With less than a third of the graduate students in the College of Engineering being American, the college and the University need to encourage more American engineering students to attend graduate school.
Only 6 percent of all University students were nonresident aliens (NRA) in fall 2009 — not a tremendous number of students, but the distribution is completely dependent upon college and department. Of our 23,000 undergraduate students, only 2 percent are NRAs, but 27 percent of the 4,380 graduate students are foreign students.
This is a tremendous difference, but it pales in comparison to the College of Engineering.
In the college’s breakdown of undergraduate student origins, 82 percent are from Louisiana, 13 percent are from another state and only 5 percent are from other countries. In the same college the grad student percentages offer a whole new world — 23 percent are from Louisiana, only 6 percent are from another state, and 71 percent are from another country.
With NRA students hailing from numerous countries, the distribution is certainly curious, and I have a few conjectures as to the reason.
Of the University’s international students, 34 percent of graduate and 28 percent of undergraduate students major in engineering. This high percentage makes sense because America is a leader in technology, making any institution of higher learning in America an appealing source of opportunity for students coming from countries with standards that are either too high or too low.
The average starting salary of an engineering student with an undergraduate degree is at just above $60,000 as of July 2009, according to the College of Engineering website, which draws American students away from graduate school.
As an engineering student I can tell you after four or five years of engineering curriculum, a classroom is typically the last thought on our minds as we approach graduation. So, when companies offer the average of 60,000 smackeroos and life without studying every night, it’s no wonder American kids take the cash and run.
I have another theory — America’s standard of education is too low.
The standards deviate severely from state to state, especially in high school.
I got to know a graduate student from India. He told me that he, and most students back home, took our equivalent of calculus III in high school. I didn’t take the class until the summer before my third year at college. This head start would make them more apt to moving through undergraduate degrees into graduate degrees.
Though these explanations may not be true for every student not pursuing a master’s or Ph.D., it’s surely the mindset of many.
The low number of American engineering graduate degrees is dangerous.
Engineering is a cornerstone of our country and society. I am proud of America, and technology, industry and the driving will to work made America what it is today. I don’t think those “damned immigrants ‘ook our jerbs!” — or educations — but I think we need to promote advancing knowledge in Americans too.
Isolationism failed before, and it will fail again. The diversity of ideas contributed by a multitude of cultures has given this country many gifts, including just about every technological advancement made in America.
Excluding nonresidents from graduate programs is not the way, but encouraging American students to enroll certainly wouldn’t hurt.
We need not fear our fellow, foreign scholars, but rather we should join them in pursuing higher knowledge — engineering in particular.
Matt Lousteau is a 21-year-old mechanical engineering senior from LaPlace. Follow him on
Twitter@ TDR_Mlousteau.
 
 
 
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Contact Matt Lousteau at [email protected]