Mechanical Engineering undergrad

WolfForager

Indeed! My 3rd choice on CAO is ME. The points dropped to 360 last year which is highly doable from my pov. However i've been hearing alot of people saying that they are gonna jump back up to 450ish this year. Anyone here have any view on the matter? I really need to know. Cheers

bnt

No-one really knows until August, when the Leaving Cert results are compared with the number of applicants. UCD says that last year's minimum was 360, but you ought to be aiming for much more than that, if you want to do well in an Engineering course.

WolfForager

I am aiming higher, i just want to know if i should put it higher or lower on my CAO.

elgriff

Place your course choices in genuine order of preference!

To do otherwise is a grave mistake.

WolfForager

Hmm, both my brother and sister are telling me to go in order of 80% points 20% preference.

Tails142

Look,

You may think you want to do the highest points course you can, because, you think it will lead to having a higher status for yourself or some other reason such as more pay at the end. You can say, oh my course was 500 points, and you'll feel great.

But you need to get that out of your head. After a year in college, nobody will ever mention points again, nobody will remember what points whos course is or anything like that.

In 9 months times, you will get your points, and starting at 1, they will go down your CAO list and give you whatever course they come to first that your points can get you.

That is then your course which you will be doing for the next 4 years.

That is then your course which you will be doing for the next 4 years.

That is then your course which you will be doing for the next 4 years.

That is then your course which you will be doing for the next 4 years.

That is then your course which you will be doing for the next 4 years.

I cant stress that enough. You pick the course you want to do, forget about the points completly, its 100% preference, 0% points.

I understand that you probably care very little, you have 3 or 4 courses, any of which you would like to do, but you seriously need to make a decision on which suits you better and which you will be more interested in.

Forget completly about the points, points are based on interest in a course solely, it has almost nothing to do with the difficulty or reward at the end, only the course requirements will be an indicator of this, such as C in Hons Maths etc.

Go get the course curriculums of the ones you're interested, try and find out which has the classes you like etc. The main thing is that you forget about the points, because in the end everybody else will too.

bnt

I agree - this is your future you're talking about here, don't try and game the system, and beware of judging the difficulty of the course by the minumum number of points required.

If you look at the ME minimum points from previous years, the 2008 points look abnormally low, even though I don't think the course contents have changed that much.
2005: 420 / 460
2006: 435 / 460 (rounds 1 & 2)
2007: 375 / 465
2008: 360 / 360

However, if you look at the ME course contents, and compare it with other Engineering courses (450-500), I do not believe for a second that ME is that much easier. My degree programme (DN078) cut off at 495 points in 2008, but the courses that are giving me grey hair - Maths For Engineers I - VI - are common to all the Engineering courses, including ME. The downwards ME points trend leads me to think that UCD wants students on this course, and have places to fill - so if you apply for it, you're likely to get it - but I would not say it's any easier than other Engineering degree programmes.

notGill

A little bird told me to put all my courses into a hat, pick them out blindfolded and put them on my cao in that order.

WolfForager

Thanks tails, that really put things into perspective for me.

bnt i'm not judging the difficulty of the course by the points, i'm sorry if i implied that in any way but i'm not in that frame of mind at all.

I'll show my careers teacher my rough work cao tomorrow and see what she thinks.

Thanks again guys

gubbie

Mech Eng in the IT's are a lot lower... all engineerings are

WolfForager

gubbie wrote: »

Mech Eng in the IT's are a lot lower... all engineerings are

Only IT on my Cao is DIT and that's common engineering, 390 points.

gubbie

WolfForager wrote: »

Only IT on my Cao is DIT and that's common engineering, 390 points.

You might aswell put down all the other IT's

WolfForager

Don't have the room on my level 8, might as well fill up my level 7s with em.

DirkVoodoo

Points are not an indication as to the difficulty of the course. Don't do mechanical engineering unless you have a love for maths and physics. Couple that with anti-social working hours, lack of female diversions in the course and some ball-busting exams.

Of course, they dumbed down the course slightly with this whole modularisation, I mean they don't even do theoretical physics in second year anymore.

And the labs are boring! No touching the machines. If you think engineering is more using CNC machines for project work as opposed to crunching out transfer functions for lightly damped systems, then mech eng in ucd might not be for you.

Like someone above said, you will be doing this for the next 4 years (possibly longe if you make the choice mistake of doing a postgrad).

seraphimvc

Tails there stated perfectly everything you should know

but bare in mind tho,(just an example)is not like all doctors who did medicine really like medicine in the first place ,same goes to all courses,especially those leads to 'better life' jobs.yes,i have seen enough people who is doing some courses they are 'supposed' to do :pac:

of course people will tell you they love what they study (most of the cases) ,surely they will need to like it since they are gonna live with that degree for a long long time - which means you are probably gonna like any course if you have any interest anyway.

i for one say go for the one you like,while think of the future job prospect at the same time,find a balance yourself.good luck in your LC!!

p/s:just,prepare for hardwork for a any 'tough' course ,you will find that LC is nothing compare to a degree course

WolfForager

DirkVoodoo wrote: »

Points are not an indication as to the difficulty of the course. Don't do mechanical engineering unless you have a love for maths and physics. Couple that with anti-social working hours, lack of female diversions in the course and some ball-busting exams.

Of course, they dumbed down the course slightly with this whole modularisation, I mean they don't even do theoretical physics in second year anymore.

And the labs are boring! No touching the machines. If you think engineering is more using CNC machines for project work as opposed to crunching out transfer functions for lightly damped systems, then mech eng in ucd might not be for you.

Like someone above said, you will be doing this for the next 4 years (possibly longe if you make the choice mistake of doing a postgrad).

Don't really mind lack of female diversions, afterall, the weekend was invented to help guys in lonely college courses to go out and try their luck :P

I love maths and physics, even do applied maths.

Is DIT's course more practical? I know it's a roundabout way of getting into their ME degree, but i hear it's just a tad better for job prospects.

rainbow kirby

DirkVoodoo wrote: »

Couple that with anti-social working hours, lack of female diversions in the course and some ball-busting exams.

Hehe, CS is even more male-dominated than most engineering courses! It's seriously about 85% male in the higher years. :pac:

Raphael

Of Course, sher everyone knows wimmen don't know nuffin about computers!