Tech school BASEET v. U BSEE

Hi all,
I graduated from ITT tech a few years ago with a Bachelor of Applied Science in Electronics Engineering Technology. I have a good job with a small company working with, and designing new electronics. It's great! No seriously I like my job. However, I feel like it will be difficult to obtain future work and higher pay in design and manufacturing with my curent ITT degree. You know the saying, 'all good things must come to an end.' So I am working on a BSEE from a university. This is very frustrating to me as I have taken many of the required classes already, but cannot transfer the credits from ITT. (something I discovered only after looking into obtaining a masters degree) I spend a ton of time in class and in the car driving to and from class. I'd rather be spending this time coding and soldering. Or researching a new market that needs me to design a PIC controlled device to make it better (and make me some money.) I feel you can get just as much out of an education from ITT as from any university. You will get out of it what you put in.

I feel very capable in the field of electronics design and have many working designs operating in the field under fairly harsh outdoor and downwell conditions. I continually strive to improve my understanding of electrical theory and design. I guess what I am getting at is; are there any other people here facing the same issues? I am researching reasons to keep going to class for my BSEE OR reasons to hit the design grind stone instead.

Oh, and by the way, PICs are great!I've tried a few others, PICs are still the best for me. I attended my first MASTERS conference this year and am very happy with the investment. Maybe next year PBP will have a booth or a class? I read a post on this forum concerning PICs being for amature v. prof, and I must say that the amatures involved in the use of PICs make being involved in proffesional use much much better. Amatures have a passionate need to be involved with PICs. Profesionals simply fill a need with pics, usually to satisfy someone elses passion or idea.

Cheers!

You are not the first person by any means to be caught in the trap of "non-transferable credits", and ITT Tech is not the only school with this problem.

By the way, here is the "fine print" on their website:

Will A Student's Credits Transfer?

Decisions concerning the acceptance of ITT Technical Institute credits by any institution other than an ITT Technical Institute are made at the sole discretion of the receiving institution. ITT Technical Institute makes no representation whatsoever concerning the transferability of any ITT Technical Institute credits to any institution other than an ITT Technical Institute. It is unlikely that any credits earned at an ITT Technical Institute will be transferable to or accepted by any institution other than an ITT Technical Institute. (emphasis added)

Students considering continuing their education at, or transferring to, any institution other than ITT Technical Institute must not assume that credits earned at ITT Technical Institute will be accepted by the receiving institution. An institution's accreditation does not guarantee that credits earned at that institution will be accepted for transfer by the other institution. Students must contact the registrar of the receiving institution to determine what ITT Technical Institute credits, if any, that institution will accept.

As to your question: I recommend you go ahead and finish the BSEE. You might do a little lobbying and inquire if you could get credit by exam for subjects you already know. However, I'm sure you've already discovered that a BSEE will take you into subject matter left untouched in your BASEET program.

I also attended my first MASTERS this year (I went to the Pre-Conference as well as the Conference--5-1/2 days! Whee!) and certainly plan to do it again.

GeoJoe,

About 30 years ago I asked the question (Bachelor of Science Electronics Engineering Technology) or (Bachelor of Science EE). I went to several large companies, HP and IBM and asked their human resource office the question. (which) They told me that if I had a BS in anything and worked for them as an EE the pay would be the same as if I had a BSEET or a BSEE. “no difference” BUT There are many companies that treat BSEET as technicians.

I took BSEE in the daytime and BSEET at night. (About killed my self) By year 2 in EE we were studding formulas. In EET I bouncing a micro wave beam off a building cross town and back to the lab. Did I mention I built the transmitter. By my senior project there were EEs that had never soldered two wires together. In EET we did projects every semester that were equivalent to the EE final project.

I hired an engineer with a BS-Chemistry. He had 80 patents and was one of the sharpest EE. The BSEE is mainstream! Many managers are looking for BSEE and may not understand BSEET. If your potential boss has a doctorate then he is looking for how many degrees (which degree). When putting together a teem, I look for a mixture of BSEE, BSEET and non degreed-EE. Each have their own strong points.

Newspaper add; “BSEE a must” How many times have you seen that? I feel the BSEE has more respect. I think the BSEET will “build this and have it to me by Monday”. Go to 5 companies that hire EEs and ask the question! Ask for an engineering manager and explain you are looking for his help. (school, job, etc) If you walked in here and asked, I might offer you a job just because you have the balls to walk in the door and because you think years down the road. After 5-10 interviews you will know “BSEET=nothing” or five will say “BSEET=same”. I believe in less than 10 interviews with companies that are not hiring you will have a job offer with a group that believe in EET. Good luck.

Thanks for the words of wisdom and ecouragement. I have seen and read all of the fine print from ITT. I don't feel like it was a waste of time. I wish ITT would make it harder for people to graduate. I also wish I had read the fine print before barfing up all that money to go to ITT. I will continue my path to BSEE. I can test out of many classes for 75 USD per test. That will cover economics, sociology, art history, world history and other periferal 'education enhancement' credits. However, I've found science and engineering departments don't have tests for things like ciruit analysis 201, or power transmission 112. Even the tests that are available for science degrees are unlikely to go well for me, and I'd bet for %99 of post graduates with science degrees. How confident would you feel taking and passing a calc based physics test five years after taking the class?