Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Date: Jul 31 2017
Major: Physics (This Major's Salary over time)
I went to RPI on a full ROTC scholarship back in the Reagan days when defense$ were flowing like water and you just had to fog a mirror. Overall it was a positive experience. I started in Aero Eng but struggled with some initial courses. After switching to Physics (Astrophysics minor) I did quite well.

The academics are rigorous and free of grade inflation. In my day, the actual mean GPA was a 2.3. I graduated with a 3.4 of which I was very proud.

RPI had a good reputation amongst the over 55 yo technical worker crowd, thus the name definitely helped when I transitioned to civilian employment. That is generally no longer the case but at least old RPI alums like me take it into account when hiring.

That said, I would advise prospective students to think long and hard about attending. If you aren't 100% sure you wish to be an engineer, choose a true university with more options. In my case, I didn't want to forfeit my scholarship.

There is definitely a chip on the shoulder as the "safety school" for students aspiring to MIT. Frankly, even that is exaggeration as there are plenty of engineering programs ranked significantly higher than RPI, many in larger universities with a far greater breadth of majors: U Mich, Ga Tech, Berkeley, BU, Univ Illinois, UT Austin, Princeton. So, in reality, RPI is third string in the first tier engineering schools. Cold hard truth that makes many of my fellow RPIers uncomfortable.