On benefit of MSU over Northwestern is that one of the most common major changes is from engineering to some form of business. Northwestern does not have a business undergraduate major, but MSU has a large program.
“I do agree that MSU feels very friendly and welcoming for such a large university. I doubt there are many schools where the Assistant Director of Admissions helps park cars on a visit weekend for high stats applicants.”
Many schools underestimate the value of this type of thing. It comes across as very welcoming, friendly and not snooty. I like that.
At MSU, the dean and assistant dean of my college were there on move-in day helping us move boxes up to our dorm rooms. While talking, the assistant dean and I discovered our shared love of bioethics. He ended up becoming my advisor and was an enormous influence on my academic path.
Heck, the same assistant dean personally moved all of my friend’s moving boxes in his own car when she was in our RC but was accidentally put into the wrong dorm.
I hadn’t really thought of it before, but D’s choice to apply ED to the school that she wanted really did make it easier on all of us.
We might have been faced with a similar decision to OP’s, but thanks to ED, we weren’t put in the place of sitting down at the table to compare competing acceptances. Yes, D might well have gotten into NU or Rice or Tufts or Brown, but she didn’t apply because ED is binding and she was “one and done” in terms of applications. No other decision to be made!
The school that D felt best about after extensive research and thought, and that she applied to ED, is the perfect school for her. But it lacks some of the name recognition and “prestige” in our neck of the woods that the other schools on her list have. That can get tedious during the endless “where is your kid going to school?” discussions that are part-and-parcel of end-of-year banquets and grad parties around here. (Let’s just say I get tired of explaining to friends in suburban Chicago that her school is in New York NOT Minnesota.) And just because I wanted to go to a school myself doesn’t mean it was the best choice for her. I would have been mad at myself if I had pushed her into going to a school that satisfied my needs rather than letting her make up her own mind.
Kids of that age make all kinds of decisions for all kinds of reasons. My H, who eventually graduated from MSU, was accepted to U Mich out of HS but attended Ohio Wesleyan because, in his words, “I liked their baseball diamond.” It is a decision he has always regretted. He transferred out to Kalamazoo after a year, and then transferred again to MSU. When he was older, he was accepted at the U Mich, Columbia, and NYU MBA programs. He chose NYU because a) he had reasons to stay in NYC, and b) it had a part time program so he could work for two years while going part time and then go full time for a year. He has pretty much regretted that decision, also. He thinks he should have gone to Columbia because, as a headhunter once said to him while discussing the matter, “It’s Columbia.” He is in a field where such things matter.
I think he would have been better off if his parents had put their foot down and told him that they were not going to pay more $$ for him to attend Ohio Wesleyan because he liked the baseball diamond when he could go to the far superior U Mich at instate prices.
The OP’s S certainly has good reasons not to go to Amherst, which really isn’t a fit. Why is he turning down Northwestern? It is unclear, other than that MSU feels like the safe, comfortable place to him. That’s okay, but I don’t see why it is necessary to start lauding him for supposedly rejecting the “brand name” schools and yadda, yadda, yadda. (As if MSU doesn’t have a huge brand name in the region…and as if there is no difference other than “brand name” and the dreaded “prestige.” Yes, to the true believers, prestige is the only reason to pick a top school, and everyone who does so is simply a snob. I am so very tired of that.) I think his father has a more realistic view of what is in play.
I predict that if the S gets in to Stanford or ND off the waitlist, everyone on CC will be urging him to dump MSU and go there. Those schools seem to be teflon-coated when it comes to accusations of chasing prestige. B-) In the mean time, He sounds like a fine young man, and I’m sure he will do very well at MSU and get a fine education.
Well, good luck @greeninohio. If your son really wants to attend ND or Stanford, then I hope he is pulled from the wait list! But if he really wants to attend MSU, then I hope he does. Sounds like he has his act together, so I think it will all work out just fine.
Some of the comments on CC are just so very smug about the difference between schools like Amherst (insert whatever small LAC) and MSU (insert whatever large state U). I really would like to know what people imagine occurs at a place like MSU.
There are about 50,000 students at MSU. There are fewer than 2000 students at Amherst. Do people honestly believe there are not 2000 students at MSU of at least equal caliber of students at Amherst? At every large state university you will find students (like @greeninohio’s son) who were accepted (or would have been had they cared to apply) to the likes of Amherst, and Northwestern, and other schools I’ve never heard of but surely many think are prestigious. They chose State U. So there they are, at State U, but they could have just as easily ended up at Prestigious LAC or MIT or wherever. And they are actively involved in research with state of the art equipment, learning from brilliant professors, and taking small honors classes discussing fascinating topics, or whatever they do in small honors classes, which is probably not so different from what they do in small classes at a small LAC.
