<p>I attend a small, inexpensive public school where I am a sophomore. I already work there as a writing tutor and a tour guide. Until now I was an undecided major, but I was interested in some economics classes and was invited by a professor there to be an economics major. This can mean alot because I can do studies with the professors here. I also have a $7k a year scholarship, and I have to pay almost nothing. On the other hand it is seldom known outside of the area. I have the opportunity to go to the big state school, but I will have to start all over again when I have already done a lot here, and I would not have a scholarship.</p>
<p>My questions:
Would it be better for personal prestige from the small or college name prestige from the big?</p>
<p>How do employers look at the name?</p>
<p>I plan on going to graduate school in some form either way, so which is better?</p>
<p>*The colleges I am talking about is Richard Sockton College or Rutgers.</p>
<p>Rutgers is pretty expensive. I assume that you are talking about Rutgers-NB. Does this mean that you would graduate with a lot of debt? If so, you might be better off staying at Stockton. That is something to think about. There is no doubt about it, Rutgers has national name recognition, and Stockton does not. Also, the funny thing is that when one leaves NJ, most people don’t distinguish between Newark, Camden, and New Brunswick campuses. Are you commuting to Stockton, because you have an amazing deal there financially? It also looks like you are taking advantage of some wonderful opportunities offered through Stockton.</p>
<p>I am instate and the actual price of Rutgers is not to different. However, I would lose my scholarship that I have at Stockton. I currently have to to take no private loans which is a great plus. I can work with the professor alot since he is always in his office, and there are less 100 economics majors. </p>
<p>What it comes down to is, is the name recognition worth starting over at a new college?</p>
<p>If you take advantage of the opportunity to work closely with a few of the economics faculty, the resulting letters of recommendation and connections can be invaluable for your next steps - work or graduate school. Attending a ‘bigger name’ school without those relationships would not be worth it. So the question is, how likely are you to be able to replicate the opportunities at Rutgers (including the close relationships with faculty) that you are getting at Stockton? What kind of internship opportunities do you have at both school? And how mobilized are the alums in terms of helping out recent grads? These factors are important important, especially in a slow economy. (Graduating with no debt is also very liberating in terms of deciding on your next steps.)</p>
<p>What I don’t follow is that you pay almost nothing for Stockton. The instate cost is over 22,000 (not including books). If you have a 7k scholarship, unless you are commuting how do you pay almost nothing? I think that costs are about 24,000 when including fees for Rutgers (you can check the numbers because I have not so and I could be off on that number). </p>
<p>The one advantage that Rutgers may have is that apparently major companies do recruit right on campus. Stockton, I would think has much less of that because they are smaller and not as close to NYC.</p>
<p>I will tell you this, my son is also at a small school. I am also a NJ resident and the school my son is attending (he is a freshman) is costing about the same after scholarship money (slightly less) as our NJ public Us at instate costs, so he could also attend Rutgers or one of our other instate schools. My son also has opportunities on his campus that I do not feel he would have gotten at Rutgers, or one of our other larger public Us. He is very happy and he has never considered name recognition for employment later, or the name on of the school on his diploma. I think that he is enjoying being a big fish in a smaller pond right now. What he considered in choosing a school was mostly about person fit and he went with his gut feelings. My guess is that his GPA is also higher than it would have been at Rutgers because of the small class sizes and the fact that he is at a low match/safety school (he was within the top 25% of admitted students at his school) and Rutgers would probably have been a match/high match for him. I have wondered whether he would be better off at Rutgers vs. small school for employment reasons only. Then I look at the opportunities he is enjoying now, and I know he is in a wonderful place at this moment. My son is one who can network with others fairly easily, and I see that he is trying to create opportunities for himself on campus and beyond it. When I see that, I worry less about the lack of national name recognition of his smaller school.</p>