# Electrical Engineering



## L (Aug 12, 2011)

I plan on double majoring for this and psychology, mostly because in psychology I hear horror stories (an overwhelmingly large amount) of people with doctorates not being able to find jobs. I eventually want to get my doctorate and get a good job in psychology, but, it is likely that, that won't happen anytime soon. So, I plan on working in Electrical Engineering because *a)* it's a good paying job *b)* electricity (started with lightning lol) has always fascinated me, almost as much as the human mind itself and *c)* I've always been fairly decent with numbers, which has actually served as a detriment to my success in math classes. I didn't study and just coasted, I did manage to pull off C's in both of my math classes though.

The need: 
I just want to get a head start on learning this stuff before I actually have to in class, to ease anxiety and make it easier to focus on my true passion and other hobbies.

The question:
What kind of math will I need to learn to get the degree? 
What other things will I need to learn for this career?
Aaaaaaaaaaand the most important part, got any good, trusted, websites that could help?


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## emerald sea (Jun 4, 2011)

learn calculus, differential equations, etc.

go to the MIT website and read some of the free engineering course lectures available there, and use the other educational resources on that site as well. 

Free Online Course Materials | Electrical Engineering and Computer Science | MIT OpenCourseWare

also, go on YouTube and look up some electrical engineering course lectures available from UCBerkeley - start with "Electrical Engineering 100."

not only will you learn some of the essentials before taking the classes, but this will give you a good taste of what engineering school would be like...it's good to try it out before you buy it lol. 

there are plenty of students who get several semesters deep into a major that initially they thought they'd really like, and end up deciding it isn't for them. investigating it in detail ahead of time can prevent this.

i hope this helps.


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## jbking (Jun 4, 2010)

L said:


> What kind of math will I need to learn to get the degree?
> What other things will I need to learn for this career?
> Aaaaaaaaaaand the most important part, got any good, trusted, websites that could help?


1) Applied Math a.k.a. Math used in Physics mainly, Boolean Algebra, and Logic would be my suggestions for areas of Math to learn that would be useful I'd imagine.

2) Figure out what part of Electrical Engineering you want to do: Do you want to design integrated circuits? Build the next generation of CPUs or GPUs? Learn about RFID applications? Create better batteries for smart phones and tablets? How much into computer hardware do you want to be? Also, know how you learn so that you take in the material in a form that is best for you to easily absorb. Are you a visual, auditory, or kinesthetic learner? Do you prefer looking at pictures, reading words, hearing words, or doing hands-on work to pick up stuff?

3) Here are a couple of sites that may be useful:
Khan Academy - for remedial Math though this may have other stuff to be of interest down the road.
Electrical Engineering - for a Q & A site about Electrical Engineering stuff.


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## AJ2011 (Jun 2, 2011)

L said:


> What kind of math will I need to learn to get the degree?



The extent of math I've seen in nominal undergrad EE curriculums is learning Laplace transforms, so that means going backwards: differential equations, calculus, etc.. Partial differential equations would be worth knowing.




L said:


> What other things will I need to learn for this career?



Depends on what you want to do afterwards. If you like building micro-miniature electromechanical stuff, i.e., MEMS, then taking some mechanical engineering classes or reading ME books would be useful. If you're going to go into the telecom industry, then your focus may be on digital signal processing and embedded programming. There's a lot of MEMS work in every field from biology to to aerospace, so it could be a fun area to get involved in for the future.


Plus if you like traveling then working in the up-and-coming fields is the best way to get to conferences. IEEE conferences are everywhere.


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## anarchitektur (Feb 11, 2011)

FWIW, I think doing an EE/Psychology double major is an awful idea.


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## L'Empereur (Jun 7, 2010)

L said:


> I plan on double majoring for this and psychology.....


LMFAO. Good luck with that.


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## L (Aug 12, 2011)

anarchitektur said:


> FWIW, I think doing an EE/Psychology double major is an awful idea.


