Hey everyone, was looking for some input please! I just finished my Associates in Mechanical Engineering Technology and am looking to move on to my BS degree. I got accepted to Rochester Institute of Technology and Temple University. RIT has the traditional MET degree, while Temple has a BSET which is a bachelors of science in engineering technology. Would it look “bad” to go get the degree from Temple, because it doesn’t sound as “specialized”? Or in the end does it not really matter because it looks like most job listings just say an engineering technology related degree as the requirement? Reason I ask is because Temple would be a quicker way to finish (they told me 3 semesters based on my credits) and cheaper, so I am considering it. RIT I am looking at another 3 yrs, however a year of that is co-ops. Any insight into the differences in degrees from your experience would be greatly appreciated.
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IMO, I’d go with RIT. Even though you have experience from earlier in your life, you’re going to need good co-op experience to stand out above other recent grads, esp. with so many experienced workers competing for the same jobs these days. RIT has pretty extensive facilities that are available to you as well, you should be able to build some great skills while you’re there.
Why go quick and cheap on your education thats going to follow you around for quite some time? Congrats on getting accepted.
UB not an option? Rit is dumb expensive
I only pay $3100 a quarter ($10k/year) to go to RIT full time. Its not that bad if you can get some scholarships/grants. I’ve never heard of Temple University so I cant speak about them at all so my vote goes to RIT.
Either choice be sure to join their Formula SAE team ASAP, its a huge door opener and networking tool.
Thanks Walter, I should have known to track you down and just ask you, thanks man
And what travisn said…its expensive if you don’t have any scholarships/grants…but when you transfer in a 3.9 gpa they work with you pretty well 
Plus coming in as a 3rd year student, the quarters that are coop are free as far as tution goes because you are not taking classes, so that knocks off 1/3rd of the cost/year right there
Or Baja
but both baja and formula are top in the SAE world so whatever floats you boat. Login to SAE International
Aren’t the switching away from the quarter system?
2013
I really like how RIT does the coops. I went to UB and they didn’t offer anything like that. My brother in law goes to Kettering and they do the coops as well. Get in with a good company and they should offer you a nice job when your done. A schools name doesn’t do much for you, you’re just paying for the education and the connections. I’m a bsme and have hired some bamet’s for really nice positions.
Anyone I know who went to RIT got jobs right out which a lot had to do with their coop program. UB has a great engineering program too but you will need to take your own efforts to get internships and be prepared to work bitch work for companies to gain “experience”. My old roommate pretty much revised CAD drawings for a local company his senior year and got a job right out. Just gotta take the effort to do more than your class work if you wanna do something after college.
Congrats Jay! I have no engineering school input though, lol.
First off, congrats. Temple and RIT are great schools… personally, I think I’d rather get out of rochester for reasons other than the schooling… Philly is an awesome city (doubt thats really a priority of yours)
As for the programs, I dont have the knowledge to help you make an educated decision. Perhaps look at avg salaries per program? acceptance rates into grad programs? grad rates? job placement histories? etc etc.
How old are you? are you married? where do you live currently?
ub grads dont have as much “hands on” experience when it comes to actually working in the field. too much theory, and ive been told that the professors there teach that you wouldnt do any cad work, and that designers will which is completely false. the ub grads that get hired here have very poor cad skills, as we have been shifting to where the engineering/design and cad layout/work is done by the same people, especially with new software such as revit. this is in the a/e world, i imagine it cant be much different in other areas. rit is a great school but i dont think its really going to make a difference over another school when getting a job. the only jobs that it will make a difference at is lame jobs where employees are a bunch of robots where the employer doesnt care about personality. when i was hired they told me after the fact they knew what to expect coming out of the school i did and that they didnt care what grades i had, just wanted to make sure i would fit in.
also, is your met degree in fact an as and not an aas? my cadd degree is an aas, all my bulshit courses were dropped in place of all the techinical classes from the met program. excellent degree in the workplace but the 4year schools dont see it as an actual degree. when i transfered to bsc they accepted my credits but i still have to take classes and needed the full requirements and not just half like a regular as or aa degree.
if i were in your shoes i would stick with a suny school that best suits your location and budget. a piece of paper is a piece of paper. but thats just my opinion.