Out of 50K students at a large U, students will find their intellectual peers, perhaps in smaller percentages than at the small LAC, but perhaps in larger number. Plus, they will find 48,000 other students, each of whom is their peer or superior in something else. If you truly think a student cannot be challenged at a large state U, or a student’s horizons cannot be expanded when surrounded by 50,000 other students with diverse backgrounds and life experiences and opinions, then carry on.
“There is nothing wrong with a university that accepts a wide swath of people, including gasp lower stats people without amazing ECs, LoRs, GPAs, and test scores”
No one has said there is anything “wrong” with a state university’s inclusive mission. However, all else being equal, I prefer a more uniformly excellent student body for me and mine.
@Barfly, everyone here agreed pages and pages ago that Amherst, although a great school, is not the place for the OP’s S. Why do you insist on beating a dead horse?
And now you are suggesting that the MIT experience is nothing special either?
As you say, carry on.
"There are about 50,000 students at MSU. There are fewer than 2000 students at Amherst. Do people honestly believe there are not 2000 students at MSU of at least equal caliber of students at Amherst? "
Sure. But the atmosphere of 2000 Amherst-level students embedded amongst 50,000 students at MSU is a qualitatively different experience than 2,000 Amherst-level students at Amherst. I think there is a huge social difference and as an introvert it’s a lot of work (and somewhat dispiriting) to have to hunt down the other 1,999 out of 50,000. It’s the same reason I liked honors classes in high school. Let me know who the serious, smart driven kids are upfront instead of playing where’s Waldo.
“you truly think a student cannot be challenged at a large state U, or a student’s horizons cannot be expanded when surrounded by 50,000 other students with diverse backgrounds and life experiences and opinions, then carry on.”
No one has said that a student cannot be challenged at a large state u, or that MSU’s classes are made up of 1+1 equals 2. This is about social acceptance and ease of finding like-minded friends.
I would think honors dorms and honors college classes, if MSU has those, would replicate that same environment though. In the same way one has like-minded peers in hs honors classes, so could OP’s son in college honors classes imo.
Honors dorms and so forth would definitely help. Honors programs vary. At some schools, only half the classes are taken at the honors college. I tried to persuade my S to apply to Pitt as a safety with the idea that he would be in their well-respected honors college and get significant FA despite being OOS. He said he didn’t want to be in a school where he had to be in an honors college amongst a much larger student body.
Different strokes and all that.
Of course, no one said that or implied it.
@romanigypsyeyes, were you in the Honors College at MSU? It is difficult to imagine that Assistant Deans help all 9-10K freshmen move in…
“I predict that if the S gets in to Stanford or ND off the waitlist, everyone on CC will be urging him to dump MSU and go there.”
Stanford for engineering? Yes. ND for engineering? No. At that price point, I would not urge him to dump MSU, although I would be perfectly happy if he chose ND for overall opportunities.
No I wasn’t.
I was in the Residential College in the Arts and Humanities… there were less than 100 of us in my class of the RC.
Only if that’s what he wants.
The OP was disappointed in her son’s choice, and many posters say they would also be upset. It is clear from the posts that some believe MSU is an inferior school.
The view that state Us are inferior is commonly expressed on CC. My post #84 is simply expressing a differing opinion, since that opinion is less often expressed on CC. I am not suggesting in any way that any type of college is superior or is right for all students, because I simply don’t believe that. But I am offering a different way to think about state Us. CC is full of discussions about many different schools, some I would have never heard of but for CC, and all the opportunities for students of all types at all these amazing schools. On the other hand, I have seen many posts where people put state Us down and proclaim the superiority of private LACs. If even one person has taken a moment to view state Us in a new light, then I’m glad I took the time to post about it instead of finishing my laundry.
“Happiness is FAR more important than “prestige”- which, of course, is ever-changing. Schools rise and fall in terms of prestige.”
@Pizzagirl “Oh good lord, the difference between MSU and NU/Amherst isn’t just about “prestige.””
I can’t help but laugh about PG getting dinged about being focussed on prestige. Oh the irony.
OP, if he is that strong of a student, he will have a lot of opportunities to stand out at MSU. He needs to get involved in clubs and try to get to know his professors. If he can establish himself quickly as a top student there may be a number of research and other opportunities available to him, that may not be open to a more average student. His ability to capture those opportunities may be very important to his four year experience.
Maybe NU and Amherst were parent choices in terms of applications. It is quite possible that the student never really cared for either school.
Maybe this young man sensed that it might serve him well to be a big fish at MSU. Malcolm Gladwell would be very proud of his choice.
@Much2learn, NU doesn’t have a business major, per se, but with the Kellogg certificates, Integrated Marketing Communication program, Entrepreneurship certificate program, Business Institutions minor, and various classes in IE & econ, a student at NU can actually get nearly the full undergrad b-school curriculum (other than accounting).