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meatball
Trad climber
Bay Area, CA
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Oct 24, 2017 - 10:33pm PT
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Currently employed as a "manufacturing engineer" but the deee-gree is in Mechanical Engineering. Plus I also come from a strong hands on background (machining, welding, beater truck fixing).
I would tend to lean toward the sayings of others that going for an ME degree with a kid on the way sounds like a horrible idea.
BUT....I don't have any kids. I'm just speculating based on the time commitments from my course load.
Perhaps look into the happy medium:
Have you looked a the Community College options nearby? CCs are generally cheaper than full blown universities, and you can transfer into a university if you find yourself doing well enough in the maths and sciences. You'll learn the same material as the university, and there are websites dedicated to helping you figure out which classes are comparable.
While its valuable to have hands on machining/welding/tinkering skills with an ME degree, they're pretty useless when the person actually making your part (not you) is doing it however they dang well please. And probably not how you intended.
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Splater
climber
Grey Matter
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Oct 25, 2017 - 01:22pm PT
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Take a couple community college type technical classes in math & science.
See how you like it and how well you do.
You could also look at some of the free online courses available,
such as https://ocw.mit.edu/about/
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Winemaker
Sport climber
Yakima, WA
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Oct 25, 2017 - 01:48pm PT
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Splater, that's a great link!
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ddriver
Trad climber
SLC, UT
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Oct 25, 2017 - 02:49pm PT
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Take a couple community college type technical classes in math & science.
See how you like it and how well you do.
This is good advice. Engineering school requires serious mathematical abilities.
My take is that your educational background does not seem to make you a good candidate (I have a chemical engineering degree). Engineering schools are generally highly competitive, both to get into and to survive in. My program for the first two years made overt efforts to weed the weaker students out. It seems nowadays that high school kids get much more advanced placement courses than when I went in, so I'd expect some serious competition.
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Winemaker
Sport climber
Yakima, WA
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Nov 18, 2017 - 05:36pm PT
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originalpmac, curious what your take is from this thread re ME school. Are you going to give it a try?
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BrassNuts
Trad climber
Save your a_s, reach for the brass...
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Nov 18, 2017 - 07:04pm PT
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Good demand for quality MEs in Boulder in the medical device industry. Specifically, Medtronic has a large presence in the area. I worked for them for 18 years in various roles, a strong industry.
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originalpmac
Mountain climber
Timbers of Fennario
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 18, 2017 - 09:39pm PT
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Winemaker, thanks for asking! Still toying with the idea, though kind of leaning towards just becoming a machinist. Love working with my hands, not so much cubicle work. I like the idea of learning CAD as well. We'll see. My whole plan was to start in community college for sure and still there are a few subjects I want to study, mainly physics as well as a few others.
I am buying a forge on Monday, really excited about that. Different, but will be some really fun projects to come from that.
Also, very much appreciate every ones input. Thanks yall!
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