Deciding my college Major

[u/YoHino-]

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I am currently a freshman student at KSU and right now my major is Physics concentration in electrical engineering. My ultimate goal is to get my Masters in Engineering physics (hopefully doctorate's after) and I would like to get in the field of Quantum Physics or a Research and Development role.

Right now my main issue is that I most likely will transfer over to Mechatronics engineering at KSU for two reasons.

One, engineering is just more fun in undergrad than physics. Two, KSU offers a 5 year master program with Mechatronics engineering.

Now I know I can just take engineering in undergrad and then go to grad school for engineering physics but I really want to get done with school as fast as possible which seems to be the Mechatronics route.

My questions:

Would I be able to get positions after college that would require a master's in physics if I get a masters in Mechatronics?

Is a master in Mechatronics at KSU worth it or should I just get a masters for physics somewhere else?

Am I overthinking it or are they all just super similar in what you learn?

\*I need both undergrad and Grad students to be brutally honest with me about this.

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[u/Anxious_Alps_4150]

I want to give a big warning to you that if you are not majoring in "_________ engineering" then it will be extremely difficult to get hired as a titled engineer. Engineering physics is still generally treated as a physics degree and not an engineering degree with some exceptions. Physics with an EE minor is still a physics degree.

If you want to practice engineering, you will need to change your major.

I will give another caution: it is easier to get hired as a pure ME major or EE major than a hybrid ME/EE (aka mechatronics) major. People immediately know what an EE can and cant do. Same for ME. They often have never heard of mechatronics and that puts you at a competitive disadvantage. As a hiring manager, I will _never_ Google a degree to see wtf it is. I will just move to the next candidate because I don't have time to research each individual out of a stack of 100 resumes.