As much as I'd like to agree with everyone else, as far as their experience at Kettering goes, I actually had a very positive experience there.

I just graduated last June with my degree in EE (I was A-section). Never dropped a class, never failed a class. My high school GPA was a 3.8. I graduated Kettering with an 89% (or WAG as they call it). Once you get to college you have to realize that your "teacher" isn't there to spoon-feed you material anymore like your 6th grade nanny. You actually have to put in some real effort outside of the classroom to learn material if you can't pick it up in class. You will get out of your experience there exactly what you put into it.

One of the most important things you learn your first year at college isn't the material you learn in class, its how to learn to study effectively out of class that is important.


My Kettering "Corporate Liason" actually found me -3- co-op jobs during my tenure there. My first was Freshmen I at an automotive plastics painting plant in Lapeer, MI. My second was Sophomore II with Dow Corning in Midland, and my third was just before my Senior III with Honda R&D near Columbus, OH. The trick to getting Corporate Services to help you out in finding a job is getting plenty of "face time" with your Liason. If you are in there every week or 2 inquiring about what is available, you will find work. It may not happen the first day or the first week, but it WILL happen. Asking your friends who are employed if their company is hiring, then submitting your resume through the back door helps too.

I still work for Honda R&D now as a full-time engineer in ABS brake and VSA (Somewhat similar to Corvette "Active Handling") development. I wrote my thesis here at Honda R&D as well. Kettering taught me all of the essentials that I needed to do my job here. You have to realize that 99% of the jobs in the engineering field use about 10% of the classes you're taught in college. Beyond the basics of your engineering field, the rest of the stuff that you need to know will most likely be taught to you in your on-the-job training.


If you have any questions feel free to send me an email. I'm always willing to help out somebody who wants to learn more about Kettering.

 

Of the hundred or so people I know who went to Kettering... that is the first positive response I have EVER heard about Kettering. You are a truly unique individual.

 

First of all let me say I am drunk right now But I am 32 yrs old and have by now realized what is right and wrong in my thinking. What I have read on this thread is people that dont like the idea of having to apply themselves to what they are doing. If I am wrong sorry. 96 bird is one that does. I never got good grades in school, but I always got A's B's on test. I just never did the homework. So now that I can look back I wish I went to a college that had the rep of kettering, (instead I went to the navy) I work in the auto industry and dont know anybody that doesnt make at least 60k that has graduated from kettering. This is the first time I have heard anything bad about the school. I have never been there so I dont know personaly if what they say is true but I know that it has a good rep in the auto industry. I hope you have a good attitude when you go. If you decide to go send me a PM or email and I'll help show you around if you want.

 

Like I said before, its all about how much effort you want to put into your education. The people who bitch and moan about how hard Kettering is, or how bad their professors are, are the ones who don't want to put in the necessary effort to learn the material. Even if you are stuck taking a class with Guru (EE), or Wholbert (Calc), or Etter (LS) you can still pass if you put in enough effort.

I'm willing to bet that 95% of the people who complain about how hard Kettering is are the ones who never cracked their book until the day before a test, then they wonder why everything is so hard, or why they fail/drop classes... If the classes were truly that difficult everybody would fail, but that's not the case. Apparently, some of the people who go to the school actually learn enough of the material to make the tests seem "easier".

I can understand the complaints about having a foreign professor, but that happens at every college. You think that State colleges don't hire foreign professors? You think they all have good English? If you go there, you'd be trying to learn from the same guy with 200 other people, instead of 30 at Kettering.

 

Man I was drunk last night ha? I didnt mean to offend anyone on here sorry if I did.

 

Glad to hear the ppl who never went to kettering chime in!! As far as partying goes, I never went to a kettering party, infact I never even touched a beer until about 2 weeks before then end of my last term, when I had pretty much already decided to leave. BTW I only had one can, on maybe two or three occations. This contrasts greatly with all of the roommates I ever had who pretty much turned into alcoholics if they weren't already.

As far as Wolbert goes (used to teach calc, no longer there) I passed the one class I had with her with a 94% i believe. I simply was able to understand her and I apparently worked well under her teaching style.

Kettering used to be a great school, and still has the appearance of such, thus most of the alumni you talk to will sing its praises, esp if they are content with $60k/ yr. But as I stated before, it's slowly sliding into mediocrity. BTW, when ppl say you have to put in enough effort in, that usually means 8+ hrs of studying outside of class. I'm sorry, but 5yrs of that won't produce a well rounded person.

 

Some of us are not willing, or not mentally capable, of studying several hours a day outside of all the classes, and remaining sane in the process. I've tried to do this, it drives me absolutely stir-crazy. I dont learn anything, and I bomb tests whenever I study. If I show up for a test without studying i tend to do okay. I studied my *** off for Calc 2, had the best math prof I've ever had, and I dropped out of the class 3/4 of the way through with a LESS than 30% grade. I studied more for that class than i have ever studied for anything in my life, literally hours each week. I felt absolutely mentally dead after a few weeks, it tears you apart inside to spend that much time in front of a textbook looking at numbers. I left that term, with a part of me dead, a part of my personality destroyed, I literally felt it sucking the life force out of me.

Perhaps it has something to do with me being an Abstract Random learner, as opposed to the Concrete Sequentials that study well. I dont learn well, or at all in many circumstances, unless I'm taught by a human being, who is interesting and exciting, with a lively personality. I despise numbers, equations, and classes without lots of interaction.

