Before I came to college, I had heard of exchange programs and some other opportunities to study in other countries. I guess being in a diverse country like India my whole life has made me an admirer of different languages and cultural traditions. Coming to a college with a great deal of diversity and students from tens of countries around the world has made me even more of a sucker for linguistics and variety in culture.
Study abroad programs are specialised programs in which a student goes to another country for a specific time period to study language, and/or experience the culture and society. Many US colleges have mutually beneficial affiliations with many colleges abroad and also a ton of scholarships for study abroad programs. One may have options like :
1) Work in an African country like Tanzania with an NGO and study part time with that. This combines studying and an internship. Reason for stating Tanzania is that my roomate is going to do that program next year.
2) Go to Asia to a place like Japan if you're into oriental cultures and languages (Although i must confess that I never really was attracted to pictorial language scripts like Chinese and Japanese because I suck at art and anything remotely related to drawing scares me.). My second roomate is going to Japan in his last year.
3) Go to Europe to a place like Germany. This is what I want to do because I'm taking German language courses and always wanted to speak more German than just the common words they speak in German movies like "Schnell" and "Jawol".
At college, I discovered a vast array of study abroad programs in countries in almost all continents. (Well im pretty sure they dont have colleges down in Antarctica, so exclude that one. Also they say its pretty cold down there and all you'll get to eat is moss, penguin sandwiches and ice).
Well, people may raise a question - Why study abroad when we already know english? Its because every passing day, the firewalls between economies are disappearing and one needs to be a global citizen. Employers especially look at varied traits like proficiency in languages and cultural experiences positively.
I am posting the link to the Ohio state university study abroad site. Interested in how it works and what sort of programs are offered? check it out.
http://oia.osu.edu/component/option,com_frontpage/Itemid,1/
And surely there is one thing that a person can claim after studying abroad; global citizenship, which, unlike a national passport, doesn't expire after in 10 years.
Harit
Showing posts with label Co-Op. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Co-Op. Show all posts
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Engineering @ Purdue (US University)
I hear this many times that apart from MIT, Stanford and Berkley, getting into a decent engineering college in US is not difficult. I agree to that notion but the reality is surviving the engineering courses at those schools.
I think doing an undergrad engineering degree at Purdue, Georgia Tech, UIUC, UT Austin, Texas A & M, UMICH, Cornell, Carnegie Mellon, Virginia Tech is more or less the same. The curriculum of these colleges overlaps as much as 75%. So if you get an admission into any of these (or equivalent colleges) and are going to be 100% dedicated thereafter, only then it's worth spending $35k per annum. Also not to forget the drop out rate of engineering students in public schools like these are the highest in the nation. Hence this proves that just getting in is not important, surviving the classes is more important.
Unlike IIT wherin they expect every student to have mastered all the concepts of Physics, Chemistry & Calculus before entering the colleges, in US remember that if you like a program they will start basically from scratch and grow on that. (Though i am not saying that IIT are not good, they are good in there own sense). It's like looking at a pyramid from the top. Your course in Calculus may start with limits and 1st order differential equation but by the end of 16 week semester they would have covered vector calculus, partial differentiation and multiple integrals too. The same thing is applicable for the rest of the engineering courses in a decent University.
The first year has got some FYE course to be finished. These are the basic tools for succeeding in the professional engineering school. Only after finishing these courses one can be admitted to the desired engineering school. The courses are Calculus I, II, III, Physics I, II, Chemistry I, II, CAD modeling/GDT, Seminar Engineering series, English Language (writing), Communication (writtent and verbal), Computer engineering problem solving tools. Even though some of the first year classes may have class strength of 250-300 students, but these are just the lectures in which the instructor is one of the best in his/her field and would be actively involved in some ground breaking research; but along with these are recitation/labs consisting of 25-30 students taught by graduate/Phd student. This is just to give you a feel of what engineering classes in first year really are. From second year onwards the class strength reduces.
In a good engineering school, there will be a dozen specialisation like aeronautics, mechanical, electrical, civil, chemical, biomedical, construction, industrial, material, agriculture, and etc. Not to forget along with this, a student can also pursue his/her area of a secondary course like management, entrepreneurship, economics, foreign language, mucis/performing arts, humanities & social science courses. Basically one can get a second degree or a minor degree in almost any field.
One of the greatest advantages offered by some good American Engineering Universities is the Co-Op and internship program. In a traditional Co-Op program (Cooperative education program) a student is hired by a company and is offered 3-5 internship alternating with the academic semester. This is a typically 4.5-5 year program but the extra year is worth the time. Apart from getting $2-3k per month a student gets valuable work experience on his/her resume realting to his academic major. This not only makes you more marketaeble after you graduate but also give you an exposure of the real engineering projects, functioning of a global company. I personally had a good experince working with Robert Bosch LLC. I was in the Engineering Developement of the Gasoline Systems Fuel Injection for the North America. Our plant was the biggest in North America. Even though it was my first internship, i got an opportunity to be a part of tele-conference with other engineers from Germany, Michigan. It was the real engineering work because whatever work i did, meant something to our department. I got to do some design and validation testing on developing products not yet launched in the market amd write some developement reports. This is a rare opportunity which is available in US. These are the programs that give you an edge in the early phase of your career. In India, average work experince of a high school graduate is nearly zero, so something like this is very helpful to us.
