Kate
DWC