<p>As a State UG alum I always found it hard to believe. Outside of a very few UG concentrations (of which, none of these friends were in), or a full ride scholarship (which none of them had), I can't see any motivation. Tradition? Are families really encouraging their children to go to a less prestigious in-state school because Mom or Dad went there? Most parents want their children to surpass their accomplishments, no? Curious if there are any cross-admit statistics avail, it wouldn't surprise me if State lost 99% of cross-admit battles.</p>
<p>Only reason I could see is financial, or I guess some random degree Umich doesn’t have but State does</p>
<p>Financial is definitely one of the biggest reasons. I know someone who got into both, and she got a scholarship from both. She contacted both schools to see if they might match each other - she never heard from UM, but MSU came back with a full ride! So she went where the money was. She was disappointed that UM didn’t even seem remotely interested enough to reply, whereas at MSU, they not only replied, they called her personally and spoke to her on the phone, so it wasn’t just about the money, but also about the personal interest MSU displayed.</p>
<p>I’ve heard the cost factor before and according to the Detroit Free Press, net cost difference is only $1,700 a year. In the grand scheme of things, is this really a factor? I find that hard to believe.</p>
<p>Saxlady, I’m not saying your friend was wrong to take the free ride, but MSU’s eagerness and pursuit should tell your friend everything, i.e., they were desperate.</p>
<p>My son visited both and hated the feel of U of M…definitely would have chose MSU over U of M - but ended up attending neither.</p>
<p>A lot of people don’t give (and rightly so) a fig about prestige because self worth is not tied into the name of a University. Ten years out of college, no one will care where you went. Five years, hardly anyone will care. The Brits are a big believer in school prestige. I believe the carryover to the US is Brit tradition learned overseas from old colonial nations of the Brits.</p>
<p>I think some people confuse “prestige” with meaningless snobbery. There’s a level of “prestige” that’s attached to attending a more competitive college that is brimming with intellects, which fosters more growth vs. a college that has such a broad range of students, like I witnessed in East Lansing. Confident smart people want to be around smart people, generally. It’s how you unlock your potential.</p>
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<p>I hear these people say things like this. Either they “hated the feel” during their visit, or while in high school, they partied with Ann Arbor friends and “hated the feel.” I still have no idea what that really means. I don’t know how anyone could claim East Lansing “feels” superior as a town, so I’d imagine it comes down to the personalities of whomever they came in contact with in Ann Arbor?</p>
<p>I would say financial reasons and personal preference are the two major determining factors. For upper middle class individuals, going to MSU makes more financial sense, especially if MSU offers them scholarships. Also, I can reaffirm that some people I know just don’t like Michigan’s campus and prefer MSU’s campus.</p>
<p>Why would MSU make more sense to upper middle class families w/o a scholarship?</p>
<p>It doesn’t make MUCH sense without a scholarship, but if finances are a top concern the ~$5,000 difference could be a deciding factor. Even though the family may be upper-middle class, they may have debt problems or are unwilling to contribute much to their child’s education. So that $5,000 could make a difference. Also, some people could care less about the prestige/quality further making the savings enticing.</p>
<p>From my understanding, this doesn’t happen very often; but when it does, it usually falls into one of these 3 scenarios:
[ul]
[<em>]State offers the student a substantial amount of merit aid
[</em>]State offers a program that Michigan does not
[li]State accepts them into their honors college, and the student really likes the perks[/li][/ul]</p>
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Michigan is actually cheaper for the vast majority of resident students (assuming they don’t recieve merit aid) because of it’s huge need based financial aid budget. Pretty much the only people who have to pay more money at Michigan as opposed to MSU are already very wealthy with little debt, so the cost differential ends up meaning extremely little to them anyway.</p>
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I don’t believe either school has released any cross-admit stats, however it is known that the instate yield for Michigan is ~70%. I would be willing to bet that the majority of the 30% that chose not to attend ended up going to great non-Michigan institutions like Harvard or Stanford. The majority of the rest most likely ended up going to a public university in Michigan with a large amount of merit aid.</p>
<p>That’s not entirely true, sure that may be true for most people (Household incomes <100k), but Michigan is not very generous for upper middle class individuals (100-150k+).
If you look at the sample financial aid packages, for incomes of 80k-100k the COA for umich is around 20k. MSU is only slightly more. For those with higher incomes, Michigan will offer very little to no aid. I ran the numbers for a family of 4 making 110k, and Michigan would give them $0-$2000 in grant aid.</p>
<p>It strikes me as odd that RTRMom2 reports that her son “hated the feel” of Michigan, but she is on the Michigan threads. Who hangs out on threads of schools that your kid visited, disliked and dismissed? Hmmm.</p>
<p>Miw140 - Would MSU provide more than the 0 - 2000?</p>
<p>A girl my year in HS apparently was preadmitted to Ross but chose MSU instead. She said she felt more at home at MSU than Michigan which is fine…</p>
<p>But if you choose MSU over Ross (and $ was not a problem for this person), IDK why she would’ve gotten into Mich to begin with.</p>
<p>@wayne Of course not! But MSU is also cheaper, that would make up for the difference. Also, many of the students that get into Michigan would be eligible for some merit aid at MSU. I personally prefer, along with most people, Michigan over MSU. I’m just trying to explain that for students coming from families that are upper middle class that get accepted into both schools, MSU would most likely be their cheaper option and therefore affecting their decision.</p>
<p>My brother was accepted to both MSU and UM for engineering, and he decided to go to MSU instead. He did get a fairly large scholarship, but he didn’t know that he got it until after he made his decision. He has no regrets about his choice, and he makes more money that most UM engineering grads.</p>
<p>I am looking at transferring schools, and I will not be applying to UM because they do not offer my major at the undergraduate level, and MSU is the best in the country for it (supply chain management).</p>
<p>I do know several people who turned down Michigan for MSU, but most of them did it for the residential colleges at MSU. James Madison College for public policy/international relations/political theory, and Lyman Briggs for pre-med/science. Most of the people I know who had to decide between MSU Honors vs. UM LSA chose UM.</p>
<p>Also, I’ll be waiting patiently for bearcats’ inevitable “HERP DERP MOO U SUCKS” comments.</p>
<p>Not necessarily, MSU is only cheaper if there is merit or financial aid as MSU does not meet need. Michigan does meet need. It would depend entirely on the student and the family financial situation. There are good things about both campuses and things that are very different and things that are very similar. There are also multi-generational MSU families and multi-generational UofM families…they tend to bleed blue or green so conceivably a kid could literally grow up wanting to attend one or the other regardless of where they could get admitted.</p>
<p>Ghost is right about the residential colleges at MSU. Those are stronger for some majors than the offerings at UofM so setting aside campus feel, residential housing, town, etc. and focusing simply on majors there are times when MSU is a “better” choice and there are majors where UofM is a better choice.</p>
<p>Michigan is ranked 29 if I recall on USNWR and MSU is ranked 72 so Michigan students aren’t giving up a whole lot with picking either university.</p>
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<p>i.) Unlikely. And if he does, he’s an outlier and it had nothing to do with MSU vs. UM, as State’s engineering dept doesn’t come close to UM’s.
ii.) That is such an uncouth and insecure thing to say. If he really talks like that then he probably regrets his decision to this day.</p>