<p>My oldest accepted a ride at a good university, but was underwhelmed. He completed a year, then transferred to a more competitive school. He agreed to split the cost with me. Gotta have skin in the game. Along the way he had to turn down a transfer to a great school because the financial aid package involved too much debt. I would not have allowed him to transfer and to walk away from a ride for a major that does not require a prestigious school to get a job (e.g. accounting or engineering). His focus requires a prestigious school with a Wall Street network. My situation is similar to Bookworm’s. My big engineering school was no fun until senior year when we interacted with professors. Now I am pushing my other children toward small LACs w/engineering.</p>
<p>" My situation is similar to Bookworm’s. My big engineering school was no fun until senior year when we interacted with professors. Now I am pushing my other children toward small LACs w/engineering. "</p>
<p>It’s interesting to hear this perspective because there are a lot of parents on this site strongly asserting the selectivity of the school makes no difference and engineering is always given as a prime example. I personally thought what we saw at some smaller highly selective private schools fell short of what we saw at some large state programs (both in terms of the quality of the projects they seemed to be doing in their classes and in related extracurriculars), but that was just an impression from an engineering tour.</p>
<p>Mathyone, we saw the same thing at one small LAC. My son would have outgrown the courses in his field quickly. He would have been fine at SCS at Carnegie Mellon, whether majoring in CS, minor in Engineering or NS. We never had a chance to explore RIT, Harvey Mudd, or any other schools known for STEM. (Son decided right before winter break in jr. year to apply–another story.) He had spent a few weeks at a computer camp at U Michigan, which was a let down, so that U didn’t make his list. Stanford he had visited and liked, but they didn’t want him. His list would have been quite different if time allowed. He was just fortunate to have some acceptances come April.</p>
<p>Many kids in our area want to stay local. My dermatologist went to Emory for UG, UF for med school, and is now practicing in local area. One of son’s friends was accepted at Cal for law school, but did not wish to leave the east coast. I suspect he will stay north. Only 1 of his friends, an engineer, has a job near Madison. Practically everyone else is living close to family.</p>
<p>We don’t check rankings unless we haven’t heard of a school, like WPI or York College of Pennsylvania (vastly different costs, but both have my son’s STEM major).</p>
<p>We have been back and forth expanding and contracting my son’s college list. I have 28 schools that I calculated net prices for, but the range is so much (no full rides unfortunately) that half of them are off the table. </p>
<p>It will be up to him, but we are letting him know 100% about the financial situation, without trying to whine “it would be really nice if you picked the $20,000 per year school that’s an eh fit for you, instead of the $35,000 per year school that is a great fit for you”.</p>
<p>Sometimes I think of college as a four-year marriage. Yes, you can change, but you need to consider a lot of factors before you decide “who you’ll be with” for the next four years. If your child was in an unhappy marriage, would you tell them to stick it out for four years? Or if your child agreed with you about which paramour they were going to marry, would you feel that your influence would have to be the prevailing factor?</p>
<p>Money is money, you can’t get blood from a stone. But if you have the choice, IMHO let your child choose while knowing the factors. If you keep your money close to your chest, and your children have no idea of your finances, set boundaries based on what you know of your own finances.</p>
<p>If you think that giving your child one choice on where to go to college is reasonable if you have the money to cover other choices, I respectfully disagree.</p>
<p>Mathyone – Call and ask the big U if undergrads get paid on-campus research opportunities. How likely? What percentage of undergrads land these opportunities? Yes, what we say about engineering schools is generally true. However, Google-type companies will take MIT/Cal Tech first. In my day when there was no Google there was Bells Labs. Also choose a co-op school to increase your likelihood of employment (i.e VaTech, Drexel and Northeastern) if undergrad experience is important to you.</p>
<p>@Burgermeister: Actually, Google will take you regardless of school if you have the skills. Even the software companies that are more elitist in recruiting (like Facebook) recruit at both the top public CS schools as well as the top private CS schools:
<a href=“https://www.facebook”>https://www.facebook</a>. com/careers/university (remove the space).</p>
<p>The high frequency trading shops/hedge funds are probably most elitist of all. Here’s where Citadel recruits:
<a href=“https://www.citadel.com/careers/campus-recruiting/”>https://www.citadel.com/careers/campus-recruiting/</a></p>
<p>Bell Labs is not the same as Google. One is more research oriented and one is a verb where everyone uses or at least heard off.</p>
<p>The one thing that I can say with absolute certainty based on personal experience is that a person who does very well in computer science at a state flagship can get a job at any technology company in the country.</p>
<p>^I’m counting on it, I hope my second kid get a job so I can retire.</p>
<p>I must mention that we will not have debt when my child graduates. We are on the payment plan so we divide our part of her tuition by 10 payments - the same as it was for her high school. The payments may be steep, but when she is done, neither of us will have any debt. Then I intend to have granite counter tops, take a 6 week vacation in Hawaii and retire. </p>