 

I have some advice for you. Don't expect to see any women. I attend there. Bring the women up if you have any. I'm talking hot women anyway. And yeah you're from florida I noticed. STAY THERE!!!! Don't come to the ghetto of Flint!! I'm sure you will be disappointed. Ok I attend but I live in michigan about an hour south. Its my junior year in a couple weeks. Oh yeah and for the Z don't BRING IT UP TO FLINT!!! It will either get broken into, torn apart by the the sh***y a** roads, broken into a second time. ok but really I won't drive mine around there anymore. I did the first year and I didn't even want to go out anywhere unless I was going home or to my girlfriends. You'll see what it's like within a couple weeks and realizing all this garbage I am saying. they have been repairing some roads however, and don't know how much are done. Oh and Flint police don't do anything unless you are killing someone with a gun, knife ahh thats ok, but gun, they'll be there in about 10 to 30 minutes. The Michigan state troopers will get you as everyone probably has posted on here. I took off my driver and passenger windows, had to. Hatch is ok no matter what. Send me a messege or email though if you read this when you get up to school. I also have a couple books you can maybe buy off of me or my roommates might for cheaper than the bookstore.

 

ditto on the girls, this year there weren't even that many ugly girls let alone hot ones apparently. Ditto on the car break ins, ditto on the roads, though Corruna is fixed between US-23/ I-75 and Court. That's all I know of, they may have done more than that on roads that don't lead to Kettering (yea right )
Ditto on the crime, it took them 45mins to get to where my friend and I were in an accident, the police station was <2 miles away.

 

I guess the only thing I can tell you is that engineering (and Kettering) isn't for everyone. If you tried and couldn't hack it, don't feel bad, at least you learned something about yourself in the process.

In life, you aren't always going to have someone with an interesting, exciting and lively personality to teach you everything you'll ever need to know. You have to be able to learn things on your own, and if you can't learn math on your own, engineering probably isn't the right field for you. Its the same thing with reading books. You can't expect to pass a test about Greek Mythology unless you read the book first. You aren't going to have a teacher reading the book to you, you have to do it on your own.

I think around 1/3 of the people who attend Kettering actually graduate, so don't feel bad for not making it all the way. It happens to a lot of people for a lot of different reasons.

I'd have to agree on this one. I drove my T/A around in Flint for 2 years, and my 96 Firebird around for 1 year before that and I never got broken into, but my suspension took on about 20 years worth of abuse. The roads are pretty bad, particularly any of the roads which intersect Corunna or Ballenger Hwy.

With regard to the vehicle theft, I think a lot of it boils down to luck. I knew quite a few people who had their cars broken into, mostly the ones who had "big stereos" or a ton of CD's in their car.

 

Like I said I work at Delphi and I am one of highest paid "non skilled" workers in the country. Have you read the papers lately? We make $50-60 hr with our benifits. Let me see you get a job that pays that and not have over $80k in debt. If I work no over time my yearly income is around $58k. When I stated $60k a year thats starting pay, "if your good at your job you get raises " What type of job do you have now and what do you make a year? How much do you have to pay each week for your health ins? I dont have to pay anything, its included in my benifits.

Maybe $60k is nothing to you but it has paid for alot of nice things for me and offers me a chance to do the thing I like. Oh and if you look at the papers by the time the next contract comes up I should be makeing around $18k more ever year, how about you? are you going to get a $18k raise in the next 4 yrs?

 

This is one of the major reasons new cars cost so much.

 

Hey Chad ya it is. I didnt ask for a raise, If it was up to me they could freeze our wages and give us more security in our jobs. I only have 9 yrs in I need 30 to retire. I want to know I have a job in 5 yrs, not worrie about makeing $5 more an hour in 5 yrs.

The UAW is the one that decides what to go after and most of the people that work there have over 25ys in, They are use to getting raises ever year and at contract time, and thats what they want. I hear they say well the company is makeing $$$ why shouldnt we get some to. Well you know they are right in some parts , Why does every ceo in gm need to get a $1-10mill bonus ever year because the company did good? Cut that back to a resonable amount ($50K) and we'll talk. Delphi gets the lowest profit sharing of any of the big 3 I think we got $700 last year? Anyway like I said the ceo's got millions for doing nothing (yes I know they have a job but cars sell themselfs they didnt increase the sales any).

I am sorry this post went off course

 

ok, I finally got around to reading all of these insanely long posts. I haven't realized how many Kettering people are on the board. We need to get everyone together someone and have some type of event or something. Of course mine is staying at home now for the fall term, but spring term is good or even summer for people in MI. Anyway, wow, yeah lots of debates over kettering. I'm just going to mention the bottom line and that is this. In reality how the school seems at freshmen admissions or whatever you call it is not what actually happens when you start attending. Whether you like or not depends on the person. Once you experience Kettering this really makes sense. I'll leave it at that, and someone get a Kettering post going or something, I'm a Junior B section. Maybe a trip over to M8?? I wasn't planning on it but with some convincing and people to go with I may change my mind.

 

Ok, well you probably have never driven outside of Flint, because I got 3 tickets from state cops before I finally removed it. on I-75 and I-96. One ticket all he pulled me over for was tinted windows!!! My tint was not even very dark easily see through during the day, don't know the %. However it is gone now on my passenger and drivers windows now. Well you have to face the facts of where Kettering is Flint is a ****hole and it is just a matter of if you can get used to it or not that makes it seem any better. I don't mind it much, but still realize a big difference from the suburbs of Detroit.