Choosing Schools

College Majors Engineering Majors
1

<p>I recently started my college search and soon realized that choosing colleges to apply to is a very difficult process, so I would love to hear some input. I'm going to be a senior this coming year at a smallish school in NH (700 students) and I hope to study engineering in college (although I don't know what type). I have tons of extracurriculars (Cross Country, Track, Math Team, Quiz Bowl, NHS, SHS, Student Government, etc.). My unweighted high school gpa is 3.92. I have taken the SATs once so far and I got a 2120, 770-math, 690-reading, and 660-writing. I also took the SAT2s and got 700-physics, 790-math2. As for AP courses, I took the AP Physics test this May (I don't have my scores for that yet), and I will be taking the AP Chem, AP Calc BC, AP SpanLang and AP EngLit next year.</p>

<p>My current college list is:
Cornell - stretch
Johns Hopkins - stretch
Dartmouth - stretch
Lehigh - middle
BU - middle
Northeastern - middle
UMass Amherst - safety</p>

<p>I would love to hear anyone's opinions on my chances at these schools and whether or not any schools should be added to or taken off this list. Thanks!</p>

2

<p>why not try some engineering magnet schools like MIT, Worcester, etc. or others in your area? I think if you want to get into engineering, and you are applying to a liberal arts school, your chances might be better than you think.</p>

3

<p>Why Dartmouth? If you are interested in engineering and the Ivy League (or just want a few token Ivy League schools on there), then there are really only 2 great engineering schools to choose from from that bunch. You already have one in Cornell; the other is Princeton.</p>

4

<p>It will probably be helpful for you in your decision-making process to run through the following drill, and if you share the results on this forum, people will be in a better position to offer advice.</p>

<p>The schools you have on your list all have engineering schools, but after that vary quite a bit. Now is the time to work on your criteria.</p>

<p>Location: Do you want city or quaint college town? A suburb? Is a slummy location OK? How about one in the boonies?</p>

<p>Size: Do you want a university or a college? Is it OK if a lot of the intro classes are taught by grad students?</p>

<p>Financial Aid: Can you pay the full boat, or is money going to be the deciding factor? If money is a big issue, study the net cost estimator results carefully, and apply to twice as many schools as you would if you don’t need aid. You can never tell which schools will admit you, and which ones will give you the best financial aid offer. Fifteen schools is not an unreasonable number, and the extra admissions fee could bring you an extra $100,000 over four years. My nephew applied to 17, and wound up going to a moderate reach school that his father and I nagged him to add to his list. This school not only was the most prestigious that accepted him, but it also gave him the best aid offer, costing the same as his state university. His aid/merit offers were all over the place. One private school wanted him to pay $55,000.</p>

<p>Region: Will you go anywhere in the world? In the U.S.? Or do you want to stay within two hours of home?</p>

<p>Sports: Are you good enough to run at the college level? If so, which schools give you the best opportunity to do so?</p>

<p>Tech Schools Only? Is it possible that you could change your mind and decide not to pursue a technical major? If so, your non-technical options at a technical school will be limited, and you may have to transfer, which is a real pain, and many courses may not transfer. Although this may sound unthinkable now, many engineering students decide that engineering is not what they want to do (and many kids who chose their school because of its political science department wind up taking only one political science class). </p>

<p>Co-ops: Is a co-op program crucial to you? (Bear in mind that you can often make your own co-op by getting a co-op job on your own and taking a semester off, or with a summer job).</p>

<p>Atmosphere? This is perhaps the most crucial part of the equation, because this is what will determine whether you’ll be happy or not. Most tech schools have a certain flavor (and few girls), schools that offer broader curriculums can be more diverse but also can be louder and have more clowns who goof off, big schools can be impersonal and small schools can offer both more attention and more people knowing everything about you even when you want them to know nothing about you. And on and on.</p>

<p>Prestige: Is name brand important? </p>

<p>Difficulty: Is it going to be OK with you if you’re average amongst the students you’re going to school with (or if you get into a reach school, below average)? This can be a humbling experience after being the superstar in high school, and a lot for some kids to take. Or do you want to challenged at the hgihest level?</p>

<hr>

<p>By the way, a few other potential other schools you may want to add to your long list (and start with a long, long list) could include WPI, RPI, Union, Lafayette, Bucknell, RIT, Stevens, Syracuse and Clarkson. UNH might give you a lot of money to keep you in-state, and is likely to be much cheaper than UMASS. Admission to the Ivies and MIT is always unpredictable, but your academics are certainly in range, and no one can evaluate your non-academic side from any resume you put on this site.</p>

<p>And although as a Princeton grad I’d love to take a shot at Dartmouth, don’t let anyone tell you that they have a weak engineering school. I’ve known and/or interviewed too many very successful graduates of their engineering school. </p>

