Mechanical Engineering Quick Start, B.S./M.S.

Print Degree Planner (opens a new window) |

The UW Mechanical Engineering BS/MS QuickStart program offers Mechanical Engineering and Energy Systems Engineering undergraduate students the opportunity to start on MS graduate coursework early and gain credit towards BS and MS degree requirements.

Requirements for Admission

Through judicious choice of undergraduate electives, this program allows double-counting up to two 5000-level courses from the B.S. program toward M.S. degree requirements, thus reducing the time requirement for completing an M.S. degree. Students can apply for admission to the B.S./M.S. program by achieving junior status and meeting the following requirements for admission:

completion of the four core ME courses (listed below),
a minimum overall GPA of 3.250,
a minimum GPA of 3.250 in ME courses, and
a minimum of three letters of recommendation (at least two must be from ME faculty at UW).

Core Mechanical Engineering Courses

Completion of the following four ME courses is required for admission.

ME 3010 - Intermediate Mechanics of Materials Credits: 3
ME 3020 - System Dynamics Credits: 3
ME 3040 - Thermodynamics II Credits: 3
ME 3360 - Fundamentals of Transport Phenomena Credits: 3

Additional Information

Students must maintain a GPA of at least 3.250 in their undergraduate and at least 3.000 in their graduate coursework in order to remain in good standing in the program. Not meeting the GPA requirement places a student on probation for one semester. If the GPA requirement is not met after that semester, the student will be dismissed from the Quick Start program. Transfer students must have taken courses equivalent to the ME core courses. Transfer students must have also completed at least 15 credit hours of courses at UW in order to be eligible for admission.

Until a student in this program has completed a total of 131 credit hours of courses applicable to the B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering, or a total of 129 credit hours of courses applicable to the B.S. degree in Energy Systems Engineering, he/she will be governed by the regulations applicable to undergraduate students in the Department. After a student has accumulated a total of 131 or129 applicable credit hours, he/she will be governed by the regulations applicable to any graduate student in the ME department. These regulations include the requirement that every student must take the GRE general examination. It is the intention of the department that, to the degree possible, a student in this program is treated on the same basis as any other student in the department at a comparable stage of his/her academic career.

As many as 6 credit hours of ME department courses at the 5000 level may be counted towards both the undergraduate degree requirements and the requirements for the MS degree. In principle, therefore, the minimum number of course credit hours required for the BS/MS degrees will be 151 for Plan A students (+ 4 additional hours of thesis research) or 156 for Plan B students (non-thesis option).