Between those two it depends on what you want. I don’t think anybody’s going to split hairs about a bachelors in engineering technology vs bachelors in mechanical engineering technology. If you need to you can make your resume a bit vague and it becomes the same damn thing anyway. :snky: Either one will have the words “bachelors”, “engineering”, and “technology” on your resume right? The education line is more or less a check-box on a resume. When you’re looking at candidates you skim that and then get on to the rest of the resume where you find out more telling info about the candidate.
If you are pursuing a piece of paper to open some doors then I’d say go to Temple and get it done in half the time, but it sounds like you’ll have the same work experience on your resume before and after? If you are pursuing a more deep change in work-life then I’d go to RIT and get more education and more engineering work experience than you could get on your own once you have your hall pass from Temple.
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Everywhere I’ve worked sees drafting as fairly low value-add work so lesser qualified and lower paid designers do the drawing so the engineers spend their time doing higher value-add work. I’ve been out of school for 6 1/2 years (wow, fuckin a) and can hardly use CAD at all because I’ve always had people who do that for me. :P[COLOR=“Silver”]
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like i said, might be different in other fields, but here at a multi-office international level A/E firm, more and more the engineers and designers are becoming the same person. its more efficient and alot of times makes more sense as BIM and its associated software such as revit progresses. just something ive been noticing in the last few years.
edit…what im trying to say is it might be a good idea to chose a program that does have some of the design/cad work and “hands on” involvment as well, some schools have more of this then others. it might be better in the long run in the workplace or when finding a job.
haha actually it is funny you say that, part of the reason I considered Temple this long is because its not in NY! So it does factor some in the final decision. As a whole as far as jobs go, there does seem to be more up here than down in PA, but at the same time I really don’t want to stay in the area once I am done with school either. Which brings me to my reasoning for liking the RIT coops so much because I don’t have to stay local to do those. Temple I’d be more networking on my own because they do not have a coop program believe it or not.
And I’m 29, not married, living in West Seneca
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Good point on the resume Fry… thats what I have been kinda thinking in my mind, that the job requirements are always so vague that they just want someone with a degree in engineering technology, rather than calling out a more specific discipline. Also true on the work experience comment…if I go to Temple I wouldn’t be adding anything on top of what I have right now, but at RIT I would add through the coops. Sounds like its worth the extra time then to stick it out and go to RIT
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Good point on the resume Fry… thats what I have been kinda thinking in my mind, that the job requirements are always so vague that they just want someone with a degree in engineering technology, rather than calling out a more specific discipline. Also true on the work experience comment…if I go to Temple I wouldn’t be adding anything on top of what I have right now, but at RIT I would add through the coops. Sounds like its worth the extra time then to stick it out and go to RIT
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and 95dime, its an AAS in Mechanical Engineering Technology that I have right now, every one of my classes transfers over to RIT and ALMOST all of them transfer to Temple
No.
He’s gay.
Gay, gay, gay!!!
And he doesn’t return phone calls…
i would check to be certain they do, when i transfered to a 4 year i had alot of classes that were “accepted and transfered” but they came in as classes that didnt even exist. they accepted the credit but im stuck retaking all the classes and after trying to protest it i still have to take them. as for the aas, i assume you are aware of all the extra classes you will need to take since it is not an aa/as. im actually going to have 145 credits for a 124 credit 4 year program because of this bulshit. my buddy is going through the same exact thing right now, and nccc and bsc had an agreement that was supposed to make this easy, well not so the case. the tech board at nccc is actually looking into reworking the agreement with bsc to try and fix some of these issues.
i imagine other schools will be the same way.
trust me, i’ve checked and made sure 
i’ve been picking out my courses every semester at ECC with the advisor from RIT the whole time with the intent on transferring once I was done here. They had a file on me at RIT before I even applied there and I have a full layout of what came in and what is left to take. No hidden suprises there, sorry to hear it worked out differently for you and your buddy??
i find it hard to believe that they will actually accept and use all the classes towards your degree considering you have not decided what program you will be taking. most likely will be accepted as some bulshit class and youll be taking another engineering course that is almost identical. that way they still get their money from you being there longer.
youre still stuck taking all the extra bulshit general classes though to meet the schools requirements for a “well rounded” student as your aas degree isnt an actual “transfer” degree at 4 year schools. with regular aa/as degrees the requirements are cut in half(im talking the history, art, humanities, etc etc) because those classes at ecc were substituted with the more technical/enginneering classes at ecc. best of luck, hope they do actually use the classes and you dont have to take a bunch of extra crap. that would be pretty awesome.