I’m a sophomore transfer accepted to both UMich and BU. I got pretty good financial aid for both schools, essentially full ride for Umich and 15k for BU. I’ve visited both schools and liked both environments. I’ve always leaned a bit more towards Umich because it’s a ‘better’ school and had given me better aid, but it’s much further from home than BU (10 hrs vs. 4 hrs drive) and I want to visit home more often than just the major holidays. How much better is Umich compared to BU? I’m a premed/business student, it would really help me out to know the differences between the schools in terms of research opportunities, level of course intensity, grade inflation/deflation, reputation among med school, and the number of students admitted into med schools according to GPA. Thank you!
They are both fantastic. But you must have researched them prior to transferring. UM is not a better school. That’s simply malarkey and ranking nonsense. They’ve both produced some of the most successful people in their respective fields.
However, knowing that UM is fantastic and 15k cheaper it becomes a much simpler analysis. UM all day long. Plus the trademark campus environment. Big ten football. Great college town. It’s tough to beat. But that’s my preferences. You have to go. Boston is an excellent place to go to college. And Bu has great medical schools locally for shadowing and research opportunities.
But take UM. Take the 15k savings and your ten hour drive is now 4 or 5 flights on Southwest Airlines. And you get to keep another 13500
Review those aid packages carefully. Are there any loans included? If not, would you or your parents need to borrow anything to make up the difference between the two? You want to finish college with as little debt as possible so you can head into med school without that additional worry.
What do you need to do to keep those scholarships? Granted, if you are pre-med you need to have a top GPA, but if you change your mind about pre-med, and your grades slip up a bit, could you afford either of these without aid that bad grades would cause you to lose?
Lastly, do you have to drive to UMich or could you fly? Is the situation that you would be dealing with a dinky regional airport (or two) and multiple connections?