The University of Colorado - Denver

Date: May 25 2012
Major: Mechanical Engineering (This Major's Salary over time)
I will keep break down my comments on the university as a whole as well as the college of engineering organized for your convenience on the topics I'll cover on my experiences at the university.

1. Mechanical Engineering professors/instructors

2. Math professors/instructors

3. Other professors/instructors

4. Engineering computer labs/resources

5. Other computer labs

6. Student housing

7. Career services

8. Scholarship/Financial Aid services

9. Overall experience with College of Engineering

10. Overall experience with UCD

11. How UCD prepared me for my professional career?

1. Mechanical Engineering professors/instructors

In all honestly, my professors were hits or misses in terms of the quality of instruction with the courses. I either had to work extremely hard on my own time when the instruction wasn't spoon-fed and clear cut, it was completely spoon-fed to the point where I am put in danger of not learning anything (but get the good grade), or the instruction was great and balanced the amount of individual work and instruction for a great academic experience. On the other hand, the professors here do a great job on developing the physics foundation necessary to become academically successful in mechanical engineering.

OUTSIDE of class, the majority of mechanical engineering professors were great mentors (given you put an effort to be more than just a student whose ONLY school involvement is showing up to class). Being a smaller school than the sister school, CU Boulder, the chance of building a nice network and pursuing great opportunities with these professors kind of balances out the lack of quality with the class instruction.

2. Math professors/instructors

I've had many other classmates who despised the math department at UCD. I beg to differ. The reason for my strong mathematical foundation and preparedness for mechanical engineering was due to the top quality of math professors and instructors at this school. That's as far as I'll go on that topic.

3. Other professors/instructors

I won't go into any other departments since I've had only a class or two for Gen. Ed.'s; but, from my experiences with most of the general elective classes I've taken, I am not pleased with the amount of inflation there is with those classes. You'd essentially have lazy, incompetent students earning A's and B's they technically shouldn't've earned. I'll also briefly mention that my experiences with the foundational courses from the Physics department (General Physics I and II), I found to be somewhat worthless in terms of the quality of the course and what I ended up getting out the course.

4. Engineering computer labs/resources

This is unfortunately one of the downsides of the college of engineering. While the labs provide the necessary programs for a typical engineering student (SolidWorks, AutoCAD, LABVIEW, MATLAB, etc.), the computers are completely a mess and could be due to the fact that the engineering computer labs are maintained by themselves rather than the university's IT department.

Some good thing about other engineering resources though include access to NIST in Boulder (which is a HUGE plus for the mechanical engineers), measurements lab, various prototyping machines, GD&T tools, machine shop, etc. The tricky part about these amenities is that the engineering professors expect you to learn most of these things and build these skills on your own (beats the concept of taking engineering courses, no?). But to sum this up, the amenities are there, it's just up to the student to make efforts to take advantages of these tools.

5. Other computer labs

This pretty much blows the engineering computer labs away. They're greatly maintained and provide great programs for the students (except engineering programs, thus we're stuck with the engineering computer labs).

6. Student housing

I lived in one of the student dorms for one year during my freshman year of undergrad in the dorms formally called "The Inn at Auraria." Worst experience ever. Drug trafficking, insane parties, dirty. Essentially, it is DEFINITELY a negative environment for a college student… even for those who love to party. Yes, I party and go to the bars; but, I'm not to pleased with the ecstasy and other drugs often used when I lived there. It was simply over the top. The same experiences were when I'd visit friends at their other dorm, Campus Village. Then again, it's been since 2008-2009 since I've lived/been there. Things may have changed there… hopefully.

Best advice here? Find an apartment/house away from the dorms considering costs and from past experiences.

7. Career services

For an engineering student, the career services in terms of networking with engineering professionals is completely worthless. Well, almost. Let's just say it's RARE for nice engineering opportunities to come by to meet UCD students, that's all.

In terms of advice for direction, the services are there. It was convenient for me to get my resume and cover letters checked. Unfortunately, although I took some of their advice, I learned best for career advice outside of the career services the school provides to its students.

8. Scholarship/Financial Aid services

Each individual school has their own scholarship services as well as an overall scholarship and financial aid office.

For my specific school (college of engineering), I was treated well in terms of scholarship advice/notice. I was fortunate being awarded the National Science Foundation REACH scholarship. So engineering students, be sure to check out scholarship aid at the college of engineering, there are MANY scholarships based on merit/goals.

The overall scholarship office has been great as well given how they implemented the processes online. There are an ABUNDANT amount of scholarships as well that'll help you pay for tuition. Here, my good experiences were due to being a Reisher Family scholar.

The financial aid office in short terms has been horrible the WHOLE time I went to school there and I doubt that'll change anytime soon. I feel like the changes in management there happens often and with them trying to separate with CU Boulder explains their disorganized ways.

9. Overall experience with College of Engineering

It's been a pleasure. Want to make the best of your experience future engineers? Be more than just a student who goes to class. When I reached out to professors for other academic opportunities outside of class, it essentially changed my whole outlook of the school and its professors. There are some bright engineers at the school and their intentions to help and prepare the student (from my experiences) are definitely there.

I used to have regrets for not transferring to the Mines or CU Boulder; however, after looking back at what I've accomplished at this school, I won't take it back. All my successes were mainly due to the professors at this school.

10. Overall experience with UCD

It's an interesting environment. It's an urban location filled with thousands upon thousands of students from all over the place. It's unique and different from any other school I've visited. I wouldn't call it a bad school overall, but the school still has ways to go in terms of student involvement, resources (especially the library), quality of education, and some other things I may forgotten to mention. This COULD be due to its location (downtown Denver) and the fact that this school SHARES the campus with two other schools (Community College of Denver and Metro State).

But to sum up this school, it's not as bad of a school as people make it to be.

11. How UCD prepared me for my professional career?

Due to my network building with professors in the mechanical engineering department, I made close ties with one professor that essentially transformed me from a typical engineering student to an engineering professional with plenty of room to grow into whatever direction I want (research, teaching, industry, etc.).

I was given taste of many aspects of engineering and wished I could've extended much more if it wasn't for a tempting job offer given to me. And of course, the RELEVANT job offer wouldn't be there without the guidance and help of the college of engineering as well as this specific mechanical engineering professor.