Reputation of Purdue?

DerStrom8

Joined Feb 20, 2011
2,390
"&sparky, it appears your cambridge and oxford rank 5th and 6th in the world - http://www.timeshighereducation.co.u...ng-and-IT.html"

That suprises me. They won't like that one bit.

Another website says that Cambridge is second to MIT. :/ Everywhere has a different list - but with the usual suspects at the top.

Massive fees for MIT though! :eek: Cambridge is like a third of the cost!
I considered going to MIT but 1) I couldn't afford it, and 2) I didn't have time to take all the entrance exams and tests in order to get in. I did some research and found that (at the time, at least) Wentworth Institute of Technology was the second best Engineering school in the United States, right behind MIT. So that's where I ended up going. And now I'm right back there working as a lab technician/assistant!

It was a great school, though their fees have shot up. Still not as high as MIT's though.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
29,978
There always seems to be one university which bombards you with junk mail. :D
One?

I had a dresser drawer (a BIG drawer from an old-time dresser that was about 4ft wide, nearly 2ft deep and over a foot high) that I put all the letters from colleges that sent me stuff. Most of them I never even opened, but the drawer couldn't hold them all and I had to start on a second drawer.

Interestingly, I don't recall getting anything from Mines. Perhaps I did and just didn't pay it any attention.

I didn't even sign up for any lists (and this was way before the Internet was turned loose). It had to be from taking the SAT/ACT that automatically got you on every college's mailing list.
 

BSomer

Joined Dec 28, 2011
434
...It had to be from taking the SAT/ACT that automatically got you on every college's mailing list.
Perhaps that is why I never received any letters from anyone, as I never took the SAT/ACT. In the summer before my senior year in high school I had signed up to join the Marines, that may have been another factor as well. I never really thought much about it because I knew what I was going to be doing after graduating.
 

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
I served with an officer that graduated from purdue. He was a pompous douche. He wore his class ring with more pride than he did the uniform and bragged incessantly about it. Considering how much he bragged and that he was the only Purdue alumni I have ever met (that I know of), I actually assumed it was a very elite school.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
29,978
Don't read too much into the one guy -- every school (even some of the pretty bad ones) has its share of "ring knockers", people that are always "accidentally" bumping their ring against something to make noise and draw attention to it.

I don't wear a class ring, but I do wear an engineer's ring. On the rare occasions which someone asks about it, I tell them that it's the 'iron ring of failure'. If they ask for details, I'll give it to them. If they just nod and move on, that's fine too.

I've run across a few CSM ring-knockers over the years, but most people here seem pretty subdued on that point. How pompous can you be when your school song goes, "Like every honest fella, I take my whiskey clear. I'm a ramblin' wreck from Golden Tech, a helluva engineer!" Now, some people will notice the similarity to Georgia Tech's fight song, but they penned theirs in 1893 while CSM penned theirs within a couple years of the school's founding in 1876. But it was clearly based on earlier school songs, particularly Dickenson College, from the 1850 time frame.

One other interesting historical tidbit. Mines and CU-Boulder were originally in the same football league (1900 time frame). But Boulder and some other schools split off to form a new league because they got tired of getting not just beaten, but physically mauled by Mines, who had two or three undefeated seasons just before the split. Now, it has to be kept in mind that there wasn't a lot of money in college football or the big lure of profressional football back then, so football teams were just made of up students that wanted to play football. Now factor in to the equation the fact that many Mines students were frequently guys that had worked for years in the mines and oil fields at hard manual labor and were now seeking a mining or petroleum engineering degree; these really were guys that were big and strong and who drank hard, played hard, and fought hard.
 

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
I never heard of Colorado School of Mines before or after this thread, until today when I saw this license plate and it made me think of you WBahn.

 

Attachments

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
29,978
When I tell people that I went to the Colorado School of Mines, two common misperceptions are that I went to the Colorado School of Minds or the Colorado School of Mimes.
 

maxpower097

Joined Feb 20, 2009
816
Purdue has a great reputation. Their chicken division alone holds a 36% market share and their OxyContin holds a 24% market share. Its really got a strong rep!

j/k really its a good school. You hear of it like Cambridge, Brown, Cornell,etc...
 

GopherT

Joined Nov 23, 2012
8,009
Purdue is in the top 20 (US Rankings) for every one of their engineering programs. That means you can get a job at nearly any company in the US. Few would say, we don't recruit from there. If they do, it is only to simplify their HR recruiting process or reduce costs by keeping a small list of schools (not necessarily better list of schools).

The questions is, did you get accepted into the engineering program or the general university? Some schools say yes to most students and only accept students into the engineering program after the 2nd year. Make sure you are aware of your acceptance level before you start (if you haven't already). I think Purdue and Illinois have used this dual acceptance process recently.

Slightly off topic but...
Isn't it interesting that nobody seems to starts a major then changes TO engineering mid-way through their first year yet so many freshmen start as engineering majors and change to something else midway into their first year.
 
Thread starter Similar threads Forum Replies Date
loosewire Off-Topic 2
kubeek Feedback and Suggestions 14
C Feedback and Suggestions 6
Top