U.S. News ranks CSULA’s engineering program among nation’s best

Sept. 14, 2011 - PRLog -- U.S. News & World Report 2012 “America’s Best Colleges” issue has ranked California State University, Los Angeles’ engineering program among the nation’s best undergraduate programs for more than a decade. Cal State L.A. is the only public undergraduate (master’s-awarding) university in the greater Los Angeles area making the top of the list.

U.S. News ranked the CSULA engineering program at #40 among the Best Undergraduate Engineering Programs (non-Ph.D.) in the United States using a reputational survey sent in the spring of 2011.

To appear on U.S. News' undergraduate engineering survey, a school must have an undergraduate engineering program accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET). According to U.S. News, schools whose highest engineering degree is a bachelor’s or master’s tend to be more focused on undergraduate education.

Cal State L.A.’s College of Engineering, Computer Science, and Technology is divided into five departments—the Departments of Civil Engineering; Computer Science; Electrical and Computer Engineering; Mechanical Engineering; and Technology. Collectively, these departments offer 12 undergraduate programs, four graduate programs and two teaching credentials. The College offers a hands-on curriculum and early research opportunities to prepare students for advanced studies and a fast-paced work environment. It is home to the National Science Foundation-funded Center for Energy and Sustainability as well as the NASA University Research Center, the first and only one of its kind in California.

The College has produced the following award-winning student projects: Solar Eagle III solar car, Mini Baja all-terrain vehicle, Golden Eagle Pinball Machine, a pendulum-driven grandfather clock, the concrete canoe, a glass bridge model, and an electricity-powered recumbent tricycle. Its original supermileage car was first in the U.S. in the 2004 SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) Contest with 1,615 miles per gallon fuel efficiency. In 2006, Cal State L.A.’s mechanical engineering team became the first university crew west of the Mississippi—and the second overall—to achieve successful flight powered by fuel cells.

According to the U.S. News, Cal State L.A.’s business undergraduate program is also ranked among the nation’s best. Within the western region, the University is ranked among the top in the categories of most international students (5 percent are international students), economic diversity (60% percent of CSULA undergraduates are receiving Pell grants) and ethnic diversity (.62 diversity index based on student-body ethnic backgrounds).

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Working for California since 1947: The 175-acre hilltop campus of California State University, Los Angeles is at the heart of a major metropolitan city, just five miles from Los Angeles’ civic and cultural center. More than 20,000 students and 220,000 alumni—with a wide variety of interests, ages and backgrounds—reflect the city’s dynamic mix of populations. Six Colleges offer nationally recognized science, arts, business, criminal justice, engineering, nursing, education and humanities programs, among others, led by an award-winning faculty. Cal State L.A. is home to the critically-acclaimed Luckman Jazz Orchestra and to the Honors College for high-achieving students, opening this fall. Programs that provide exciting enrichment opportunities to students and community include an NEH-supported humanities center; a NASA-funded center for space research; and a growing forensic science program, housed in the Hertzberg-Davis Forensic Science Center.