<p>Finally, beware of advice from anyone on College Confidential (including me – you don’t know who I am). A lot of the advice here comes from high school students, or current college students who have experienced only one college and have no real world experience. Use this as one resource only, and talk to as many people as you can.</p>

5

<p>Thanks for all your input, I really appreciate it. First off, I don’t know why i forgot to put it on my list, but RPI is definitely a school I’m looking at. As for the drill, here are my responses:</p>

<p>Location: I honestly have no idea, the only thing I do know is I don’t want to be in an ugly or dangerous area (i don’t consider boston to be dangerous or ugly).</p>

<p>Size: Any size is good as long as the college isn’t massive (30,000ish +)</p>

<p>Financial Aid: Money is a big factor, however both my sisters applied for financial aid and were given around $25,000 per year to most of the colleges they applied to.</p>

<p>Region: I need to stay in the northeast or mid-atlantic</p>

<p>Sports: I would be able to run at most of these schools, and depending on how this upcoming season goes, possibly all of them.</p>

<p>Tech: I definitely want to pursue a major that involves engineering, and possibly double major in physics or math</p>

<p>Co-op: Co-ops are not crucial to me, although it’s definitely a plus if a school has them</p>

<p>Atmosphere: The atmosphere is very important to me, and I have huge concerns specifically about the guy:girl ratio at schools like RPI. This is mostly why my list has schools like BU and NEU instead of WPI and RIT.</p>

<p>Prestige: Prestige is important to me because I feel it can help someone get a better job</p>

<p>Difficulty: I want to get into the best school possible, if that means being the dumbest person there than i’m completely fine with that.</p>

<p>As to “why dartmouth?” I’ve spent my entire life in NH and i really like it here, plus dartmouth’s campus was amazing. However, i am concerned about the strength of its engineering program. I also feel as if applying to MIT would be futile, no one in my school has ever been accepted there (although for some reason Cornell accepts a ton of kids from my school).</p>

6

<p>One tidbit: If you can run at the college level, and want to do it, then that could be your ticket in. Coaches at the top schools have a tough time getting good athletes who can meet their admissions standards (which are usually lower for athletes). </p>

<p>Meet with your coach to evaluate what level (DI, DII, DIII) would be appropriate for you, and then work out a plan to get you known to their coaches. Each college coach has a very small number of kids he can get through admissions. If you can get one of the coach’s admissions slots, you can almost certainly get in to any school in the country, with your numbers.</p>

<p>If you don’t get one of the coach’s slots, your running will be viewed by admissions as just another activity, even if you’re All-State.</p>

<p>Bear in mind that even DIII is a lot better than you think. </p>

<p>Good luck, and post or private email me for more info on this. I was recruited, back in the age when footballs were made from wood.</p>

<p>PS: When you say any size is OK, bear in mind that a school with 10,000 students may have classes of 500 taught by professors, and have the intor classes taught by grad students, whereas the liberal arts schools with engineering schools (Lafayette, Union, for example) will have a lot of classes with 10 students, all taught by professors. Unfortunately, there’s lots of things to investigate when you evaluate schools.</p>

7

<p>“both my sisters applied for financial aid and were given around $25,000 per year to most of the colleges they applied to.” - Be aware that number of students in college is a big factor. Run some financial aid calculators for your scenario each year. You don’t want surprises in the years when you are the only kid still in college.</p>

8

<p>PSS:</p>

<p>A few random thoughts:</p>

<p>Think about adding U Rochester and Carnegie Mellon to your list. </p>

<p>Also, a good indicator of financial aid is often the endowment / student (for private schools, anyway).</p>

<p>I would guess that MIT has admissions slots for runners – find a way to get noticed by the coach.</p>

<p>Dartmouth’s engineering school is solid. There are many other benefits that come with being a Dartmouth grad, which include the cohesiveness of the alumni network.</p>

<p>When I started college, I thought I would have a technical major, and wound up being a psychology major, and not because I floundered in the tech intro courses, but because I chose to go in another direction, almost as soon as I reached the school. Many kids change their minds when it comes to their majors, and almost all will be doing something they can’t even imagine thirty years after graduation.</p>

9

<p>Just a caution–our 2 D’s received great financial aid offers from the private schools (better than what UMass offered), while our son, a male interested in engineering (not too common, right), got a great offer from UMass and very little from the private schools. All 3 kids are comparable academically, EC-wise, etc.</p>

10

<p>Dartmouth’s engineering program is solid if you plan to go the non-technical route with your career. If you don want that, I’ve not seen a single Dartmouth grad in traditional engineering industries. That isn’t to say they don’t exist (they certainly do) but it isn’t common. If you look at non-traditional careers such as finance, however, I’d bet they are over-represented. It’s all about what you want to do later. Princeton and Cornell both have a wider footprint in industry without cutting off the paths to the non-traditional career tracks. They are simply better options.</p>

