A handy collection of advice for college freshman from The New York Times.

Think about the college’s overall environment

For my undergrad, I attended Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (Troy, N.Y.), and majored in biomedical engineering. Now, as a Ph.D. student and aspiring engineering professor, I absolutely use this major in my career!

With that said, I do think that it is a case-by-case basis in whether it matters where you attend college. For me, attending RPI was certainly a benefit. The school itself has great name recognition for engineering, and the overall curriculum there is excellent for students desiring to pursue a professional engineering career. Additionally, I was able to pursue independent research as an undergraduate and develop close relations with my professors. All of these factors enabled me to further my career and pursue a BME Ph.D. at a leading institution.

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August is Back to School Month here at Adafruit! Each week we’ll be bringing you a two #BackToSchool posts on the blog! Stay tuned for product and gift guides, tutorials from the Adafruit Learning System, and inspiration from around the web! Get started by checking out Adafruit’s educational resources, such as our kits and project packs, suggested products for young engineers, blog posts for educators and an extensive selection of books to help you learn!