<p>Does anyone have any thoughts about which is better? My son likes these two schools. He definitely wants to go to a private school in Texas. He is homeschooled and made a 34 on his ACT. Most of his activites are church related including running the computer for worship and all special events and concerts. He made a 5 on the AP Stats exam in 10th grade. He is currently taking AP Chem and AP Gov as a junior. Any thoughts?</p>
<p>If you mean computer science or *engineering<a href=“programming%20is%20needed,%20but%20is%20not%20the%20only%20thing%20included%20in%20study%20of%20these%20subjects”>/i</a>, the highest reputation schools in Texas are UT Austin and Rice, but many other schools including Baylor and TCU are fine.</p>
<p>A student intending the study computer science or engineering should be good at math, and should have completed precalculus (or calculus if available). Precalculus topics that the student should know are included in this placement exam: [Calculus</a> Placement Exam | Department of Mathematics at University of California Berkeley](<a href=“http://math.berkeley.edu/courses/choosing/placement-exam]Calculus”>http://math.berkeley.edu/courses/choosing/placement-exam)</p>
<p>Your son is too smart to go to TCU/Baylor. But that’s just my opinion. He should check out Rice or UT Austin.</p>
<p>He is taking Precalc right now. He will take AP Calc next year, though I don’t plan to use the credit. He’ll also take AP Physics his senior year. ( We have found a great online AP provider we are using. It is the same one where he did AP STaTs and currently AP Chem and gov.) </p>
<p>To be honest, I wondered about Rice. However, I honestly didn’t think he could get in and he doesn’t seem that interested. His Christian faith is important to him. Also, his extra-curriculars are not that outstanding. He is a work in the background kind of kid. He is a VERY hard worker and VERY self-motivated. However, he would never take leadership of a group of people. Instead, for his youth group they will get to camp and he’ll have the map out and the schedule and so everyone looks to him about where to go and when because they know he knows. He would never get up and make a presentation or inspirational speech or start some great cause. That said, he would be a great worker who does things that need to be done without being asked.</p>
<p>Your son is too smart to go to TCU/Baylor.</p>
<p>Why? Both my husband and I went to Baylor. My husband graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Baylor, at the top of his med school class at Southwestern and went to a great residency program and is making a good living as a doctor. Baylor seemed to give him a good enough education!!! I felt well prepared as a high school teacher as well. Just curious.</p>
<p>Baylor and TCU are affiliated with different denominations (Southern Baptist and Disciples of Christ respectively), so someone with strong religious beliefs may want to investigate with denominational differences of a religiously affiliated school matter. Note also that religion affiliated schools vary in environment; some have a highly religious environment, while others are hardly distinguishable from secular schools (though religious students often find such schools fine if there is a religious community of their religion there).</p>
<p>Regarding calculus and physics, another option is to take actual college courses at a local community college. Choose courses that are transferable to UT Austin as calculus and physics courses for physics and engineering majors.</p>
<p>To be honest our cc isn’t that strong. The degree plans he is looking at have him taking Calc I, II and II and Physics I and II. I would hate for him to take the entry level at our cc with questionable strength and then try to enter into the second course at the “real” university if that makes sense… He is currently taking Spanish at the cc and will take English there next year as well.</p>
<p>University of Texas engineering specifies the following courses for Texas community college students intending to transfer as juniors (specified in Texas common course numbering):</p>
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<p>[TCCN/UT</a> Transfer Guides](<a href=“http://www.utexas.edu/student/admissions/tccn/]TCCN/UT”>http://www.utexas.edu/student/admissions/tccn/)</p>
<p>The above should give you an idea of what courses to select at the community college in order to get courses that are more likely to be accepted at a four year school.</p>
<p>Yes, I know that there are classes that WILL transfer. My concern is that he takes calculus at the cc and it transfers. He enters calculus 2 and realizes that some basic/crucial information was missing from his calc 1 class that everyone has had. He would be playing catch-up. </p>
<p>Also, to be honest there is NO way he would go to UT Austin. It is WAY too big for him. He prefers small schools.</p>
<p>Ask each school where recent grads have been employed and see which places appeal more to your son. Both are decent schools. He’ll also get decent merit aid from Baylor and could be in their Honor’s College. I’m not as familiar with TCU.</p>
<p>Rice never appealed to my guy either and he did have qualifications (scores, leadership, and all) to have been competitive for admission. Don’t fit round pegs into square holes just because of perceived prestige. Check to be certain graduates are getting desirable jobs and then go with fit.</p>
<p>UT-anywhere never appealed at all to my guy. They’re good schools, but not for everyone.</p>
<p>The reason for using UT Austin as an example to check community college course transfer is that (1) it is a state school with articulation agreements with Texas community colleges, and (2) it is generally considered an academically rigorous school, so the Texas community colleges feeding it transfer students need to maintain some level of rigor in their courses. It does not mean that the student will necessarily want to go to UT Austin – just that it can be helpful when selecting useful courses at the community college.</p>
<p>Having visited both schools, I’d say the emphasis on religion is stronger, more in the forefront, at Baylor. I could be wrong, but that’s my impression. All students must take a full year of Religion class at Baylor, and a full year of weekly Chapel attendance. I don’t think that is true at TCU.</p>
<p>Your son should really visit both campuses and get a feel for them. Though you’d think they’re very similary, they really are not at all.</p>
<p>Andrewt787 – a person’s intelligence is only one factor in reaching a college choice. As well described by OP, religious, social geographic, and other factors are just as important. Both schools are in the USNWR top 100.</p>
<p>Yes we have been to both schools. I do want him to go back for an overnight. We are Baptist and so obviously Baylor if fine. That said, I didn’t grow up a Baptist and went there. I was fine. Yes religion is a little more in the forefront. But many times the chapel speakers are not religious. The religion classes were taught more like history than Bible study when I was there and now you have tons of choices of what kind of religion class to take.</p>
<p>But TCU is so much smaller and as long as you find a good church to belong to, it would be the same. There were a lot of backslidden Baptists at Baylor. He will have to make the decision about how much he wants faith to have a part in his life whether he goes to either school. I did not get the idea that TCU was anti-faith like UT. </p>
<p>I will have him stay overnight to get an even better feel. He is also trying to compile a list of questions to ask each computer department: what programming languages they use, internships, job placement afterwards. Any thing else we should think of?</p>
<p>If you are concerned about job placement, see if putting “career survey” in the school’s web site search box produces anything. (At many schools, it does not, unfortunately. For examples of what you’d like to see, try Virginia Tech, Berkeley, and Cal Poly SLO.)</p>
<p>You should think about other schools like Notre Dame, BYU</p>
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<p>?? For an OP who is obviously looking at Protestant leaning schools in TX these two suggestions, while both good schools, hardly seem like what they are looking for.</p>
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<p>But would a strongly religious Baptist fit in well at a Catholic or LDS school?</p>
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What in the world is that supposed to mean? UT is anti-faith??</p>
<p>Here in our part of Texas, Austin is considered a pretty liberal town. I’m not sure a conservative kid would fit in…</p>