This analysis of the Best colleges for Materials Science and Engineering considers the college departments that sometimes are called materials science or materials engineering or some combination of those names. This RealRankTM study is intended to assess important factors such as the overall standing of the department, renown and the university as a whole. The listing of the top 20 in this field can be found below.
Materials science and engineering at its very basic level involves the study and use of materials at the atomic and even subatomic level. In essence, every type of material is part of a materials curriculum, including ceramics, metals, nanomaterials, and plastics. The new materials that get developed and eventually applied to every day products may be developed by materials engineers or scientist. It is the study of materials that has led to revolutionary new technologies from densely packed integrated circuits, to nanotechnologies, to golf clubs, to aircraft and rocket components, to high tech apparel materials. In the job market, materials engineers may go by many different names, such as ceramics engineers, metallurgists, plastics engineers and so on.
Economic Value of An Materials Engineering Degree
Materials Engineering careers include:
- Materials engineer.
- Materials scientist.
- Ceramics Engineer.
- Metallurgist.
- Plastics engineer.
- Chip designer.
- Manufacturing process engineer.
- Project specialist.
- Composites Engineers.
- Plastics Engineers.
- Semiconductor research and development.
- Semiconductor manufacturing engineers.
Materials Science and Engineering is a Relatively High Paying Career
Materials Engineering, like other engineering disciplines, is a relatively high paying career path for recent college graduates. Because of that, there may be some cost-benefit to attending a higher priced university if you believe it will provide a better credential that one of the lower cost state universities.
However, as shown in the ranking of the top 20 programs, some of the highest ranking and most prestigious materials science and engineering programs are at the state universities. These public universities all provide real resume value and academics.
20 Best Colleges for Materials Science and Engineering Majors
Because materials science and engineering is a popular major and highly paid for recent graduates, compiling this analysis of the top programs was particularly difficult. There are a lot of colleges with excellent programs that did not make this list this year. Below is our RealRank listing of the top colleges for Materials Science and Engineering. The list includes links to each of the university’s websites for ease of reference, should you wish to investigate further. You can search around those websites to find out more about their Materials Engineering programs. (Independence Note: We do not earn any commissions from the links!)
| Rank | College | City | State |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology | Cambridge | MA |
| 2 | Georgia Institute of Technology | Atlanta | GA |
| 3 | Stanford University | Palo Alto | CA |
| 4 | Northwestern University | Evanston | IL |
| 5 | University of Michigan | Ann Arbor | MI |
| 6 | University of Florida | Gainesville | FL |
| 7 | University of Illinois | Champaign | IL |
| 8 | California Institute of Technology | Pasadena | CA |
| 9 | University of California - Berkeley | Berkeley | CA |
| 10 | Cornell University | Ithaca | NY |
| 11 | Penn State | University Park | PA |
| 12 | Carnegie Mellon University | Pittsburgh | PA |
| 13 | Purdue University | West Lafayette | IN |
| 14 | North Carolina State University | Raleigh | NC |
| 15 | Texas A&M University | College Station | TX |
| 16 | University of Pennsylvania | Philadelphia | PA |
| 17 | University of Texas | Austin | TX |
| 18 | The Ohio State University | Columbus | OH |
| 19 | University Of Alabama | Tuscaloosa | AL |
| 20 | University of California Los Angeles | Los Angeles | CA |
Do you have any experience with any of these programs? Would you add or subtract any from the list, or move some of the departments higher or lower?
