BME being a very diverse field definitely has some advantages and disadvantages. One of the main advantages is that you can narrow down what you’re interested in for your Masters as well as knowing what kinds of jobs you would like to do as a career. During my undergraduate career, I specialized in biomechanics initially being interested in prosthetics. However after doing a fellowship focused on assistive technology, I found out that I was more interested in that field. Now that I’m doing my Masters, using my newfound interest in assistive technology, I plan to do a Certificate in Medical Device Development. One of the disadvantages is that since BME is a highly multidisciplinary field, it can be hard to find a job. Some jobs require the applicant to have a specific skill or knowledge that might have been glossed over or not covered within coursework. 

I actually see the jack of all trades aspect of BME having some positive outcomes in my own experience. For me specifically, I wanted to focus on data analysis focus jobs, but because I also had experience working in biolabs and new lab safety techniques, I was able to land a job connected to that. It wasn't my first choice, but I was more focused on building my resume and gaining experience and more connections, which BME's diversity helped with. Has having a broad range of experience opened unexpected career options for anyone else? 

To an extent, I believe that Majoring in BME does leave you a jack of all trades but master of none. In this sense, by majoring in BME we show that we are very capable of learning and applying a variety of different material to problem solve, which is definitely a benefit of this major. From an industry stand point, we fit an entry level position better than most as we are not overly specialized in one specific area of expertise and are therefore more adaptable. BME's can flex into other areas of industry outside of biomedical engineering, I know people in this major that have gotten jobs in aerospace positions, pharma positions, and coding positions. It boils down to how you show yourself to potential employers and how well you can advertise yourself and your abilities. The cons of this of course are that you are not specialized in a single area of expertise, which can certainly hinder your ability to be hired by certain employers as they may feel that you are underqualified for a certain position or role. However as stated before it matters mostly on how you apply yourself and how you advertise yourself to potential employers. I also believe that BME's fill a very interesting niche in a growing job market and that is medical device development.  From speaking to others in other majors, I can certainly say that BME's know a lot more about the process of developing medical devices much more so than a mechanical engineer or an electrical engineer. These majors may know more about the actual components and mechanics of a device, however they do not understand concepts like making a device biocompatible/bioactive to work inside the human body, or developing a device within FDA guidelines. While it is definitely true that BME's may be a jack of all trades major, it is certainly not a negative and should be used in a positive way to improve ones chances of being hired.

The reason I pursued a BME degree was that it blended my love for engineering and biological science. I want to be a physician in the future, and I feel that having a comprehensive knowledge set before diving deeply into medical studies would allow me to become a better physician. Through my BME degree, I learned a lot about engineering and medical devices, and so much about electricity that I would not have learned if I had pursued a regular Biology degree. Additionally, I learned a lot about project management and the legal side of medical devices, and this knowledge can help me understand what's happening behind the scenes during my work as a physician. I think the little bit of everything of a BME degree is perfect for those who want to know a little bit of everything before deeply diving into a specific profession, since this helps them gain a better understanding of how the different parts of their relevant world work and what parts they like best. I definitely love the biological and chemical side of BME the most, with math being next. Pursuing a BME only reinforced my desire to be a physician, since seeing the engineering side was very informative, but I would not like being an engineer as my full-time career. Overall, my experience with a BME degree so far has been excellent, and I'm excited to learn more in the upcoming year.

That said, I do see the tradeoff. For me, the ‘little bit of everything’ approach is perfect. I’ve gained exposure to many areas, but I haven’t gone as deep into any single one as my peers in other majors have. This works because my ultimate goal isn’t to be an engineer, but a physician who appreciates the engineering context of healthcare. But for those pursuing a purely technical career, I can see how this might require extra specialization through a master’s or PhD.

In high school, I had learned about every subject, but in college, this gets narrowed down to the degree you choose. Do you think the comprehensive studies should continue in college and the narrowing should happen in graduate school, or is the current system efficient? 

I do like the fact that this pursuit does make you knowledgeable in wide variety of areas (as I echo what everyone else says, being a jack of all trades). Being able to slot yourself into multiple positions at a job or company sounds extremely helpful, but I also find it kind of stressful as well because there are going to be others applying for the same position that might have more specialized experience. I think because of this, I feel like it is a hard industry to start in, but as you get more experience and since it really is a multidisciplinary field, your work value snowballs exponentially. This, along with an ever growing industry in medicine, makes it very enticing to stay the course (that's what motivates me at least). 

I think that is a great reason to get a Masters as well, as mentioned by riddhiramesh, to narrow down your specialty or even pursuing something in ME or EE (especially for medical devices). JacobChabuel, you mentioned that speaking to others in the major say they have more knowledge on the process of medical devices than other engineers (ME and EE), which is relieving to hear since those specialties and jobs are needed almost everywhere. I wonder if it is also possible to get some initial job experience working overseas as well? I feel in order to do that, you'd have to start at a job here, but maybe traveling and working elsewhere might help expand the knowledge of the specialty you intend to be in. 

I would agree that Biomedical Engineering is such a diverse and useful degree. I feel that this degree as a whole teaches people about all the applications that this degree has, but at the same time it feels that some of the classes are very similar to one another in especially in the Biomaterial track. I would say that the degree is so specialized but so broad at the same time. It is like a dual edge sword that on one hand the degree is specialized in the sense that you learn specific things for biomedical engineering, but at the same time you just get a basis of it. I do feel that also if you are unsure of what concentration in the degree that you want to go to, it is hard to decide when you are unsure of what it could lead to in future opportunities. 