It's incredibly difficult to get a job in psychology with even a doctorate. I made up my mind a long time ago to get a doctorate in something to prove to everyone, including myself, that I can. Psychology is the natural choice. Psychology is the career for me. But, I have to be realistic and Engineering is a good field to get into while I work towards my dream career.


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## anarchitektur (Feb 11, 2011)

L said:


> It's incredibly difficult to get a job in psychology with even a doctorate. I made up my mind a long time ago to get a doctorate in something to prove to everyone, including myself, that I can. Psychology is the natural choice. Psychology is the career for me. But, I have to be realistic and Engineering is a good field to get into while I work towards my dream career.


I know it is difficult to get a job in psychology and I am in no way refuting that. I have a friend in her late 40's who just finished her PhD in psychology last Spring. I also know several chemical, electrical, mechanical, nuclear, and civil engineers-- most of whom have an MS or PhD. I want to give you some practical considerations, though.

First and foremost, juggling a full-fledged career (as opposed to just some menial job) and going to school for something totally unrelated is very difficult. Psychology and engineering just do not complement each other.

In that same vein, when you are looking for that first engineering job, the psychology part of your degree will stick out on your resume like some kind of malignant growth coming out of your forehead. Likewise, your engineering experience will not add any value to your psychology career in the future... any years you spend working in engineering will essentially be "lost" time. You will be older than many people with the same education level, and it will be harder for you to compete. You will almost certainly dismiss this because you are young right now, but trust me, the years catch up to you-- older students earning the same degree as people far younger than them have a lot of difficulty competing. I'll be 29 in a little over a week and I'm in my last year of law school. I'm by no means the oldest of my classmates, but I am 5-7 years older than many of them and I find it hard to compete in many respects because I just don't have the same tolerance for bullshit that I used to (which was, admittedly, never very high). Of the students older than I am, some as old as their late 40's to early 50's, not a single one of them is ranked in the top two-thirds of the class. They are smart, but they just can't compete because of lowered physical and mental endurance, familial and household obligations, etc.

Just some things to consider.


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## AJ2011 (Jun 2, 2011)

anarchitektur said:


> First and foremost, juggling a full-fledged career (as opposed to just some menial job) and going to school for something totally unrelated is very difficult. Psychology and engineering just do not complement each other.



Psychology could be very useful as a quantitative analyst ("financial engineer") ... but that's going in a whole different (yet interesting) direction.




anarchitektur said:


> In that same vein, when you are looking for that first engineering job, the psychology part of your degree will stick out on your resume like some kind of malignant growth coming out of your forehead.



I agree completely with the malignant tumor part.


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## L (Aug 12, 2011)

anarchitektur said:


> In that same vein, when you are looking for that first engineering job, the psychology part of your degree will stick out on your resume like some kind of malignant growth coming out of your forehead.


I'm not really understanding, do you mean people might skip over me when I apply for a job simply because of that?



> Likewise, your engineering experience will not add any value to your psychology career in the future... any years you spend working in engineering will essentially be "lost" time.


On this part I disagree a little bit, I don't think it would be lost time as I might not ever get a job in psychology. What's more is that I might end up really loving EE over psychology. 



> You will be older than many people with the same education level, and it will be harder for you to compete. You will almost certainly dismiss this because you are young right now, but trust me, the years catch up to you-- older students earning the same degree as people far younger than them have a lot of difficulty competing. I'll be 29 in a little over a week and I'm in my last year of law school. I'm by no means the oldest of my classmates, but I am 5-7 years older than many of them and I find it hard to compete in many respects because I just don't have the same tolerance for bullshit that I used to (which was, admittedly, never very high). Of the students older than I am, some as old as their late 40's to early 50's, not a single one of them is ranked in the top two-thirds of the class. They are smart, but they just can't compete because of lowered physical and mental endurance, familial and household obligations, etc.


I didn't really think about that part at all....

