Poll:How many of us are Engineers?

[MichaelB]

Hilarious, and so true.

 

[Midpack]

For those who haven't seen it, here is a funny, short clip, from the Dilbert video called The Knack.

I love it when the mother asks the Doctor if he will live a normal life and the Doctor replies, "No, he'll be an engineer", causing the mother to burst into

That's a classic that all Engineers need to see. I had not seen it in a while, thanks for reminding me, I enjoyed it again.

 

[H2ODude]

I started out wanting to be an MD but decided it wasn't my thing about one month into gross anatomy and related courses. But it makes sense when you consider that my father was a chem-e and his father an ee. I returned to school and got a BSCE and MS in Environmental Engineering. The family predisposition was borne out when both my son and daughter became chem-e's, she a a PhD.

IIRC there were NO women in my engineering classes in early 70's; now it seems the majority of young engineers are women.

 

[clifp]

I started out wanting to be an MD but decided it wasn't my thing about one month into gross anatomy and related courses. But it makes sense when you consider that my father was a chem-e and his father an ee. I returned to school and got a BSCE and MS in Environmental Engineering. The family predisposition was borne out when both my son and daughter became chem-e's, she a a PhD.

IIRC there were NO women in my engineering classes in early 70's; now it seems the majority of young engineers are women.

I remember roughly 10% girls in my computer science class and lesser percentage in the EE classes. My perception also is that there are more than their used to be. I think that is mostly because every major tech company has some program from promoting women in engineer. However when I do I bit a googling I see lots of headlines like this.

Women Engineering Graduates at 15-Year Low

The number of male engineering graduates rose by 11% from 2004 to 2009, while the number of female engineering graduates actually fell by 5.2% over the same period, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. In 2009, the percentage of undergraduate degrees from engineering schools that went to women hit 17.8%, a 15-year low, according to the American Society of Engineering Education.

So I have to conclude that despite lots of efforts to get more woman into engineer it just isn't happening.

 

[grasshopper]

Someone once called me a Sanitary engineer. I am usually the driver/engineer on the fire apparatus.

 

[JOHNNIE36]

I graduated as a mechanical engineer so my brother who was 10 years younger, decided he wanted to be an engineer also. I didn't know why. He didn't know why. Folks didn't know why either except it sounded great to them. He never worked a day in his life as an engineer. He was the high school jock. After getting his degree he went into coaching football in high school. In order to qualify for that he had to teach math, so he got a teaching certificate until he went back and got his degree in education. This really irritated my folks who thought they wasted their time and money helping him through engineering school. He always wanted to coach. Moved up through the coaching ranks, became athletic director, went back and got his masters in education and later became high school principle. Now retired from schooling and still on the board of the state high school athletic association. A very successful career for an engineer who never worked as one.

 

[JOHNNIE36]

For my part, I've never understood why engineers love to proclaim that "engineers can't write." Do all engineers hold this view, or just the many I've worked with and managed? It's not as if anyone expects them to produce poetry on the job or something.

Business writing is a learned skill based on disciplined, organized thinking. Engineers appreciate disciplined, orderly thinking, so why would they disdain writing?

Amethyst

As an engineer, you better not hate writing because in my career, I must have written 1000 reports, engineering proposals, essays and documents. In fact, most engineers I knew were good at writing. I always thought they went hand in hand. I'll have to qualify that. They wern't good writers but great printers.

 

[tightasadrum]

Loved the Dilbert thing.

I wanted to study music. So my dad gave me a choice. If you study engineering, I'll pay your tuition. If you study anything else, you're on your own. I became an engineer. But I still did the music stuff on the side. I guess it worked out.

Engineers and writing...It never concerned me to take courses on the other end of campus that required writing, like philosophy, classics, literature etc. I enjoyed the break from the analytical courses. But I had a few classmates that had to take a required entry level composition course three times. So the perception is sometimes correct.