<p>I should also note that she already knows if she intends to go to law/grad school she needs to find money for that. I also told her she needs to move home (we live right outside Washington, DC) go to law school and live at home. Or, go to grad school at the University of Maryland, College Park, which is right up the street from us. At that point I will be 58 and not willing to continue to work to support her educational pursuits at the same level.</p>
<p>“Cal Tech vs. University of CO at Boulder or University of Arizona” - Is this the reall “full ride” situation, or just hypothetical? </p>
<p>I think full tuition scholarships to CU are pretty rare and not usually announced this early. </p>
<p>My son turned down an almost full ride offer from a public college to attend a top-ranked LAC. He would have been in the honors program and graduated with a math degree and $0 debt. I don’t think he really wanted to commit to that major. He chose the LAC and received a very good financial aid package, but he does have some loans. In his case going to the best school possible outweighed financial considerations. </p>
<p>I do not understand the logic of paying for UG and then taking loans for Grad. (Med., Law, etc) school. What it the reason for that? Some of these loans are paid over several decades, why have such a burden? All kids who enter Grad. school were stellar top caliber HS students who were eligible for at least full tuition Merit at some places. </p>
<p>No full ride at CU, that was not the context. Close to full ride at U of AZ or close to full pay at Cal Tech, U of CO, Harvey Mudd. </p>
<p>Miami, for heaven’s sake, would you finally accept med/law school is different from grad school? I and many posters have written to you about this so many times. Grad school is generally funded, and a good student can apply for NSF or something else to fund their grad school. With a good background, even law school offers funding for some students. </p>
<p>Miami is confusing professional school with grad school. Grad school in STEM should be funded.</p>
<p>“I do not understand the logic of paying for UG…”
The logic is that some people feel that they will get a better education, or have a better college experience, if they are not the standout student in the class. They don’t want to be the hand-picked TA teaching the other students. They want to learn from other students who may be better than they are. Some kids are tired of teaching other students; they’ve been doing that their entire lives. They’re looking for academic peers.</p>
<p>Of course, if your main goal as an undergraduate is to get in to med school, then it may be a good idea to go to a school where your stats are much higher than the average student. Aside from financial consideration of the large scholarship you should receive as an academic recruit to raise the stats of the school, you shouldn’t have much trouble excelling, since you’ll be compared with students who weren’t able to do as well as you in high school, and so it should be easier to get the high GPA required for med school.</p>
<p>So if those are the choices, full-pay at CU (even in-state) makes no sense if a near full-ride at 'Zona is available.</p>
<p>Comparing CalTech/Mudd with the near full-ride honors at 'Zona is tough. I respect CalTech and Mudd grads, but they also have tough curricula, and not everyone makes it through at those schools (which is more of a concern if you are full-pay with tuition what it is these days).</p>
<p>What are career goals? I would say that if med/law school or even a PhD is in the plans, I’d choose honors at 'Zona. You’d get plenty of opportunities for research there, and if having an elite school on the resume is so important, if you do well in undergrad, you can get in to an elite grad school. Plus, the name and network of the school where you get your JD or PhD (or MBA) is more important than where you went for undergrad if you get those degrees.</p>
<p>Even if you plan to work right after undergrad, full-pay at CalTech/Mudd is still hard to justify (unless you’re so rich that the extra $200K or so doesn’t matter much to you). And as I mentioned before, if you discover that you really need/want that elite school on your resume, you can get a Masters from a place like Stanford (assuming that you do well in undergrad). Full-pay for 2 years of a Masters is still far cheaper than 4 years of full-pay for an undergrad degree (and some employers will subsidize that Masters to an extent).</p>
<p>Ah, I get it now. CU is a fine school… but no, not worth full pay vs free options. Apply anyway, in case you luck into scholarships. </p>
<p>Cal Tech and Mudd are tougher decisions. Much depends on the student aspirations and family finances. It’s a bit like buying a new car - no right answer for everybody. Actually, it’s like buying a new car 4 years in a row. </p>
<p>"Miami, for heaven’s sake, would you finally accept med/law school is different from grad school? I and many posters have written to you about this so many times. Grad school is generally funded, and a good student can apply for NSF or something else to fund their grad school. With a good background, even law school offers funding for some students. "
- Shooting in the sky? …funding for some law students - how many? We are dreaming here. Dream is good only as a plan to convert it to reality. This logic does not make much sense. You can keep yor opinion, and obviosly, my argument does not apply to those who could afford paying both UG and Grad. tuition. But vast majority is not there. </p>
<p>@MiamiDAP:</p>
<p>Actually, with the popularity of law school waning, pretty much all law schools outside the very top offer merit money to some applicants now. Same with b-schools. And the top b-schools (probably law schools as well) now offer financial aid.</p>