I would be about 30 by the time I completed my doctorate, assuming everything goes well. But, I would be about 24 by the time I completed my bachelors in EE, which hopefully, I would already have a job in.

I just can't really explain why, I just know that I need to get a doctorate in something and psychology is a passion which would make things easier. It's like a life goal that I have to complete, I'm compelled to it... I think it has more to do with proving to myself that I can do it.

I do appreciate the advice though.


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## L (Aug 12, 2011)

AJ2011 said:


> Psychology could be very useful as a quantitative analyst ("financial engineer") ... but that's going in a whole different (yet interesting) direction.


What's that?


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## AJ2011 (Jun 2, 2011)

... double post ...


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## AJ2011 (Jun 2, 2011)

Quantitative analyst basically focuses on developing and using financial models to assess risk or to obtain a better financial position. For example, those guys in Wall Street developing the programs to electronically trade. An understanding of psychology is useful to develop prediction models on how people react to certain events and how those events and consequently those reactions affect market decisions (buy/sell). If you like building mathematical models and seeing how they work, then being a quant could be an extremely profitable direction.

Quants require knowledge of stochastic partial differential equations and finance/economics. Some universities offer degrees in this area. Here is a typical post-graduate degree curriculum:

M.S. in Financial Engineering | Department of Industrial Engineering & Operations Research


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## anarchitektur (Feb 11, 2011)

L said:


> I'm not really understanding, do you mean people might skip over me when I apply for a job simply because of that?


In a nutshell, yes.

In most cases, your resume is the first thing that an employer will know about you... in many cases, it will be the _only _thing they know about you. Most companies pre-screen resumes before they decide who to interview... if you fit what they're looking for, your resume goes in one pile... if you don't fit, your resume goes in the trash. This is typically done by someone who works in Human Resources, who tend to be totally clueless. Baseline salaries in entry-level positions are heavily determined by education. In your case, when they see your education goes beyond what they require, one of two things will happen: 1) they will give you a salary offer that totally ignores one half of your degree, or 2) they will say you are over-qualified and not even consider you because they assume that more education means you will automatically have higher salary requirements.

#1 is obviously the better-case scenario, but employers also consider things like employee retention. A dual major like the one you're contemplating seems _unfocused_, for lack of a better word. It could easily give potential employers the impression that either you don't know what you want to do, or you do know and this job will only be temporary. In either scenario, the employer will be reluctant to incur the expense of hiring you, training you, getting you up to speed, only to have you leave some time before they've seen a return on that investment. This sort of thinking is particularly prevalent during down economies such as this, where employers try to get as much as they can while paying as little as possible.


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## L (Aug 12, 2011)

AJ2011 said:


> Quantitative analyst basically focuses on developing and using financial models to assess risk or to obtain a better financial position. For example, those guys in Wall Street developing the programs to electronically trade. An understanding of psychology is useful to develop prediction models on how people react to certain events and how those events and consequently those reactions affect market decisions (buy/sell). If you like building mathematical models and seeing how they work, then being a quant could be an extremely profitable direction.
> 
> Quants require knowledge of stochastic partial differential equations and finance/economics. Some universities offer degrees in this area. Here is a typical post-graduate degree curriculum:
> 
> M.S. in Financial Engineering | Department of Industrial Engineering & Operations Research


Thanks, I'll look into it.



anarchitektur said:


> In a nutshell, yes.
> 
> In most cases, your resume is the first thing that an employer will know about you... in many cases, it will be the _only _thing they know about you. Most companies pre-screen resumes before they decide who to interview... if you fit what they're looking for, your resume goes in one pile... if you don't fit, your resume goes in the trash. This is typically done by someone who works in Human Resources, who tend to be totally clueless. Baseline salaries in entry-level positions are heavily determined by education. In your case, when they see your education goes beyond what they require, one of two things will happen: 1) they will give you a salary offer that totally ignores one half of your degree, or 2) they will say you are over-qualified and not even consider you because they assume that more education means you will automatically have higher salary requirements.
> 
> #1 is obviously the better-case scenario, but employers also consider things like employee retention. A dual major like the one you're contemplating seems _unfocused_, for lack of a better word. It could easily give potential employers the impression that either you don't know what you want to do, or you do know and this job will only be temporary. In either scenario, the employer will be reluctant to incur the expense of hiring you, training you, getting you up to speed, only to have you leave some time before they've seen a return on that investment. This sort of thinking is particularly prevalent during down economies such as this, where employers try to get as much as they can while paying as little as possible.


