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The article and comments here suggest it's because homework and math are hard and non-Engineering students don't work as hard. My hunch is that students drop m

The article and comments here suggest it's because homework and math are hard and non-Engineering students don't work as hard. My hunch is that students drop majors because the initial appeal doesn't match up with the actual path. Numbers weren't given for math majors who drop math, but it wouldn't surprise me if they were lower than for engineering: perhaps math majors know what they're getting into. To my 10th grade mind, engineering was where students bolted together wacky gizmos to suit their own desires, rather than study consistent strategies to minimize cost, maximize performance, etc. I'm sympathetic to the idea that engineering could have a glamerous outward appearance (despite Dilbert) that doesn't match up to what it's actually like. And math is hard.

JamesLeonis 15y ago
I agree. Traditional engineering has the appeal of robots and rockets, while comp-sci has the Facebooks and Googles. Even chemistry has the mad scientist images. The closest I can think of for Math is A Beautiful Mind, which doesn't have the same glam as the above. This phenomenon was observed during the DotCom boom with engineering classes surging with wannabe millionaires who found out how hard this stuff can be. For a couple years after that bubble burst, there was a real scare that the drought of incoming comp-sci freshmen would stagnate the industry. In a way, I wouldn't be surprised if this was happening again as we are entering into another tech boom.
WalterBright 15y ago
Every single engineering and science class I took at Caltech was a math class. If you don't like math, you're going to switch to something else. Math is what separates engineers from mechanics. You can put together a tractor that works without knowing math, but not an airplane or a rocket. Nor will your tractor be anywhere near as good as it could be.

JamesLeonis 15y ago

I agree. Traditional engineering has the appeal of robots and rockets, while comp-sci has the Facebooks and Googles. Even chemistry has the mad scientist images. The closest I can think of for Math is A Beautiful Mind, which doesn't have the same glam as the above. This phenomenon was observed during the DotCom boom with engineering classes surging with wannabe millionaires who found out how hard this stuff can be. For a couple years after that bubble burst, there was a real scare that the drought of incoming comp-sci freshmen would stagnate the industry. In a way, I wouldn't be surprised if this was happening again as we are entering into another tech boom.

WalterBright 15y ago

Every single engineering and science class I took at Caltech was a math class. If you don't like math, you're going to switch to something else. Math is what separates engineers from mechanics. You can put together a tractor that works without knowing math, but not an airplane or a rocket. Nor will your tractor be anywhere near as good as it could be.