ESP Program Overview

Most people have pretty modest goals for college: a good education and the "experience". They will learn enough to get a decent job and work reasonably well with others.

Others have higher goals. They know that cultivating an intellect takes more than terrific facilities and demanding standards - it takes individual drive and achievement. Students who understand this are few and far between.

Rather than be defined by their backgrounds, their towns, and their schools, these students rise above them. They don't fit easily into the labels society tries to define; but rather than rebel against roles and labels, they work to transcend them. They share an uncommon intelligence, self-confidence and creative problem-solving talent. They have the ability to grasp opportunities that others cannot.

Texas A&M recognizes the need to cultivate such students. We established the Engineering Scholars Program for individuals who accept the challenge of an engineering degree, but who recognize that they need extra opportunities and preparation to achieve their goals. ESP is for students who are interested in more than a job - they want to invent, imagine, create, explore, inspire, or heal.

ESP provides a unique perspective to your education. Call it Extra Scholastic Perception, a sixth sense for your college career. We will introduce you to leaders in the worlds of engineering and business who will acquaint you with options you might never have considered. We'll help you look beyond next semester's classes to see the advanced research opportunities at Texas A&M that can lead you to an unforgettable one-on-one project with one of our professors. We will show you the paths other engineers took after college - paths that look less like that of Dilbert and more like that of Henry David Thoreau, a civil engineer who also had a pretty good writing career.

We think engineers are a special lot. They are logical, technically minded and capable of taking abstract principles from difficult theories and applying them to the real world. They take the preconceptions of others and turn them upside down. Like H.B. Zachry, they revolutionize construction. Like Thomas Paine, the help start revolutionary wars.

Texas A&M offers over 100 years of traditions that set the school apart while bringing its students closer together. It makes thousands of classes and hundreds of student organizations available to you. It allows you to explore art, history, music, leadership, and teamwork - qualities that magnify an engineer's abilities.

ESP wants people who "think outside the box"- those bright few who constantly challenge their own abilities, those who ignore the conventional wisdom of what can and cannot be done. We want to help create the next Thoreau, Paine, or Zachry. We want to help you figure out how to make the world a better place.