Best-paying college major: engineering

[Imdmn04]

GPA matters to an extent, depending on the company and the hiring manager, for your first job (because you have no other paper qualifications to be judged upon). But what matters more is the interview, if you can answer the technical questions, we will be more flexible on the offer, provided your personality meshes with the company culture.

You can negotiate on your first job (+-10 percent), but you don't have that much leverage, at least not as much as a senior engineer. Don't try to sell me on your "potential", every fresh grad tries to do that, it is played out. A few questions I can tell whether you slept through class or actually paid attention. Intelligence is overrated, work ethics is underrated for the jr positions, most of the jr engineering positions doesn't require IQ that is greater than 100 as long as you work hard.

 

[the DRIZZLE]

I was so lazy in college. I spurned the ultra intensive engineering courses at my elite university (Friday/Saturday night homework?! Fuck that!!) for the Social Sciences.

Thank God for the MBA/NYC/Banking/Consulting industry for the pseudo-lazy/frat guys! I would be fucked earning shit pay otherwise!

In retrospect, I would put up with the BS hours in the major and do engineering. It's much more interesting than the BS/scheister services industry.

Eh the grass is always greener. I worked hard in my engineering program in undergrad and didn't care much for the industry. I'm getting my MBA now.

 

[Hacp]

<-- graduating in chemical engineering in about 3 weeks.

Been applying to jobs for 6 months even technician work I'm overqualified for, easily 100+ places. Not a single reply. No experience no thanks and entry level jobs probably get swarmed by better qualified graduates.

Sad engineer, I have a useless paper and a useless ring to show for all my hard work.

Yes its a hard time to graduate with nothing on your resume. I had to join a club and do undergraduate research just so I could put something on my resume. What a pain. Thats at least 15 hours a week dedicated to these activities just so I can put something on the resume, not even guarantee anything.

 

[JTsyo]

Much better than the 32K I got starting out, though that was 10 years ago.

 

[Bignate603]

The best way to get a big jump in pay is to jump companies.

Or hint that you're considering leaving. I did that last year during my performance review. Our company wasn't doing any raises that year for anyone, but after mentioning that I was thinking of leaving I got a 12% bump in pay. Of course, your boss could always call your bluff and say "Good luck at your new job".

 

[overst33r]

Wish this was true in FL...

I graduated BSME last August with a 3.4 GPA and 2 years of co-op experience. Finally got a job thru an agency working as a contractor for $40k. I wonder what the people who get 60k jobs do differently...

 

[Bignate603]

Wish this was true in FL...

I graduated last August with a 3.4 GPA and 2 years of co-op experience. Finally got a job thru an agency working as a contractor for $40k. I wonder what the people who get 60k jobs do differently...

A big part of it is being willing to move anywhere. If you want to live in a specific area you'll be much more limited.

 

[overst33r]

A big part of it is being willing to move anywhere. If you want to live in a specific area you'll be much more limited.

Yeah, I've put in applications for lots of out of state positions. Even though I might qualify, companies aren't flying people out for interviews on a dime like they used to.

 

[Vette73]

A big part of it is being willing to move anywhere. If you want to live in a specific area you'll be much more limited.

THIS!!!

So many people want to stay in one place. I moved from NC to north VA, yet I HATE cold weather. I also had to take a pay cut. But it had other option to where I can, and do, make more now and have more options.

 

[polarmystery]

1. It's northrop grumman.

2. Northrop grumman should be removed from your list.

While they are a large defense contractor, they do not compensate competitively and tend to lose out on the best of new grads.

NGC offered me 20&#37; more than Lockheed and Boeing.

-Electrical Engineer

 

[DougK62]

These numbers seem optimistic to me unless you live in a major metro area. They're saying that the average college graduate with any degree starts at about ~$50k? That's quite high.

 

[Capt Caveman]

Yes its a hard time to graduate with nothing on your resume. I had to join a club and do undergraduate research just so I could put something on my resume. What a pain. Thats at least 15 hours a week dedicated to these activities just so I can put something on the resume, not even guarantee anything.

That's what college is for, you shouldn't have been a slacker then.

 

[Vette73]

These numbers seem optimistic to me unless you live in a major metro area. They're saying that the average college graduate with any degree starts at about ~$50k? That's quite high.

Thats probable average. Once you factor in the 100k+ people and they probable remove those that do not get jobs and bamm, 50k average.

