The College Solutions Blog

Valuable insights from Lynn O’Shaughnessy
a nationally recognized college expert.

Engineering
Featured image for “Chasing After the Money in College”
December 11, 2012

Chasing After the Money in College

Is your child interested in picking a college major based on lists of the country’s highest-paying college degrees? Plenty of students are pursuing degrees that they perceive will generate the biggest salaries. I assume that’s why business is the most popular major – more than one out of every five students select it. I can’t resist mentioning that the blockbuster...
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Featured image for “A Look at America’s Newest PhD’s”
December 7, 2012

A Look at America’s Newest PhD’s

I hear from a lot of parents who assume that their children will eventually go on to graduate school. And that’s hardly surprising since Americans who earn a master’s degree or a doctorate typically earn more in their lifetimes than the rest of us. For those who dream that their children will someday earn a PhD, I want to direct...
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September 16, 2012

Getting Real About Majoring in Engineering

It seems to me that too many parents are stressing about what their children should select as a college major. I’m of the opinion that what’s important is getting a degree. I believe it’s less relevant what that degree is. Students are more likely to be successful if they choose a discipline that they are passionate about. In this rush...
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November 4, 2011

50 Schools That Produce the Most Science and Engineering PhDs

I got an email this week from a California mother who was happy that her child would be a attending St. Mary’s College of Maryland, a wonderful public liberal arts college, in the fall. Her husband, however, remained skeptical. He worried that his daughter would be jeopardizing her chances of going to graduate school if she went to an obscure...
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November 18, 2010

50 Top Colleges for Science and Engineering PhDs

I flew up to the Bay Area yesterday to give a college talk to a group of affluent families. I was told that some of the parents in the audience worked for Google, Facebook and other high-tech goliaths. Not all of their children, however, are necessarily as smart as they are. I expect that having high-achieving parents  can put even...
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September 7, 2010

A Hidden Jewel: 3-2 Engineering Degree Programs

My family lives in California where roughly 84 percent of the state’s college-bound students enroll in public colleges and universities here. With such a strong tradition of students staying put for college, my son Ben wasn’t surprised at the reaction he routinely received this spring when students at his high school in San Diego asked him this question: “Where are...
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March 5, 2010

What's Happening to the Average GPA?

Are college students getting smarter? If you looked at the grades they are “earning,” you might assume the answer is yes.  The average GPA in college is 3.1. At private schools, the norm is a 3.3 GPA. In contrast, the typical college student had an average GPA of 2.52 in the 1950s. In nearly every decade, the GPA has inched...
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January 31, 2010

Why You Should File the FAFSA, Freshmen Facts and Engineering Degrees

6 Reasons to File the FAFSA Should you file the FAFSA? Here’s my answer for just about everybody, including myself: Absolutely yes. I admit it’s not fun to complete the FAFSA, which I am going to do today. If it’s any consolation, the FAFSA is easier to fill out than the CSS/Financial Aid PROFILE, which I am also tackling today....
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July 25, 2009

College Blog Weekend Round Up

I was surprised this week to see such heavy traffic on the college blog post that I wrote for CBSMoneyWatch.com on the the college degrees that generate that highest paying and lowest paying jobs for new college graduates. I guess it’s only natural that people are curious about what college degrees are the most lucrative. Engineering degrees dominate the list. New...
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April 30, 2009

The Popularity of Engineering Majors

With the economy flatlining, practical majors are starting to look awfully good. Heck with linquistics and comparative literature. More students are declaring themselves engineering majors. Undergraduate engineering programs, according to an article in The Christian Science Monitor, haven’t been this popular in three decades. Since 2007, the number of undergraduate engineering students has jumped 7.5%. During the same period, graduate...
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