DW was an English major who went back to study law. But she has always impressed me with her innate grasp of anything involving mathematics. I tutored her in a required physics course her senior year while I was in graduate school. She aced it! When I asked her why in the world she majored in English, she looked at me oddly and said, "Because I enjoy it." Hum...let's see, I didn't have a choice, DW apparently did. I became an engineer, DW majored in what she liked. Now I see why there are more male engineers than female engineers.

 

[Huston55]

My experience in the US was the opposite in terms of male:female.

I got accepted to four engineering schools, and narrowed it down to a final two. When I noticed that one of them (Georgia Tech) had a male:female ratio of 39:1 (no idea if it's still that lopsided) vs my other choice about 2:1 - it was a no brainer. Never did tell my Dad the real reason I eliminated Georgia Tech, and I was happy with my choice...

And your choice was?

 

[GalaxyBoy]

I are an eng-ga-neer too! Started in nuclear and moved on to fire protection. So I'm HOT.

I wonder if this means engineers tend to burn out and want to retire early? I know it does in my case!

 

[omni550]

So my dad gave me a choice. If you study engineering, I'll pay your tuition. If you study anything else, you're on your own. I became an engineer.

When I asked her why in the world she majored in English, she looked at me oddly and said, "Because I enjoy it." Hum...let's see, I didn't have a choice, DW apparently did. I became an engineer, DW majored in what she liked. Now I see why there are more male engineers than female engineers.

Really?

My parents gave me a choice -- teacher or engineer. As I'm not overly fond of children and couldn't stand the thought of teaching the same stuff year in and year out, I opted for engineering.

I'm a female, BTW.

omni (BSME)

 

[Amethyst]

Johnnie, you crack me up - great printers.

Amethyst

As an engineer, you better not hate writing... They wern't good writers but great printers.

 

[Huston55]

As an engineer, you better not hate writing because in my career, I must have written 1000 reports, engineering proposals, essays and documents. In fact, most engineers I knew were good at writing. I always thought they went hand in hand. I'll have to qualify that. They wern't good writers but great printers.

[-]Strangely[/-] Interestingly, I've always been a good writer. After quickly mastering the art of diagraming sentences in the 8th grade, I was placed in advanced (the old timey version of AP classes) english classes. I was bummed at first because I thought my aptitude would preclude further English classes but, NOOOO. It got me more English classes. However, I quickly realized my good fortune the next year when I reported to advanced English class. The classroom had 22 students; 3 guys and 19 girls. BINGO! I continued to apply myself in advanced English thereafter.

Funny JOHNNIE, I never saw my fellow engineering students holding hands. They never went any farther than just studying together as far as I know.

 

[W2R]

I got accepted to four engineering schools, and narrowed it down to a final two. When I noticed that one of them (Georgia Tech) had a male:female ratio of 39:1 (no idea if it's still that lopsided) vs my other choice about 2:1 - it was a no brainer. Never did tell my Dad the real reason I eliminated Georgia Tech, and I was happy with my choice...

When I first arrived at A&M, I was proudly told (without having asked) that there was a full 8% female enrolled that year, more than ever before. Of course, that was across all majors. I think my graduating class in engineering was about 1%-2% female. To me it wasn't a big deal since I was treated like everybody else.

 

[Khan]

BS (and one year of graduate work) was Math.
Tried some engineering courses, but had problem with spatial stuff.
Most career was in computer programming.

 

[Brett_Cameron]

For the record this is the first time here at the forum that Aggies are mentioned and I'm not going to make an Aggie joke.

Now, THAT is funny.

 

[KingB]

I graduated as a mechanical engineer so my brother who was 10 years younger, decided he wanted to be an engineer also. I didn't know why. He didn't know why.

Someone asked my grandson, age 9 then:

Q: What do you want to be when you grow up?
A: Engineer.
Q: Why?
A: They make a lot of money and they can fix anything.

 

[NW-Bound]

Threads about engineer-posters have come up several times earlier, and every time there was a good turnout of nerds.

