Demand for civil is building as more folks are retiring from the field than are entering. As well, he just doesn't want to do electrical. I'll settle if he gets an MS in civil.
And if he goes to Harvard, he'll have to do mechanical.
sitetest
You are more up to date than I on the opportunities available for engineers. My husband bought his own business (electronics) 17 years ago which we are still running, and the kids have been out of college for nearly 20 years, so we are a little “out of touch” now.
My husband graduated from UC Berkeley in Mechanical Engineering — honor student — back when UC was top of the game in Engineering and everything else. (UC Berkeley tied with Harvard at that time as top school in the country. His first 2 years of college were spent at Northwestern. Berkeley at $55 per semester was a better education than Northwestern at $1300 per quarter.) In those days (early 1960s) Mechanical Engineering was more comprehensive than I think it is now. He studied electrical, nuclear, & electronic, disciplines, as well as mechanical. Many of those subjects are now seperate degrees. He has used all of that knowledge over the years.
He had an excellent education that has served him in good stead every place he worked, and he still uses it every day. Of course the real basis of his education was what he learned from his late father (a GE Engineer) who also ran his own machine shop in his basement in Detroit during WWII making airplane parts for the US Army in his off hours. Over the years my husband has worked with engineers who did not know which end of a hammer to hold. Seriously! So look for a school that offers some practical applications in their programs. His first assignment at Northwestern was to make a mold and cast a hammer head. That hammer is in my bottom desk drawer at the office where I use to hang pictures, etc. around our plant.
Our nephew graduated in Civil Engineering 8 years ago and found that the only job he could get was joining the AF and serving in Iraq building FOBs. He loved it and got a MS out of it, thanks to the USAF, but his marriage did not survive the separations.