I agree with the those who have said that BME as a degree feels a bit too broad compared to other degrees, at least as an undergraduate degree here at NJIT. One of the first things in noticed as an undergrad at NJIT is that many of the professors, at least the ones I have had classes with, have not done an undergraduate degree in Biomedical Engineering. Since, I had done a bioinstrumentation track most of the professors I have seen were electrical engineers, or mechanical engineers. To me this does not place high confidence in the value of an undergraduate degree in BME, as being a jack of all trades. I do like that BME gives a good background in a large variety of topics, however I do not think it is as useful in industry as someone who as a more solid understanding of a single field. I think BME works better as a post-grad degree, paired with an undergrad in chemical, electrical, or mechanical. I think something that hit the BME program at NJIT hard specifically, was the reduction in credits to 120 that New Jersey implemented forcing the school to cut classes from the undergrad program that was probably already finding difficulty covering the large amount of material from a broad variety of topics in the detail necessary. However, I do think the jack of all trades approach works for academic research, even if it isn't as useful in industry. I think that since projects may include much smaller teams, or even be individual research projects having people able to have a much broader knowledge base helps with this, as getting an expert in every possible field involved is probably not feasible. I think this enables BME degree to be much more successful in academic research, potentially making graduate degrees more beneficial to students. 

I can definitely relate to the idea of BME feeling like “a little of everything.” In my own experience, that has actually been one of the biggest strengths of the degree. Having exposure to mechanics, materials, biology, and even coding has given me the flexibility to step into a wide range of projects. For example, in one project I worked on, we developed a system to detect blood-back in an intra aortic balloon pump line. It incorporated coding for the sensor interface, mechanical design for the housing and moisture trap, and biomedical knowledge to understand the clinical relevance. At the same time, it does mean you occasionally have to go deeper on your own in certain areas to really specialize. I have found that this broad background makes collaboration easier too and allowed me to communicate with electrical engineers, clinicians, and software developers. To me, the “a little of everything” aspect is less of a weakness and more of a foundation you can build into whatever direction interests you most.

For me, Biomedical engineering is a little of everything. Through my bachelor's, I had the chance to touch and learn from so many different areas like mechanical design, electronics, bash scripting, PLC coding, drug delivery and much more. And each of these which I learnt during my bachelor's came alive during my internship and research experiences. 
When I was designing orthopedic braces using PolyLactic acid (PLA), I was not only thinking about the mechanical designs but also had to think about the biocompatibility, anatomy and patient comfort. Also during my project on cuff-less non invasive blood pressure monitoring, I had to focus both on Electronics and Signal processing as well as had to keep in mind the clinical application.
Looking back, I feel that's what makes BME to special and interesting for me as it doesn't narrow you down into a single skill-set. My experiences taught me how different skills connect in practice and that's what excites me so much about this field.

I do agree that a BME degree has disadvantages and advantages, but more on the advantages side. I have heard from multiple people that BME is too specific, in the case where you cannot do other jobs that a mechanical engineer, electrical engineer, or chemical engineer can do. I have also heard the opposite side of this, where BME is too general, where you learn a bit of everything, but you are not really a professional at anything. I believe BME is more of a middle ground of these two cases (meaning it is really both and ultimately a great option). From what I see and hear, BME graduates have jobs in biomedical fields and non-biomedical fields like quality control engineering in biological or chemical labs and also industrial mechanics or electronics respectively. In addition to this, from personal experience, I have had an internship in chemical engineering on the industrial side, lab experience doing software in a motion capture lab at NJIT(more mechanics and coding), and an internship in pharmaceutical engineering on the analytical side. From my experience and from learning so much about different fields and professions in my college classes, I have been able to perform tasks of varying different topic areas effectively. From my personal experiences the "jack of all trades" is a very helpful result of a BME degree. Learning from my classes, I gained experience in Matlab software, which I applied to my work in analytical pharmaceutical engineering (a different coding language but still similar application). In addition, my chemistry classes and fundamental biomedical engineering classes related heavily to even industrial chemical engineering. Although most of this is anecdotal from my person experiences, it is a great example of success from a BME degree in attempting to work in different fields/professions and the experience I had. Not only me, but I have heard from countless others how even though they are not working BME jobs, they have applied a lot of what they have learned to their current jobs. The real question would be:

How effective is a master's degree in BME for getting a better/higher paying job?

Is a master's degree in BME too general or should you specialize in something else (like pharmaceutical engineering, since at NJIT a master's degree in BME goes through a wide range of topics rather than a more narrowed focus)?

One thing I've found about getting a Biomedical Engineering degree is that it truly seems like "a little of everything." We study electrical engineering, mechanical systems, physiology, coding, and certain regulatory and commercial topics. While this might make it difficult to feel like a true expert in one field, I believe it is also a strength, as medical devices are intrinsically interdisciplinary. For example, creating an implanted device need knowledge of materials science, biology, and mechanical durability, whereas a wearable monitor necessitates signal processing, software, and clinical workflow concerns. A BME student may not go as far as a pure EE or ME student into a single topic, but they learn the ability to communicate across all of these professions and bring teams together. I'm curious what others think: is it preferable to be a "generalist" in biomedical engineering and interact with experts, or should BMEs strive to specialize fully in one specific field while still serving as a "translator"?

I'd agree that BME does dive into a lot of other disciplines and you never go beyond a surface level understanding. While I did have a similar dilemma early on in my college career, I found that BMEs have a different approach to problems than other engineering disciplines and that's why there are many industries that hire biomedical engineers. There are also various tracks for biomedical engineers and you can choose to specialize in a specific track and base your PhD around this original research and become an expert. Overall the upside is you can work on really interdisciplinary problems, adapt to different teams easily, and have a lot of flexibility in career paths.