@thshadow thanks for the Rochester area lowdown. Sounds like my son would like RIT better too, and would probably have an easier time getting accepted anyways. When my son found out that RIT was named the geekiest campus recently he was intrigued, and he thinks he would fit in there. We also read somewhere it was named one of the ugliest campuses in the US, so I’m glad to hear your thought it was ok. 
Might have to take a drive to Rochester this summer to check it out.
One of my H’s co-workers son is a Freshman at RIT and absolutely loves it. He is very geeky ( in a good way.)
My S didnt like U of R at all. H was on that trip so I don’t remember son’s reasoning.
This has been an interesting thread as many of the schools were on my S’s list. He’s going to be starting in engineering at RIT in the fall. I was intrigued that you heard small classes at RPI and big classes at RIT (though small recitations). We heard exactly the opposite. RPI was proud of their huge lecture hall and the clicker system used by the profs. We were told by our guide that many of the general classes the first 2 years were 100+. RIT they said you might have one class that’s close to 100. They really do seem to emphasize undergrad teaching. My S also had similar views about UofR. WPI was a big hit with him as well.
He loved the RIT campus - as you said, great facilities, very modern. But if you have dreams of a traditional ivy-covered campus, it’s not for you. No old buildings, as the campus was built in the late 60s, when RIT moved from the city to the suburbs. And you better like orange brick - it’s called brick city for a reason.
I’m a huge fan of co-op. My D is an engineering major at Northeastern and the co-op experience has been great. Both for the work, the chance to experience different types of companies, and the chance to live in different cities (and countries). Yes, it adds a year, but it doesn’t add to tuition. What’s the hurry. And a good CS major won’t have any problem getting a co-op It’s good experience for learning how to get jobs after graduation too.
Good luck. I’m glad to be on the other side of this now.
@krnBoston - what you said is totally correct, and I realize I wasn’t clear in what I wrote. The point I was trying to make was that even for the huge 100 person class (I think my guide said 120 for chem 101), the 20-person recitations were also taught by the prof (which I’ve never heard of anywhere). (It seems like EVERY school said "yeah, you have some big freshman classes, but then the later classes are small. I’m sure that’s what I was reporting from RPI.)
Yes, RIT gave a very strong impression of caring a lot about undergrad education.
FWIW, My Olin kid was with the school’s Baja Racer team at the SAE Baja race a few weeks ago. Just under 100 teams participated, and the RIT team took first place.
Am I allowed to post image links to imgur? (I guess you have to *** → imgur . com) If so, here are 4 pics I took of RIT’s campus. I didn’t get the best (interior) parts though!
Okay…we did not apply to RIT (Sort of sorry we didn’t now) and we’re choosing between Carnegie Mellon, RPI and Northeastern…but your comments about RIT sound EXACTLy like what my daughter wanted. 
We found those students at RPI but not at CMU or NE…and she prefers those town. Alas…this search thing is hard. What did you make of the RPI students compared to those at RIT??
KRNboston…can you tell me more about NEU experience? lol. My daughter liked her visit there but thought students maybe more into partying and working than the geeky/nerdy/fun/silly type she saw at RPI and liked…but frankly she can do NEU for free so …hard to turn down… any thoughts on social world? Daughter is into Comp sci and virtual reality and game and film.
My D is a computer engineering major. NEU isn’t a huge party school - but it definitely has more of a professional vibe than the geeky nerdy vibe. There are a lot of pre-health (not just pre-med - all health fields) as well as business and engineering. The kids tend to be focused. My S wanted the geeky vibe - his type of school was RIT/WPI/RPI. Wouldn’t look at NEU because it is in the city (my D would only look in the city). That said, she found her first group of friends watching Dr. Who - so the geeks are there. She’s active in the entertainment division of NUTv - producing. filming, editing skits, etc. for their web-based tv station.
RPI seemed more serious to us (just from visiting, no inside track there). My S liked it more than I did - he was WL, so it didn’t get a closer look. I was an engineering grad student at CMU - the undergrads were very intense. I’ve heard it hasn’t changed, but once again, I don’t have any inside track. Very geeky/nerdy - but very hard working and intense. That said, Pgh is a great place to go to school.
They are all great schools for CS and engineering. NEU is big enough that there are all kinds of kids. Great location in Boston. She’s had a fantastic experience. Also, if your D is at all interested in travel, NEU is unbelievable in the travel opportunities, even for engineers. She’s done study and co-op abroad.
My daughter is a first year at RIT and is very happy there. She isn’t a STEM major but could have been and absolutely loves the nerd, geeky vibe there. She is the first to admit she is a geek.
She also looked at Northeastern and RPI.
We looked at Northeastern early in the college search process. She liked the school, loves the Boston area and was very interested in NEU. However, by the time she was ready to apply, she switched her intended major - from Graphic Design to Industrial Design - and NEU didn’t offer it.
RPI’s Design,Innovation and Society program was of great interest to her, On paper it is a blend of science and art that should have been perfect for her. However, it is a developing program and she got the vibe that anything other than an Engineering major was considered second class. That turned her off and she didn’t apply.
Our RIT visit was completely different. RIT’s design programs are very well respected both on and off campus. We met with a professor and had a tour of the studios as part of the visit. D later told me that as soon as she saw the current ID students at work she knew that RIT was where she wanted to be. The fact that RIT offered an array of classes in many other areas was very important to her. In the end she applied there and to only one other school.
Something she didn’t expect was the positive impact of having the National Technical Institute for the Deaf intertwined with RIT would have on her. She plans on minoring on American Sign Language and somehow incorporating this into her design work.
Good luck to your daughter. It sounds like she knows what she wants. That is half the battle. The other half is not being surprised when she changes her mind!
My daughter loves RIT as well. There is a great mix of engineering/math/art there, and crossover between the three. A big plus for it is that it is a co-op school as well. The education takes a little longer, but when people in the STEM fields graduate, they have real world experience on their resumes. It was also voted the Geekiest school in 2014 by ThinkGeek. Their grants are fairly generous for great stats. They had a very high yield this year. Personally I recommend eating on a campus when you go (at all schools) to get a sort of feel for the place. Have fun!
@IowaMom66 - WRT RPI kids, looking at my daughter’s notes, she liked the people, called them “quirky” (which is high praise from her ). The main turnoffs to her was the athletics slant to the info session, plus didn’t really like Troy / called it “dreary”. Of course it was pouring the day we were there, and definitely very dreary weather!
And did you make it as far as Buffalo?
Yes, we made it to Buffalo, but we didn’t look at SUNY Buffalo. We had already seen UMass Amherst, so I figured it would be the same.
It’s not
SUNY buffalo is a fraction of the size of UMass Amherst.
^In what sense? Collegeboard lists UMass Amherst at 22K undergrads and UB at 20K undergrads.
I thought 28,000 for UMass Amherst.
I’ll retract my comment. Maybe they are similar in size. But really a college in suburban Buffalo is different that a college that IS most of the town of Amherst, in my opinion.
They’re different in “feel”/“vibe” but I don’t know how to characterize that difference. I’m sorry.
I meant to say, we weren’t really ever that interested in SUNY Buffalo. The only reason I put it on the schedule was because I wanted to show her a big school. (Originally we didn’t have UMass Amherst on the schedule.)
Buffalo also didn’t seem to be interested in having visitors. No sessions planned. I emailed them, and said we’d be in the area, and they said, yeah, sorry, we don’t have any tours then. End of message. Nothing like “stop by and we’ll be happy to talk to you” or anything like that…