What are the advantages and disadvantages of going to a big state university versus a small private university to get my engineering degree?
Big universities like the UW or WSU have several advantages over smaller colleges or universities. They have more faculty and more specialty classes available. Usually you can specialize in a subfield. For instance, an electrical engineer could specialize in Power Systems or Communications or Control Systems. Most smaller colleges do not have enough faculty or the facilities to offer many specially courses. Large universities also do research. This means you not only get taught by instructors who are doing cutting edge research, but you often have the opportunity to participate in that research. This will not only give you valuable experience, but could earn you some money or credits or get your name on a published research paper or get a good letter of recommendation from the professor you are working for. Another advantage of the bigger schools is that because there are so many professors in a particular department, you won’t likely get stuck with a bad teacher more than once. That i
