<p>Parents can afford Emory, but love the fact that they wouldn't have to pay anything to go to Northeastern. I told them definitely Northeastern, but I know nothing about either school. My instinct is to follow the money.</p>
<p>Full disclosure: Northeastern alumnus here from way back.</p>
<p>It is impossible to give an opinion in this situation without more information. Where does the student want to go? What does the student plan to study? </p>
<p>There is an interesting debate going on in another thread along the same lines:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1329912-supporting-daughters-college-decision.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1329912-supporting-daughters-college-decision.html</a>
Northeastern full scholarship versus Rice/Vanderbilt.</p>
<p>Some questions to ask:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>What is the student’s intended major? NEU’s academic strengths tend to be in pre-professional fields like Engineering. On the other hand, their Arts & Science College tends to be very uneven from what I’ve heard from older alums. </p></li>
<li><p>What are the requirements of that “free-ride”? Is it to merely remain in good academic standing or the more onerous “maintain a 3.5+ GPA” or “maintain top 1/3 or better class standing”? If the latter, I’d be wary as most recipients of such free-ride scholarships end up losing them for dropping below those requirements and most college first-years find they had to make serious adjustments to do well in college-level work. </p></li>
<li><p>Is the student’s main goals mainly oriented to getting a good job or going to pre-professional oriented grad schools like business, law, or med schools…or more academic like PhD. If the latter, it is critical to check the strength/ranking of the department the student intends to major in and compare potential undergrad research opportunities.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Hey, it’s only a quarter-million dollars or so. Pocket change.</p>
<p>Follow the money.</p>
<p>I can answer #2. At Northeastern, to maintain merit scholarships the requirement is a 3.0 GPA and 100 hours of community service per year.</p>
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<p>That can be onerous for most first-year Engineering majors…especially considering NEU’s strengths in that area according to several NEU Engineering alums and an uncle who did a stint as a part-time engineering lecturer there a couple of decades ago.</p>
<p>She’ll be pre-med. I’m not sure about the GPA. Apparently she’s received one of the new honors scholarships that Northeastern has.
Her ‘dream school’ is Emory, one of the reasons being she has friends there. She’s been to see Northeastern and thinks that she could get used to it.
She’s already turned down UNC Chapel Hill, by the way.
She loves Emory. Parents love Northeastern (or at least the idea of the free ride as opposed to full pay). They can afford to pay for Emory, but is it worth it?</p>
<p>^ ^</p>
<p>Definitely check the fine print on that new honors scholarship. You don’t want to find yourself paying much more because she had a bad semester and her GPA/class standing fell below the minimum requirements. </p>
<p>Has she looked into the med school admissions placement of each school? </p>
<p>Does she have a plan if pre-med/med school doesn’t pan out due to not achieving the high GPAs often required? </p>
<p>Pre-med/STEM intro courses are notorious for weeding out a sizable chunk of incoming pre-med/STEM majors. Most formerly above-average/better students end up getting their first Cs or even Fs in such courses. This will apply whether its NEU or Emory.</p>
<p>Comments on GPA are well-taken. I’ll pass this on. She’s always been a very strong student, but things can take a turn in college.</p>
<p>If the minimum GPA were 3.5 then that could be a nail biter. But for a student who has earned Northeastern’s University Scholars program, there would only be three reasons for her not to get a 3.0 minimum:</p>
<p>-She decides to major in partying
-She develops emotional problems/homesickness
-She was the type of student in high school who did well because her parents/teachers pushed her and constantly looked over her shoulder</p>
<p>If her primary reason for wanting to go to Emory is that she has friends there, then that would likely be quickly forgotten once she settles in to Boston. </p>
<p>Personal bias: I feel Boston would be a much more interesting city in which to spend four years.</p>
<p>Pre-med? Go to NEU and save the money for med school.</p>
<p>If med school is in the equation, unless the 'rents are rolling in dough (in which case this question is irrelevant), this should be a no-brainer.</p>
<p>I posted on the other NEU that my niece graduated from NEU and attended med school. I say go for free.</p>
<p>If the parents have the money and are willing to spend it on their DD’s choice, that’s fine. It comes down to whether they will pay or not. The daughter has made it clear, it seems, that her choice is Emory IF the parents will pay. The parents have to decide if they want to spend their money on that choice.</p>
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<p>Unless money for both undergrad and med school is no object, then I say follow the money.</p>
<p>Full disclosure: My son is at Northeastern on a full tuition scholarship and really likes it. But I have advised other students to follow the money elsewhere when Northeastern was the full pay option.</p>
<p>re: “she’ll be pre-med”</p>
<p>My parents said that too about me. I said it myself. What do you want to study? Pre-med.</p>
<p>After freshman year, I…changed my mind. Which is what people do sometimes. If there is a chance that she might not pursue the pre-med path, which school offers strong departments in other majors?</p>
<p>If you feel that Northeastern (a fine school, in a great city) offers enough options and/or she won’t waver from the path, then follow the money.</p>
<p>Good point, Classof2015. I changed my own major many times and my son changed his several times after he arrived at NEU.</p>
<p>My niece was not pre-med and still went to med school.</p>
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<p>If she was taking the pre-med curriculum…even if she didn’t major in the biology/related majors typical of many premeds, she was pre-med. </p>
<p>Unless she took a post-bac program to take all the pre-med core courses she didn’t take during her undergrad years.</p>
<p>When our kids appllied to college, we set a monetary maximum on what we could pay. They were accepted at schools that cost more than that maximum, and schools that would have been free. If they wanted to borrow and scrape up the difference, if they could, it was their choice to do so. But we did not point at the free choices and jump up and down and say, “free, free, gotta go there”. If we could have afforded to make $60K or whatever it is that Emory will cost, our limit and our kids got a free ride at NEU or any school, for that matter, we would have reacted the same way we did with our current maximum. So our kids knew up front if would be a hardship and not on the table for them to insist on a school that was over what we were willing to pay. They did apply to some, and did get some merit money from some in a few cases, but anything that was over the affordable numbers went off the table. They did, in two cases, pick the max and did not save us any money when they could have done so, but that was the deal. </p>
<p>So it seems to me that it’s a bit unfair to say at the tail end of the process, that you want the kid to take the freebie when none of this was stipulated up front. On the other hand, financial security is important enough that if the family truly can’t swing the full cost, which is, wow, truly a lot, then they should come clean to the student I am curious as to what circumstance would have them pay the full amount. Is it just because the NEU offer is there that they are balking? If NEU did not make this offer or was at half cost, would it affect the decisions? If the other school were Harvard , rather than EMory, would that affect the decision? How about UPenn or Brown? I’m trying to see where the line is drawn in the minds of these parents, and they should do the exercise as well to make it clear what they are thinking and so they can articulate it to their daughter.</p>