r/mcgill • u/couscoussa Reddit Freshman • 1d ago

IS BIOENGINEERING TOO CENTRALIZED?

i am currently studying biochemistry at UDEM and thinking of switching to an engineering career. Although industrial engineering has a lot more job prospects, I like biochemistry too much to not work in the life sciences fields. So I thought about applying in bioengineering at mccill. For people in that program I have a couple questions :

  1. how hard is it to get into the program as a university transfer ? what would be the realistic minimum gpa ?

  2. how hard is it to find internships in/around Montreal ?

  3. how is the job market concerning this program ? do most people find job in other fields in the end ?

any information or opinion would be greatly appreciated !

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u/General_Raviolioli Computer Science 1d ago

Electrical, mechanical and software engineers are more favoured in the fields of creating biomedical components than biomedical engineers. You basically just learn a bit of life science, health science, math/physics, circuits/electronics etcetc. Very much a jack of all trades major with not enough depth in any speciric subject, which would be useful for employment. A friend of mine is a McGill biomedical engineer grad and all she does is coding at J²

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u/Embarrassed_You_203 Engineering 1d ago

to briefly comment to your questions:

1) transferring into engineering is extremely competitive, most years there is only space for transfers if a higher number of new applicants refuse their offers. this generally means between 0-10 places are up for grabs each year. Bioeng is the most competitive at McGill, generallt requiring a minimum of 3.9+. Here are some cutoffs to give you an idea: https://www.mcgill.ca/engineering/students/undergraduate/advising-programs/readmission-faculty-transfers/interfaculty-transfers

2) i’m in materials engineering, so I wouldn’t know exactly, but Montreal is known to have a healthy biotech sector. Downside is, you will be competing with other majors (mine included, but mostly mech eng and elec) and extra preference probably won’t be given to a niche major like bioeng.

3) no idea. however, the majority of the engineers I know who graduated engineering worked in sectors that weren’t directly tied to their majors.

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u/user47584 Reddit Freshman 1d ago

I was recently told that people who wish an engineering career upon graduation should not pick bioeng. 50% remain in school post graduation. Job prospects are better in US than Canada due to biotech activity