My son is looking at these 4 schools for Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering. He was accepted EA to WPI and Mines, deferred EA from Case and waiting to hear from RPI EA. We have not visited any of them due to covid. He is considering changing to ED2 at Case but its hard without having a clear strong preference for any of them. He is pretty easy going and thinks he’ll be happy at all 4 of them. Cost is not an issue.
If he doesn’t have a clear preference, why ED2 at Case? Especially since he’s already been accepted to WPI and Mines…
Case has a better reputation and looks the most financially sound of the 4. I think this will be important post covid. Plus the Think Box looks amazing and its close to a NASA lab. Lots of negtive posts on RPI, but the school looks great on their virtual tours. Aerospace looks strong. Everyone seems very happy at WPI, which is important. We like the location of Mines but no aerospace. No clear winner. Trade offs. Looking for insight. Thanks in advance!
Of the four, my D liked RPI the best (for chem e). Case suffered from being too close to home and she didn’t want to be in the city. With that said, everyone we know at Case was happy and had good career outcomes. It has a quirkier vibe than the others.
One of the most successful aero engineers I know went to RPI. Their facilities are amazing. D was worried about the arch program though and in the end, even though she got a good amount of merit $, she liked Purdue better. (Same cost too).
FWIW, NASA Glenn doesn’t take a lot of students and cancelled everything during covid. I wouldn’t make that a deciding factor.
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I’m just going to say that, for me, Case didn’t sit right with me when I toured in 2019. Neither myself nor my parents cared for the school much afterwards. It seemed very nice from the outside, like great campus and reputation, but the tour was disappointing, where it felt like we were simply just another prospective student family in the massive group they placed us in. Most of the time, it seemed like the tour guide was just rushing through the tour so he could be done, and he would only talk while walking, making it hard to hear him with our group of at least 10 families all hustling to catch up. So when compared to other schools I got to tour, like Georgia Tech, it paled in comparison. Most tours I’ve been on have felt much more personal and had guides who obviously cared about their schools. All of this just to say that although I do think Case is a very good school, the tour really turned me and my family off, and inevitably removed Case from my list. Of course all of this is anecdotal, but just want to share since your son is considering ed.
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I just have to laugh… Every tour for engineering pales in comparison to Georgia Tech. 
. We were super impressed
I wouldn’t let tour’s make your decision… Some are good at it and others aren’t.
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Totally, it also came down to disliking the set up for where dorms were on campus, changing my intended major, and the entirely different circumstances we now live in compared to Spring of 2019 (I was mainly looking at Architecture at that time).
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I’ll also chime in that we visited, toured, and researched Case and it dropped down the list when my D was looking for a MechE school.
The son of a good friend is at RPI and doing fine. That would be my choice among the four, but that doesn’t really mean much - everyone has their own priorities.
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Mines is a state school, so financially it is fine. However, CU Boulder is the aerospace school in Colorado and that’s where instate students who want aero go (or the Air Force Academy).
Mines is great, a nice place to live, lots of opportunities. I’d rather live there than Worcester MA or Troy NY
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Thanks. He also applied to Boulder but prefers Mines. He applied to Georgia Tech and USC but his chances are very slim. Maybe we can travel in March or April…