11

<p>boneh3ad: Dartmouth is on my list specifically beause I’m not yet sure whether or not I would like to go the technical route (I’m considering law school). And although it’s great that Cornell and Princeton would present me with more opportunities, is it realistic to think that I would get accepted to these schools?</p>

12

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<p>Cornell isn’t any harder to get into than Dartmouth to my knowledge. Princeton probably is on account of the fact that it is Princeton, but still, if you are shooting for Dartmouth then what’s to lose?</p>

13

<p>

Huh? Cornell is vastly easier to get into (relatively speaking). Cornell’s admit rate is roughly 16%. Dartmouth’s admit rate is 9.4%.</p>

14

<p>terenc, you are missing the forest for the trees. The point was the OP was applying to Dartmouth yet was worried that Cornell and Princeton might be a stretch. The point was to point out the error in that thinking.</p>

15

<p>Although Dartmouth has a lower acceptance rate than Cornell, I would be applying to their engineering schools. So since Cornell’s engineering school is far superior to Dartmouth’s wouldn’t that mean Dartmouth is easier to get into than Cornell?</p>

16

<p>Rankings/quality and acceptance rates are not the same thing and don’t always correlate. You’d have to look at what that statistic applies to (engineering or the whole school) and how admissions works (departmental or university-wide). I suspect the latter is true for both of those and thy Dartmouth is harder to get into despite lower rankings in engineering.</p>

<p>To be fair, rankings and quality are not the same thing either.</p>

17

<p>All of the Ivy schools are very difficult to get into.</p>

<p>I can’t speak for the other seven, but I’ve been alumni interviewer for Princeton for many years, and as far as I’ve heard, all of the Ivy schools have pretty much the same admissions process.</p>

<p>With Princeton, all applicants are rated 50% on academics and 50% on non-academics. The non-academic side is a difficult thing to evaluate, and no one on this board will be able to tell from any summary you post here whether it is strong enough or too weak. Usually, you need something extraordinary on the non-academic side to get in. One guy I know got into Cornell – back in 1992 – because he was the youngest county chairman for the Ross Perot for President Campaign in the country, in a county with few people in it. Being class president usually isn’t enough. Another girl got in to Princeton in part because the choir director left, and she was conducting the choir at school. Another girl got in (to all Ivy schools at which she applied) because she was ranked first in her class, had 780/800 SAT’s, was all-state in soccer (for small schools – not an Ivy caliber player), and had started the snowboarding club, the peer counseling program and another activity at school. She was a superior applicant all-around.</p>

<p>Your academic numbers will put you on the field for these schools if your non-academic side is rated as very strong.</p>

<p>My advice would be to apply to Dartmouth and Cornell, assume you’re not going to get in, and then forget about them. Then apply to many other schools. I’m not being negative, but Ivy admission is unpredictable, so no one should bank on getting into one of them. If you get into one, then it’ll be a welcome surprise, but you’ll be certain to have other options if you don’t.</p>

<p>Athletically, the Ivies have a complicated system for athletic admissions based around the Academic Index, which you can research. Here’s one article about it:</p>

<p>[Calculating</a> the Ivy League Academic Index](<a href=“http://home.comcast.net/~charles517/ivyai.html]Calculating”>http://home.comcast.net/~charles517/ivyai.html)</p>

<p>Other top academic schools, even Division 3 schools, will accept athletes that the coach says he wants who have academic standards that are below the university average or who have ho-hum non-academic records other than athletics. The easiest way into an elite school is through athletic recruitment, but bear in mind that there are plenty of kids that are after those track/cross-country admissions slots.</p>

18

<p>Also, look into the programs that these schools offer-I personally wouldn’t go for a school simply because of prestige (though it is a factor), but more important is what that program can do for you. Look into the other Ivies and schools like Carnegie Mellon (as Boondocks said, if your non-academic abilities/achievements/experiences match up to your academic ones, then you’re in the playing field for admission into these schools). </p>

<p>Compare the programs and see what best matches with your own personal interests; for example, someone I know and I both turned down Cornell (very well known for engineering) for Penn (not so known for engineering). We’re both die-hard engineers that build robots, love math and physics, make coil guns for fun, ect. However (in my case), Penn offered me opportunities to have access to university resources and to be involved in projects and research (and even personal projects) that aren’t as open to undergraduates in most places.</p>

<p>Point is, don’t discount Dartmouth, other Ivies, or other such schools just because their engineering programs aren’t as well recognized. Go for the ones that let you do what you want to do with your undergraduate experience (at that level, you’ll end up having connections either way).</p>