Also there are many engineering clubs in which you can join. Something like SAE would build a car and race with other clubs from various colleges across US. Such things give you a real feel of working in team with a diverse group of students. That is the case in real life, as thomas friedman says, "The world is really Flat", because in the life after college you would be working in an American company, with Asian engineers, product being desgined in Germany, parts imported from Mexico or Brazil and manufacturing happening in Australia. As the globalisation has become a crucial movement in the last decade having a good internation exposure is essential for all the students.
Apart from the undergraduate degree, US colleges are known world wide for their Graduate programs and Phd research programs. They have got all the world class facility with million dollar funding. Some colleges like Purdue, even have their own particle accelerator. Even for the undergraduate students there are research opportunities available rigth after the frehman year.
The research would be actually be done in some research park with some professor. Hence this is definitely something big for a student at such a young age.
Good Luck to all for your professional career. If you need any further guidance, i can be reached at patel57-at-purdue-dot-edu(Hope that screws up lots of web crawlers!).
999
(Note: Although I have shared my experiances at Purdue University, I am presuming that any other equivalent University would offer similar exposure to the students)
I think doing an undergrad engineering degree at Purdue, Georgia Tech, UIUC, UT Austin, Texas A & M, UMICH, Cornell, Carnegie Mellon, Virginia Tech is more or less the same. The curriculum of these colleges overlaps as much as 75%. So if you get an admission into any of these (or equivalent colleges) and are going to be 100% dedicated thereafter, only then it's worth spending $35k per annum. Also not to forget the drop out rate of engineering students in public schools like these are the highest in the nation. Hence this proves that just getting in is not important, surviving the classes is more important.
Unlike IIT wherin they expect every student to have mastered all the concepts of Physics, Chemistry & Calculus before entering the colleges, in US remember that if you like a program they will start basically from scratch and grow on that. (Though i am not saying that IIT are not good, they are good in there own sense). It's like looking at a pyramid from the top. Your course in Calculus may start with limits and 1st order differential equation but by the end of 16 week semester they would have covered vector calculus, partial differentiation and multiple integrals too. The same thing is applicable for the rest of the engineering courses in a decent University.
The first year has got some FYE course to be finished. These are the basic tools for succeeding in the professional engineering school. Only after finishing these courses one can be admitted to the desired engineering school. The courses are Calculus I, II, III, Physics I, II, Chemistry I, II, CAD modeling/GDT, Seminar Engineering series, English Language (writing), Communication (writtent and verbal), Computer engineering problem solving tools. Even though some of the first year classes may have class strength of 250-300 students, but these are just the lectures in which the instructor is one of the best in his/her field and would be actively involved in some ground breaking research; but along with these are recitation/labs consisting of 25-30 students taught by graduate/Phd student. This is just to give you a feel of what engineering classes in first year really are. From second year onwards the class strength reduces.
In a good engineering school, there will be a dozen specialisation like aeronautics, mechanical, electrical, civil, chemical, biomedical, construction, industrial, material, agriculture, and etc. Not to forget along with this, a student can also pursue his/her area of a secondary course like management, entrepreneurship, economics, foreign language, mucis/performing arts, humanities & social science courses. Basically one can get a second degree or a minor degree in almost any field.
One of the greatest advantages offered by some good American Engineering Universities is the Co-Op and internship program. In a traditional Co-Op program (Cooperative education program) a student is hired by a company and is offered 3-5 internship alternating with the academic semester. This is a typically 4.5-5 year program but the extra year is worth the time. Apart from getting $2-3k per month a student gets valuable work experience on his/her resume realting to his academic major. This not only makes you more marketaeble after you graduate but also give you an exposure of the real engineering projects, functioning of a global company. I personally had a good experince working with Robert Bosch LLC. I was in the Engineering Developement of the Gasoline Systems Fuel Injection for the North America. Our plant was the biggest in North America. Even though it was my first internship, i got an opportunity to be a part of tele-conference with other engineers from Germany, Michigan. It was the real engineering work because whatever work i did, meant something to our department. I got to do some design and validation testing on developing products not yet launched in the market amd write some developement reports. This is a rare opportunity which is available in US. These are the programs that give you an edge in the early phase of your career. In India, average work experince of a high school graduate is nearly zero, so something like this is very helpful to us.
Also there are many engineering clubs in which you can join. Something like SAE would build a car and race with other clubs from various colleges across US. Such things give you a real feel of working in team with a diverse group of students. That is the case in real life, as thomas friedman says, "The world is really Flat", because in the life after college you would be working in an American company, with Asian engineers, product being desgined in Germany, parts imported from Mexico or Brazil and manufacturing happening in Australia. As the globalisation has become a crucial movement in the last decade having a good internation exposure is essential for all the students.
Apart from the undergraduate degree, US colleges are known world wide for their Graduate programs and Phd research programs. They have got all the world class facility with million dollar funding. Some colleges like Purdue, even have their own particle accelerator. Even for the undergraduate students there are research opportunities available rigth after the frehman year.
The research would be actually be done in some research park with some professor. Hence this is definitely something big for a student at such a young age.
Good Luck to all for your professional career. If you need any further guidance, i can be reached at patel57-at-purdue-dot-edu(Hope that screws up lots of web crawlers!).
999
(Note: Although I have shared my experiances at Purdue University, I am presuming that any other equivalent University would offer similar exposure to the students)
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