I see...


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## jbking (Jun 4, 2010)

anarchitektur said:


> First and foremost, juggling a full-fledged career (as opposed to just some menial job) and going to school for something totally unrelated is very difficult. Psychology and engineering just do not complement each other.


Uh, no. I'd argue Psychology and Engineering are sufficiently different that they do complement each other. Complement (set theory) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia being my use of the term in this case.

I'd imagine someone that can apply both psychology and engineering principles would likely make a great manager in dealing with technical and social aspects of the workplace. I'd agree that this could be quite hard and difficult though that seems like the easy part of the initial question.


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## emerald sea (Jun 4, 2011)

for whatever it's worth, i don't see any problem with a double-major in psychology and EE. the mere presence of so many Ti users on PerC should indicate that the two interests aren't mutually exclusive. 

i'm an engineer myself and am very interested in psychology. and my engineer, Ti-dominant boss is himself fascinated with personality typing and wants to learn more. and i spend my career around other engineers, and many of them are also interested in understanding how other people work...i know, because they discuss this stuff with me, and sometimes i start the conversation and sometimes they do. Ti is innately curious, that is part of its nature. the word "psychology" may arouse disdain if they view it as overly emotional rather than logical, but some of the contents of psychology are often of interest to them, if they have any Ti in them at all. the more open-minded any engineer is, the more likely they are not to assign some sort of "stigma" to an interest in psychology. 

if the combination of interests is so strange, why does it occur so often? i find that INTPs and ENTPs like to figure out everything: they want to understand how everything works, and the human psyche fits under that heading of "everything." and ISTPs are interested in understanding what they need to know to interact with the others in their life - whatever information they can practically use. INTPs seem to like to take the theoretical approach, analyzing people internally from a distance, while ENTPs seem to like a more hands-on approach of pressing people's buttons and socially experimenting to discover what each button on their "psychological control panel" does. that's a typical way Ti reflects itself: an obsession with "how stuff works."


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## DiamondDays (Sep 4, 2012)

L said:


> text


At my school EE is considered to be the second most demanding discipline after EP. I just can't see anyone actually following through on a commitment like EE if they only intended it as a back up plan. You wouldn't consider something easier like business or accounting where your psychology degree probably would help a lot more than it would in EE?

I don't know how things work where you're at but where i am a psychology degree would be worthless when applying for entry level engineering jobs. They want you to be able to do the task at hand, they don't care about you interpersonal management skills because most likely you wont be a boss for the first 5 years at least.


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## anarchitektur (Feb 11, 2011)

jbking said:


> Uh, no. I'd argue Psychology and Engineering are sufficiently different that they do complement each other.


Well, I'm certainly open to hearing your argument in support of it, but I hope it is based on more than just "imagining." I recognize my arguments have all been entirely subjective, but they are based on personal workplace experience, intimate knowledge of corporate hiring procedures, and a general awareness of the rigorousness of most Electrical Engineering programs.

I believe @DiamondDays and I are looking at this from the same perspective.


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## DiamondDays (Sep 4, 2012)

anarchitektur said:


> text


This is my point exactly. Nobody in his right mind would do an engineering degree as a back up plan. It's insane.

OP should consider teaching or somesuch if he want's to be sure to have a job or ( much rather ) just make a leap of faith, go to a really good school, study psychology and apply yourself to your studies. Don't worry, if you're excellent you'll have a job anyhow.


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