Hey all,
I’m currently trying to decide between Carnegie Mellon (MCS) and UNC Chapel Hill for hopefully a math major and a compsci minor. I live in North Carolina so Chapel Hill’s annual costs come to around 21k a year, while CMU is around 70k. My dad says that he can cover college expenses but didn’t really elaborate on how easily/comfortably he could do that. I’m personally leaning towards CMU but I’m not sure if I can justify the price difference. I’m certain that I’ll be able to enjoy my time at either school, but I was interested to see if anyone had insight on any academic or career advantages that CMU might provide for triple the cost. Career wise I’m interested in either tech or finance.
Thanks!
Both are great schools and you’ll be wonderful at whichever one you decide! That being said, I feel like UNC is the more viable option simply due to cost. However, if you’re really set on CMU, go for it! You just need to understand the amount of loans that you’ll be taking out.
Very tough choice OP. Here are my comments. I apologize if they are not that well organized. I’m just going to write my thoughts as they come in to my head.
I am a CMU alum and Pittsburgh native and I’ve also become very familiar with and an admirer of UNC through visits, my own son applying (and getting accepted), and the many classmates of my kids who have gone there. I think you can succeed very well at UNC - CH in the areas you mentioned. As you know, UNC-CH is well regarded throughout the Nation. It has a very strong alumni network. But I sense that you prefer the environment (i.e. pace, workload, fellow students, more consistently nerdy environment), thus it perhaps comes down to how sure you are your family can afford it? Pittsburgh is not a difficult trip, but it is fairly long (about 7.5 hours by car). The weather is worse in Pittsburgh (lots of gray skies), but not horribly so. Fall and Spring are beautiful there.
As I stated above, CMU is more uniformly nerdy and, of course, does not have the unifying feature of D1 sports (no Dean Dome, haha), but UNC has the honors college and among the many thousands of undergrads you can find many students who are as smart as you’d find anywhere. Are you prepared for and do you relish the pace and more focused academic experience at CMU?
You are fortunate that you have two very strong choices, and I wish you the best of luck.
I think it’s a pretty easy choice. Look, these two are comparable schools (in terms of prestige).
One costs over 3 times as much.
Enough said.
Hi, sorry for the really late reply I sort of forgot about this thread due to AP exams and all. I ended up choosing CMU over Chapel Hill due to their Math and Computer Science programs. (Won’t be a Compsci Major but will have opportunity to take amazing classes and possibly a minor). However, I was placed off the waitlist for Berkeley on the 5th so I withdrew from CMU and enrolled at Berkeley after difficult deliberation. I found Berkeley’s flexibility to be attractive with possible majors/double major in CS, Math, Applied Math, and Statistics, and I liked the location better. Despite the much larger class size I think I’ll be able to make the most out of my chances there.
Thank you everyone for the suggestions.