“‘If you go there, you’ll definitely get a job,’ ‘Their career fairs are so big,’ ‘Oh, that’s a challenging school!’” are comments I heard very frequently when I would share my interest in going to Michigan Tech. That was when I was a senior in high school and now as a senior in college, I have learned to appreciate the attitude of Tech’s students in regards to personal finance and the return on investment from our time here. This past week, I talked to other students and faculty to get more opinions on this topic.
For students who know they want to pursue engineering, Tech having institutional focus over other schools is a deciding factor. This same factor contributes to the success of the Career Fair, as companies who are looking specifically for engineers flock here to hire Tech students.
This does present a setback, as students who are not in the engineering programs cite difficulties trying to sell themselves to companies, particularly for internship opportunities. For reasons like this, the College of Business has worked very hard to make a business minor or adding an MBA to another degree accessible to students of other disciplines, and a handful of students mirrored that attitude saying that adding a business minor “just made sense.” Though it has a tendency of being overshadowed by the College of Engineering, the College of Business here at Tech has some impressive statistics including top 5 rankings in Highest CPA pass rates and best MBA program as of 2021.
Many Michigan Tech students also work hard to support themselves with extra income, in addition to working hard at school. Every student I talked to this week has landed paid internship experience and many have part-time jobs during the school year. Those that said they didn’t have a part time job were either on scholarship or had done some time at community college before transferring in order to save money. This highlights how pragmatic students here are, which professor Matt Seigel noted, adding that “the culture here is first generation, even though that might not actually be the case.”
