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Wow. Times have certainly changed. I graduated from a large state university in 1985 with a BSEE, a 2.7 GPA (I partied too much my freshman year ), and no internships, and got a job with a large aerospace company prior to graduation.
Got an internship in your field during the second year? You couldn't possibly be doing more to make it easy to get a good job after college.
One important thing though.... Leave your first job after a year to two years!!! They will have you on a chump's salary that can never be raised to the right value! I went from 30k, to 50k, to 80k, and now 120k. I had to quit and find a new job to get those raises. You really think that 30 or 50k job was going to give me a raise to 120k after 3 or 4 years? Also inflation is pretty dramatic these days. You have to get a new job every year or two just to get the new version of the same pay...
Got an internship in your field during the second year? You couldn't possibly be doing more to make it easy to get a good job after college.
One important thing though.... Leave your first job after a year to two years!!! They will have you on a chump's salary that can never be raised to the right value! I went from 30k, to 50k, to 80k, and now 120k. I had to quit and find a new job to get those raises. You really think that 30 or 50k job was going to give me a raise to 120k after 3 or 4 years? Also inflation is pretty dramatic these days. You have to get a new job every year or two just to get the new version of the same pay...
This one is pretty spot on. Keep looking for opportunity. That first job will only get you where you need to be if you're a rock star and can be fast tracked...otherwise you'll be unsatisfied. The first time that happens, shop yourself. I lasted 2.5 years and went from 45-64k; Left for 80, then 88, then 95; Stuck with that last one and should double on it soon after 3 years there. Opportunity is yours...and don't think twice about moving if you're not married and don't have kids. You can always use some of this extra paycheck to buy airline tickets to go visit your buds.
This one is pretty spot on. Keep looking for opportunity. That first job will only get you where you need to be if you're a rock star and can be fast tracked...otherwise you'll be unsatisfied. The first time that happens, shop yourself. I lasted 2.5 years and went from 45-64k; Left for 80, then 88, then 95; Stuck with that last one and should double on it soon after 3 years there. Opportunity is yours...and don't think twice about moving if you're not married and don't have kids. You can always use some of this extra paycheck to buy airline tickets to go visit your buds.
How do you double that salary in 3 years? Some sort of major promotion?
One promotion, one change in role, and an ability to bring in business in a major way, i.e. I bring in far more in profit than I get paid and cost. Some of it was right time, right place, much of it was that I found that I'm pretty good at sales engineering and running a team.
It sounds like you are doing great with your GPA, and I don't necessarily see that it should fall in the junior and senior year. Mine pretty much stayed the same. I thought physics and calculus were harder than the upper-level specialized courses. Just my opinion...
An internship seems to be very important to employers these days. I agree with one of the previous posters that things have changed. I knew someone back in 2000 who had a 2.1 (barely above the minimum to graduate), no internships, and got a few offers before graduation.
I, on the other hand, decided to go back to school as a 30-something to major in civil engineering. I did this because I kept reading about how great the job market would be. I have a 3.7 and prior work experience (in another field). I'm in my last semester and have yet to find a job. This, however, is just my current sad state of affairs, and things will hopefully turn around. I do like civil engineering and am glad I did it, but if I can't get a job soon, I'm really gonna start to wonder.
You have plenty of time to make yourself marketable. You have a great GPA and an internship. Sounds like you are doing great.
It sounds like you are doing great with your GPA, and I don't necessarily see that it should fall in the junior and senior year. Mine pretty much stayed the same. I thought physics and calculus were harder than the upper-level specialized courses. Just my opinion...
An internship seems to be very important to employers these days. I agree with one of the previous posters that things have changed. I knew someone back in 2000 who had a 2.1 (barely above the minimum to graduate), no internships, and got a few offers before graduation.
I, on the other hand, decided to go back to school as a 30-something to major in civil engineering. I did this because I kept reading about how great the job market would be. I have a 3.7 and prior work experience (in another field). I'm in my last semester and have yet to find a job. This, however, is just my current sad state of affairs, and things will hopefully turn around. I do like civil engineering and am glad I did it, but if I can't get a job soon, I'm really gonna start to wonder.
You have plenty of time to make yourself marketable. You have a great GPA and an internship. Sounds like you are doing great.
2000 was such a crazy year when it came to employment. My friend told me that he was fired from his engineering job for poor performance and after that happened he called up a friend and told him that he was fired for poor performance. My friend wasn't even calling his friend to look for a job but to just tell him that he was fired. That friend helped him get three job interviews within a week which led to three job offers (all with pay increases from his previous job btw). Things are obviously different now and these days if you are fired for poor performance, you are going to be unemployed for a long time. A lot of companies back then also had difficulty getting job applications online. One recruiter for a large Bay Area company that I read about in an old newspaper article in 2000 was complaining that he was getting only 3 applications for each position from the online job posting. As I said before, things are obviously different and even networking is less effective than it used to be.
On topic, I am not sure how you are conducting your job search but are you looking outside of Ohio and have you been networking? Things are definitely tougher but you do have prior work experience and that should help you in your job search even if it isn't related to your civil engineering major. Of course you are older than the traditional entry level engineer but I am not sure age discrimination is that big of a problem in civil engineering as it is in programming/computer science.
Given my current position (expected graduation GPA is between 3.42 and 3.11, with the upper bar at 3.63 and the lower bar at 3.01) what kind of job options could be available?
Anything over a 3.0 is pretty good for an Engineering degree and I have no doubt you will be able to get a job or get into Grad School if you choose to go that route. I graduated from ASU with a BSCE and a 2.54 GPA. Several of my friends had even lower GPA's than I did and still found jobs with relative ease, although this was back in 05' when construction was still booming. I'm not sure what the state of the Aerospace industry is right now.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SamWall
Should I pursue a different internship.
It all depends on what you want. I'm doubting that you are utilizing your design talents working at a state DOT, but if that's the field you want to work in then by all means stay there. If you'd rather be designing rockets for Lockheed/Martin then that's the sector you should do your internship in. Keep pestering your professors to give you a lead on an internship. Ask them two or even three times a semester.
I, on the other hand, decided to go back to school as a 30-something to major in civil engineering. I did this because I kept reading about how great the job market would be. I have a 3.7 and prior work experience (in another field). I'm in my last semester and have yet to find a job. This, however, is just my current sad state of affairs, and things will hopefully turn around. I do like civil engineering and am glad I did it, but if I can't get a job soon, I'm really gonna start to wonder.
I feel your pain. I've been out of school for 7 years now, just passed the PE and am only making.....well, lets just say that I'm not making the $90k/yr that my college professors said I'd be making by this point in my career. I think we both should count ourselves lucky that we're not Architects or Drafters because they're totally screwed right now.
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), and no internships, and got a job with a large aerospace company prior to graduation.