I wanted to be Bob Dylan. Much later, I settled and wanted to be Jimmy Buffet. Right now, I would be happy sitting on the beach in San Pedro, Belize, listening to Jerry Jeff Walker.

When I was a kid, I wanted to be Uncle Scrooge when I grew up. I never got the idea that he was stingy. His vault full of gold coins was the coolest thing!

 

[Telly]

Another stereotype is that Electrical Engineers are no good at mechanical stuff. I grew up tinkering with things, so I'm pretty good with mechanical things. But some EEs really were clueless with the physical world. But is that any more/less the case of the general population? I dunno.

In my worklife, I saw it shift over the years. EE's of the 1970's that I knew or worked with were by and large more physical based. They tended to have a lifetime background of wonder of how things worked, took things apart, etc. This ability to take something that one did not understand, break it down into pieces, figure out the sub-parts, then work up to the system level served them (and me) well. Later, even if you could not physically break down a component, subsystem or system, you had the ability to do it mentally.

By the later 80's it seemed that the majority of new grads I saw did not have this background. They were in Engineering because they were good in math in high school, and were guided to Engineering by counselors. And if they were very good in math, guided to EE. It was a job.

Over the years, the basic stock that most Engineers were built from changed, and I started seeing the ills in Engineers that I saw in the general population. So Engineers weren't as special anymore. And the people problems increased. Sometimes I wished I could have dispensed medications... forcefully!

People problems became my biggest thorn, rather than technical problems. Glad it's over, now I can . It's somebody else's problem now to handle the , the , the , the , the and the !

But back on topic, I knew very very few ME's that could do anything electrical. And few EE's that could do anything useful in ME.

Over the years, I knew some really great Engineers, and had many work for me. But the memories are tainted by the problem ones. If someone in management says "oh, you don't need to hire as many Engineers for that project, I have a couple coming free in a month or two"... RUN! Nobody gives up their best people! They pass off their problems, the ones that they never handled or fixed. Even have had fellow management lie to me about a person's capabilities (lack thereof) just to get them out of their area.

Oh, this thread is making me regress, not good! Must repeat "doesn't matter now, not my problem" over and over...

 

[Telly]

Wasn't "Dory", the founder of the E-R.org website an Engineer? Seems like I remember he was.

 

[bssc]

Congratulations Alan.

For the record, Dear Wife is an engineer so I checked Engineers are hot.

 

[Bestwifeever]

Great photo of you and Mrs. Alan, Alan. I too wondered at the incredible height discrepancy .

Not an engineer, DH is not an engineer, no engineers in our family tree going up or down. We must have a recessive gene.

 

[NW-Bound]

Ah, not a big loss. Perhaps you have a 1-percenter in the family. They do not pay Dilberts that well.

 

[Midpack]

Someone asked my grandson, age 9 then:

Q: What do you want to be when you grow up?
A: Engineer.
Q: Why?
A: They make a lot of money and they can fix anything.

And some people never grow out of it. Whenever anything anywhere breaks, if I can't fix it myself, DW says 'why not, you're supposed to be an Engineer!'

 

[Nords]

FIFY My sympathies!
Edited to add: Thanks for seeing the error of your ways and editing your post, after I FIFY. You're welcome. Ah, Ags vs UT, once again.

For the record this is the first time here at the forum that Aggies are mentioned and I'm not going to make an Aggie joke.

Whew, looks like I got here just in time.

W2R, you must be so tired of that electric chair joke!

For my part, I've never understood why engineers love to proclaim that "engineers can't write." Do all engineers hold this view, or just the many I've worked with and managed? It's not as if anyone expects them to produce poetry on the job or something.
Business writing is a learned skill based on disciplined, organized thinking. Engineers appreciate disciplined, orderly thinking, so why would they disdain writing?

I'm pretty sure that if nuclear engineers can write, then the rest of you can figure it out too...

So I have to conclude that despite lots of efforts to get more woman into engineer it just isn't happening.

Our daughter was born hard-wired to be one.

She probably inherited that from her mother...