High School Courses for Mechanical/Civil Engineering

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Posted by Chris.   [PICTURE: SAME | NEW | HELP]


Coach on team #308, Walled Lake Monster, from Walled Lake Schools and TRW Automotive Electronics.

Posted on 10/23/2000 1:57 PM MST


In Reply to: High School Courses for Mechanical/Civil Engineering posted by Matt Ryan on 10/21/2000 9:31 AM MST:



As mentioned below, as much math as possible, and physics. Statistics is nice for any engineering discipline.

When taking math, pay special attention to the following (most students learn just enough to pass the exam and forget about these topics):

1. Trigonometry (especially the all properties about the unit circle and Trig Identities). You will beat trig. into the ground from the day you step onto your college campus until the day you retire as an engineer. Especially as an M.E. or C.E.
2. Matrix algebra. If you decide to go into anything with a lot of linear differential equations (like any field involving dynamics or Finite Element Analysis), matricies are extremely important. Get used to them as early as possible as this will help later on. When I was in high school, we covered matricies for maybe two or three weeks in algebra 2. Pay good attention during this.

The only thing I can say: you can't have enough math. The more the better. And be sure you REALLY understand it.