Yes back in 2005 when I first went to undergrad as a mech engineering major, linear algebra was not a requirement. Our mechanics professors were highly irritated by this.
I don't think this has changed much (but absolutely should). I've watched in real time as Micron representatives reject mechanical engineers and prefer résumés from industrial engineers for design roles due to their superior grasp on linear algebra and statistics. I'm paraphrasing but "it's easier to teach an IE how to do FEA than it is to teach a mechanical engineer DOE and Weibull analysis".
Yeah, stats is the other major deficiency in the course load. I think one course is required but its basically high school level "check out these normal distributions, 68-95-99.7, here's a Z-score, see you later".
Thankfully the companies I've worked for have done a really good job with advanced stats training.
IE == Industrial Engineering: broad, but generally "Engineering of Systems" instead of a physical product. Laying out factories, setting up supply chains, etc. It's morphed a little bit from the original field so the name isn't super accurate.
FEA == Finite Element Analysis: advanced method of predicting the strength of a product via numerical simulation.
DOE == Design of Experiments: evaluation of how the outputs of a system change as you vary the inputs. At a high level, you build model of the system, then vary all the inputs through their entire range and to build a response surface of the output.
> It's morphed a little bit from the original field so the name isn't super accurate.
I'm currently doing a masters in IMSE--Industrial and Management Systems Engineering--and yeah it's changed since the 70s or whenever it had its real heyday (they come in waves).
The updated curriculum for undergrad is essentially the same as a mechanical engineering for the first two years, but as they wander off into advanced mechanics and fluids, IMSE students are doing time studies, factory design (FLOW!), and lots of stats and algorithms.
I've actually had the pleasure of getting to gripe to our school's Industrial Advisory Board which seems mostly full of Boeing people. They want to know if the curriculum serves the students well and I preach to them that, actually, if you spend 6 or 9 extra credits on proper software engineering that you've created a monster... but they don't listen. Some even get kind of offended because they think that a career in project management is a fine way to go about life (why go to engineering school?)
Sorry programming blows your mind? Perhaps that's why we need to teach it? I've done a lot of ERP integrations in my career and I'm not sure who they think is most qualified to do those sorts of things.
I don't think this has changed much (but absolutely should). I've watched in real time as Micron representatives reject mechanical engineers and prefer résumés from industrial engineers for design roles due to their superior grasp on linear algebra and statistics. I'm paraphrasing but "it's easier to teach an IE how to do FEA than it is to teach a mechanical engineer DOE and Weibull analysis".