 

[PingSpike]

Maybe its like the law school statistics where they use tons of shady moves to make the result look good.

 

[Rumpltzer]

NGC offered me 20% more than Lockheed and Boeing.

-Electrical Engineer

A circuit design manager keeps wondering why UCLA grads that we make offers to never accept them. He asks the prof and finds that Raytheon and HRL offers are always better.

When I was offered, the work opportunity was the most appealing part of the offer. The offer and benefits were not that appealing compared to where I already was. I had to ask for more, and we played that game for a while.

Maybe it's an East Coast vs. West Coast thing.

-PhD.EE

 

[Regs]

It's good to see a major that educates people in a business that actually makes tangible objects yielding good income.

 

[vshah]

engineering ftw! i had a <2.5gpa and had 3x 60-70k offers

i must smell really good or something

 

[ussfletcher]

Yeah, I've put in applications for lots of out of state positions. Even though I might qualify, companies aren't flying people out for interviews on a dime like they used to.

I've been flown out twice in the last year for internship interviews. It really just depends on your field of study, Computer Engineering still seems to be in demand.

 

[yh125d]

Basically, after you turn 45 or older, you're likely out of work, and getting new positions becomes exponentially harder the older you get. Age discrimination is a huge issue in engineering.

One particularly good way an engineer can add valuable skills to his skillset easily, and make himself a notably better hire while still making good money is to work for a while as a draftsman. Engineers and draftsmen almost always work closely together, and an engineer who knows his shit about drafting the stuff he's working on is invaluable. And if there are no engineering jobs readily available in your field in your area, drafting still pays well

 

[ShawnD1]

One particularly good way an engineer can add valuable skills to his skillset easily, and make himself a notably better hire while still making good money is to work for a while as a draftsman. Engineers and draftsmen almost always work closely together, and an engineer who knows his shit about drafting the stuff he's working on is invaluable. And if there are no engineering jobs readily available in your field in your area, drafting still pays well

That and an engineer who can't draw is completely useless. If you know what you're trying to make, you can do it yourself in one go instead of passing it back and forth.

"Based on your description, here is what I drew"
"Well ya see this won't work because this wire is wrong and the relay is upside down and you drew it normally open when it's really normally closed"


Every engineer should learn how to draw. Starting your career as a drafter is good because at least you learn how to properly draw things.

 

[yh125d]

That and an engineer who can't draw is completely useless. If you know what you're trying to make, you can do it yourself in one go instead of passing it back and forth.

"Based on your description, here is what I drew"
"Well ya see this won't work because this wire is wrong and the relay is upside down and you drew it normally open when it's really normally closed"


Every engineer should learn how to draw. Starting your career as a drafter is good because at least you learn how to properly draw things.

Sometimes it can even pay better. Our in-house engineer was moonlighting as a drafter back in the day. His boss where he was as an engineer found out and told him to stop moonlighting or quit. He was making more drafting at the time so he quit his engineering job


And speaking AS a drafter/designer, engineers who have worked as drafters before are our best friends.

 

[96Firebird]

I'm curious, what graduating engineer won't know how to draft? The part-time job that I mentioned earlier in this thread is actually a draftsman position. I am pretty much converting 2D AutoCAD drawings into 3D Solidworks parts, because none of the guys at this fairly small company know how to use Solidworks. It seems to me that all (mechanical, at least) engineers should know how to use Solidworks or something similar (Pro/E, Inventor, etc...).

 

[Imp]

One particularly good way an engineer can add valuable skills to his skillset easily, and make himself a notably better hire while still making good money is to work for a while as a draftsman. Engineers and draftsmen almost always work closely together, and an engineer who knows his shit about drafting the stuff he's working on is invaluable. And if there are no engineering jobs readily available in your field in your area, drafting still pays well

I'm one of those suckers. Graduated as Engineer, got a job as a tech. I hated CAD, but was forced to use it and to learn ArcGIS. Almost all of the engineers in training I'm officially a bitch to have no CAD skills, hate it and won't try (female are notorious for this), or were never trained.

With GIS, company put me through a 3 day course, I picked everything else up off Google. Now I'm one of a few competent GIS users in the building, and it's a transferable skill for anything that involves more than a lot of land; I work in the highway industry.

 

[IAteYourMother]

BS in ChemE this June...

 

[Saint Nick]

Anything with information sciences, computer sciences, or engineering is a safe bet. Same with the healthcare field. Anything else is pretty up in the air, even something like accounting or marketing.