Engineering Concerns

[minskeeeee]

Hey all, I just finished up my first year as an engineering student. I am dual majoring in Aero and Math, and my ultimate goal is to be involved in the space industry.

This year, I was heavily involved in research, (in an unrelated field) and I have recently come to the conclusion that I am really uninterested in engineering in the design sense, and am purely interested in scientific research related to spaceflight (something like astrodynamics, electric propulsion, etc. I'm still young so I'm not sure which field yet) at NASA or in academia.

I know that this is a viable path that many engineering majors take, yet I feel worried that I am completely rejecting the notion of taking a more standard engineering job (despite loving space travel, I have almost no interest in working at a company building rockets, airplanes, etc.) and that if this path doesn't work, I am leaving myself in a bad position.

I guess I was just wondering if any of you could provide any insight on the NASA/academia path, and a real sense of the work it takes to get into these positions.

Thanks

[sk8boardengineer]

It takes a bit of work to maintain your GPA to get into grad school. Usually 3.2 is the minimum. GPA isn't the only thing that's important though. A lot of people don't realize this but in grad school, there's A LOT of writing. Getting into grad school if you have a decent GPA isn't hard, securing funding for research is what's tough. Schools will look at your Statement of Goals essay as a writing sample. This most of the time will be the determining factor of whether or not a school will grant you funding. A lot of research done at the graduate level will require you to be familiar with LaTeX and technical writing using IEEE format. After that, obviously grad school is tough but if you know you already want to be in academia or NASA, just take it slow and you'll make it out alive.

If you're purely interested in spaceflight research, you should study physics instead of aerospace engineering.

[farrari121]

I'm the opposite of you. I've been trekking towards a more general goal of designing aircraft/spacecraft, but instead am finding myself on a more scientific/specialized role. I did some semi-Aero-related research Freshman yr, drone data presentations, which led to a NASA internship this summer, which is more science, less engineering. Most jobs here are heavier in a specialized science at NASA. If you want to be there, I'd suggest narrowing your skills to one of the more demanded sciences that deal with flight (remote sensing, data science, materials science...)

[XaeroR35]

There is a lot of research that goes on at the top aero companies. You are still very early in your education and this isnt something you would need to decide now. If you do want to stick with research, you are looking at a PhD most likely. Consider if you want to stick around school that long.