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Going to colage for electrical engineering , help me lol

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LAN_403

Vigh holtage

Tue Dec 19 2017, 04:45PM

Registered Member #61739 Joined: Wed Aug 23 2017, 04:43PM
Location:
Posts: 44

Okay so I'm enrolling in UMass Lowell for electrical engineering I'm going to take a 4-year bachelor's degree, I understand this is a difficult major and was just wondering if anybody here has gone to college for electrical engineering and if you have any pointers for me as in books I should buy and read and things I should study up on before I get to school

Also just let me know how it was for you how were the labs and what were your projects like

Anything you can tell me to help me prepare wil help

2Spoons

Tue Dec 19 2017, 08:19PM

Registered Member #2939 Joined: Fri Jun 25 2010, 04:25AM
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Posts: 615

Do you know what area you want to specialise in? EE is pretty broad.
"Art of Electronics" by Horowitz and Hill is one to add to your library - as much for your career and for your schooling.
Aside from that I think you'll learn more by picking personal projects that interest you and designing/building them. Make sure you research and understand the principles behind whatever you are doing - don't just blindly follow 'cookbook recipes'. Information always sticks better when you learn with purpose.

When you get to college: don't be afraid to ask if you don't understand something - odds are others in class have the same issue. A good tutor will always be happy to clarify. If you don't ask you will quickly get lost, as EE is one of those subjects where new knowledge builds upon old knowledge - so if you don't learn the fundamentals you will be f***ked.
Note also: you will encounter both good and bad tutors - some people can teach. some can't. If you find a good one don't be afraid to ask for help with material from a bad one. I had one paper covered by two tutors, and one day the good one briefly covered some stuff the other guy was teaching, and in five minutes I suddenly understood what the other guy had been blathering on about for 3 months (something to do with Maxwells equations IIRC)

In my case I was well served by my hobby interest, which I'd had since I was about 8. With every magazine project I'd always read and try to understand the 'how it works' part of the article.

the_anomaly

Tue Dec 19 2017, 09:59PM

Registered Member #19 Joined: Thu Feb 02 2006, 03:19PM
Location: Jacksonville, FL
Posts: 168

Its not bad. I found myself buying extra math textbooks and downloading lots and lots of pdf files since math was a challenge for me. Its a bit of a chicken before the egg problem. They teach calculus and other high level math classes before bringing in how that math can be used in engineering. I found it dry and difficult until I saw real world examples. I will recommend a book, 'Calculus: A Liberal Art' by W.M. Priestley (second edition).

Note also: you will encounter both good and bad tutors - some people can teach. some can't.

I encountered this a lot. Same goes for professors. You will run into this but don't be discouraged. Supplement the lectures with your own research and learning. Being able to balance work and life is also a challenge. Friends of yours in different majors will have different workloads. Don't party all the time but make sure you have a little fun.

After 5 years of professional experience, I feel like I have earned a second degree. Uni is a good start, a degree gets you in the door, but you never finish learning.

2Spoons

Tue Dec 19 2017, 10:25PM

Registered Member #2939 Joined: Fri Jun 25 2010, 04:25AM
Location:
Posts: 615

the_anomaly wrote ...

Uni is a good start, a degree gets you in the door, but you never finish learning.

I'm getting pretty close to 30 years as a professional EE - and I'm still learning!
Its always slightly amusing to see a bright and shiny EE grad in their first job suddenly realise their education is only just beginning.

Weston

Sat Dec 23 2017, 02:51PM

Registered Member #1316 Joined: Thu Feb 14 2008, 03:35AM
Location: Cambridge, MA
Posts: 365

I recently finished my undergrad degree in EECS and entered college having worked on a lot of similar projects similar to you.

A big part of getting your money's worth from college is being able to get individual attention from professors/TAs. This is useful for help in classes, chances to work on cool projects (or getting your own projects to count for class work), or research opportunities. An important component of that is getting the professors to think you are worth their time. Being attentive in class and being able to send them well formatted and correctly spelled emails go a long way towards that. Spelling and the ability to write well formatted emails is important, even in engineering.

Aside from that, your biggest challenge is probably going to be sticking with the boring intro classes and required math classes before things get interesting. Most math classes kind of suck and the EE curriculum is going to be optimised for bringing people with a lot less (zero) experience than you up to speed.

...

Tue Dec 26 2017, 04:06PM

Registered Member #56 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 05:02AM
Location: Southern Califorina, USA
Posts: 2445

I recently graduated with my PhD in EECS (same school as Weston I believe)
My main advice is to get involved in extracurricular activities (not sure what UMass has, but surely they will have some type of EE oriented student groups and clubs, and undergraduate research for when you get a bit older) and make the most of your classes. Undergrad can be boring when you are first starting while you churn through the math and other groundwork but making sure to stay on top of the coursework and really work to understand the material (as opposed to just aiming for good marks on the tests) will help you out in the long run. You can also leverage your practical experience gained as a hobbyist to get into the undergraduate research cycle, which will put you ahead of your colleagues considering to apply for advanced degrees or more interesting jobs. Don't get too distracted hanging out with the girls over on the humanities side of campus

Patrick

Wed Dec 27 2017, 02:33AM

Registered Member #2431 Joined: Tue Oct 13 2009, 09:47PM
Location: Chico, CA. USA
Posts: 5639

... wrote ...

...... really work to understand the material (as opposed to just aiming for good marks on the tests) will help you out in the long run........ Don't get too distracted hanging out with the girls over on the humanities side of campus

BOOM ! this is it.
not much more advice needed.

Plasma

Wed Dec 27 2017, 06:38AM

Registered Member #61406 Joined: Thu Jan 05 2017, 11:31PM
Location:
Posts: 268

Like other have said, you fuck this up, and you're screwed, no pressure

Hazmatt_(The Underdog)

Thu Dec 28 2017, 05:22AM

Registered Member #135 Joined: Sat Feb 11 2006, 12:06AM
Location: Anywhere is fine
Posts: 1735

oh my god.. that is funny.. EE in 4 years... that's a good one, I'll have to remember that.

4 years of math alone there big guy.

I'm pretty slow on the math, because I just don't care, Engineering requires a lot of tweaking so being exact the first time rarely got me the answer I was looking for. Getting in the "ballpark" was good enough with approximations, then tweaking-in the widget for final performance is routinely the case.

But I hope you're good on your math. They made me take college algebra for some reason, probably to fund the department more, then pre-calc, trig, calc 1, calc 3, calc 3 I had a lot of trouble here, ODE, Linear systems.

Note: don't take calc 3 with magnetics/Maxwell's Equations at the same time! The two instructors change back and forth between theta, and phi, it will mess you up beyond measure!

Oh and all those classes you plan to take in order, don't be surprised if they are all booked-up or in the wrong time slots, this has been exposed many times on several programs that your classes don't all line up where they need to be, so it takes longer than 4 years.

Long Beach State has their program in 5 years now because their 4 year outline was impossible.

Definately invest in the REA's problem solver books if they still exist. Lots of worked examples in there.

Another series is sooo wonderful from Lorne MacDonald, he does all the calculations and bias points for the Practical Circuit Analysis of Amplifiers, everyone should have this book.

It took me 8 years with GE's .. would have been 7 but my upper division control systems classes kept getting canceled due to there only being 9 of us, so I had to take robotics instead. It was painful, but I survived.

The stupid part is... I should have studied RF because everything I do at work is RF. So either go into RF or Power, unless you absolutely have a job waiting for you with robotics or controls or something.

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