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What Students Say
Likes
- Great Infrastructure & resources
- Easy access to learned professors
- Curriculum is as close as it gets to something being used in the industry
Dislikes
- Expensive
- Your entire time is pretty much consumed by the course work (beneficial at the end of the day though)
- Campus is very vast. Getting around could prove a little difficult especially during winters
Course Curriculum
10
- The curriculum was a lot driven with assignments that put you to work and engaged your brain quite a lot
- Industry-focused curriculum but sometimes because the professors are directly someone who has worked in the industry and are extremely knowledgeable but not inherently teachers, could be a struggle to bridge that gap
- It is unlikely you would get such personal support but for positions like research assistants, the professors could get involved
- My system engineering professor is Art Hyde. Great personality, had been the chief engineer for the Ford Mustang, a poster car for all the automotive engineers
Admission Experience
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I had applied to 3 universities.
- 1. Clemson University, SC
- 2. University of Michigan, Dearborn
- 3. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
- Received acceptance from Clemson and University of Michigan, Ann Arbour, but got waitlisted from University of Michigan, Dearborn. The university found some trouble accessing my academic records, like transcripts. Hence, they had not accepted it straight away. I had received acceptance from UofM, Ann Arbor by then
- 1. The best-ranked university for Automotive Engineering in the world with professors who worked or led the automotive industry for 30-40 years (like GM, Ford and many more)
- 2. Unique to U of M Ann Arbour, they have a SOP and personal statement as two separate items during admission. SOP is more leaned towards your professional aspirations, while your personal statement is more of you as a person, as the name suggests. GRE was a part of the admission criteria but was waived due to COVID during my admission. It’s probably back in the mandatory list now
- 3. The overall experience was amazing. Then you get to learn real-world applications as opposed to just theoretical knowledge. I got my internship, which eventually converted to a full-time job because of the university and the relevant curriculum here. It is probably one of the most prestigious and celebrated degrees in the country and the world
- I had applied for the fall intake of 2022. The application deadline was in the second week of December 2021, so any exams IELTS AND GRE have to be taken before that and the scores have to be reported to the universities as well.
- I had taken the exams in the month of August 2021, and the results were ready by September 2021.
- Received a response in the first week of February 2022. From there, it took me about a month to figure out finances. Had to show proof of funds for 81000 USD in the form of either savings or loan or combined. Had my finances sorted and received i20 before May 2021 and had my VISA interview in June2021
Faculty
10
- 40-50 students per class. The professors are very responsive and active on emails as well
- 60% of the students were Indians in my course. Although engineering is dominated by Indians, the other courses are largely diversified
- No matter how large the class, the professors are very interactive and considerate
- Each one's approach is different; do not expect the spoon feeding you get in India. You have to learn stuff on your own for sure
Campus Life
10
- It’s essentially divided into 3 sides. North campus, central campus, and south campus. However, these are just in Ann Arbour. There is U of M Dearborn and Flint as well.
- All kinds of facilities are available and mostly free to access for students. You could book yourself a ride to home late in the night as well and it’s free of charge.
- For all Indian festivals, ISA (Indian Student Association) organises an event where students gather to celebrate. There are independent private parties or celebrations as well where smaller pockets of student gather
- Recreational centres are the primary sports centres and have all the sports you could imagine. There’s heated Olympic-size pools as well.
Part Time Jobs
- TA RA or GSI are harder to get. It depends on your interactions with professors and your performance in that subject.
- Typical pay range is 2500-3000 USD per month and they get the tuition waived that semester, so it is a very high-paying job. But it could vary from department to department and number of GSIs for that class
- There are many other part-time jobs on campus that students go for. Dining, media for classrooms,
- Part-time here pays around 15-18 USD per hour. This is above average pay. It’s easy to secure on campus part times. There are always plenty available. As soon as you get access to the university portal after your acceptance into the university, you can start applying for jobs on campus. Most of them do not have any sort of special requirements and no interview process is usually involved.
Placement
10
- The majority of the students were placed within 6 months.
- The average pay could be around 75000 USD per annum for our department but this could be a lot higher for CS or EE departments. Closer to 100,000 USD.
- The university organises a career fair every semester; this is a great networking event and a lot of students do find internship opportunities at such events. Internships could be a good way to land full-time roles eventually.
- A lot of tier 1 and tier 2 supplier companies hire international students and offer H1B sponsorship. This is a major differentiator; a lot of companies do not offer that, therefore leaving out many options for international students. The major automotive OEMs do not offer first-time H1B sponsorship, which was a big surprise for all of us.
- Any company that is local to Michigan has their highest preferred student recruits from UofM Ann Arbor
- However, this is not to say only Michigan companies hire the students. The degree is highly valued by companies like Apple, Tesla, Google, Toyota, Bosch
- The majority of the students make a good network through LinkedIn and eventually convert those connections to interviews at the least
Accommodation
Off Campus
8
- I used Facebook Marketplace initially. I used a lot of websites from Google searches as well. I couldn’t get a solid response though, so joined a WhatsApp group where I was constantly posting for a room requirement. I got a few responses but couldn’t solidify anything until the last week before flying out to the US. So ideally start at least 3-4 months earlier.
- A little further away from the college centre, I paid 600 USD for an entire room in 2B 1B layout.
- Later I moved closer to the university, where the rent per room was 800 USD. However, I was sharing that room, so effectively 400 USD. The on-campus accommodation is slightly expensive, close to 700 per room but that includes utilities and usually could come out to be 50-100 USD extra otherwise.
- Most Indians stay closer to the campus, spread across a few apartments communities
- The most common apartment Indian stay is about 10-15 minutes away on a bus, which is free for UofM students.
- Also, you have to be ready to pay at least 1 month of rent as a deposit and at least 2 months of notice while vacating. If you have to break the lease, you would end up paying that 2 months rent or the full amount of the remaining term in some cases.
Exams
- IELTS is mandatory, and GRE was optional during my admissions since a lot of US universities did not accept GRE online at that time.
- SOP, personal statement, and LORs should be enough to get you through. Other than these, standard documents like passports and visas would be most important.
- Interview was a part of the process but MROSS (business school) has an interview process.
Fees
- Sem1 was 27000 USD
- Sem 2 was 29000 USD (The tuition went up by around 10%)
- Sem 3 was 10000 USD
- A total of 30 credits
- Sem 1 and 2 I had taken 12 credits each ( 4 subjects and 3 per subject) Sem 3 was just 1 subject, I.e 3 credits and the last 3 credits were fulfilled by internship
- The fee is charged per semester; above 9 credits per semester are charged the same, so 9, 12, 15, etc. credits will be the same full semester fees of ~30000 USD. Anything less than 9 credits will be charged per credit, 3300 per credit at the time of my graduation
- Total monthly expenses could round up to 1000 USD easily, depending on if you choose to eat out a lot; that could be a lot higher
Scholarship
- I did not receive a scholarship
- The do not have like a definitive criteria for rolling out scholarships for international students. You are automatically enrolled for the list but you’ll only get to know if you had been selected, they evaluate everything including your SOP and personal statement. So if you make a strong case there, you could get one
- One of my friends had received scholarship. That waives off 1 semester worth of tuition
- Very few scholarships are there for international students.
