University of the Pacific

Date: Feb 04 2010
Major: Engineering Department (This Major's Salary over time)
After reading tons and tons of reviews posted on the school, I have a couple of things to say:

1. College is what you make of it.

2. You have to seriously be responsible for yourself.

While I was at the Pacific I had some great experiences and some bad ones as well. For the most part the Engineering Department does not want anyone with the potential to succeed in engineering to leave the School of Engineering. They will advise you and encourage you to continue on whenever you have doubts.

College in general is not for the faint of heart. You are responsible for pushing yourself to do well in school. You are responsible for getting your work done on time. You are responsible for how you allocate your time. Most students I see who fail or drop out of classes don't know how to manage their time properly. No one is looking over your shoulder and making sure you put in an hour into your studies. If you skip class, no one made that decision but you. If you choose to party the night before an exam you aren't confident about passing, of course you aren't going to do well. The school can't pass people who can't put the time and effort into their studies. That would start a bad reputation for any school.

The thing I love best about the School of Engineering is their Co-op program. I had an opportunity to intern at two different companies and made the most of my last semester taking classes that would help me when I graduate. You get to know what class you want to take for the remainder of your time there after interning.

I also like their tutoring program a lot. They have the top students help other students out with understanding concepts like digital design and material science after 7pm in Khoury Hall.

I would suggest entering the school of civil, mechanical, electrical, computer engineering as an undergraduate. I graduated as a bioengineer and have learned that it is much harder to get a job in the field because it is still relatively new across the country. The University still has a lot of kinks to work through for this program to get accredited and I am not a big fan of the Director of the Department. Once the program is accredited, then I wouldn't caution as much about entering the program.

I graduated and was able to land a job in about six months. I have had friends who were able to find jobs right after graduation because they really stood out or made a good impression on the companies they interned with. I have other friends who found a job a little over a year later after graduation. No school can guarantee employment or job placement after you are done with the program. You have to be persistent when looking for your first job out of college.