Hello all:
My D20 is trying to decide between these two schools. She is an NMF with a full tuition award to Fordham Gabelli, and she is also guaranteed a full ride to FSU, and is in the honors program there.
Her major will be Accounting/Info Systems (either double major or major/minor).
We were pretty much set on FSU honors. They have recently started up a Business honors program that starts sophomore year that sounds great, and they will have a new Business building opening in the fall of 2021. She likes that she is in the honors program, and will be applying for their undergraduate research program that is open to honors freshman students. It’s a great school that is rising in ranking, gorgeous campus, and all contacts we’ve had with the administration and current students have been nothing short of warm, friendly and just all-around excellent.
We appealed Fordham’s financial aid offer and they just came back with a partial room award. Our direct billed costs for Fordham per year would be approximately $11,500, which we think is doable (even when factoring in indirect costs such as books and travel). Despite having been accepted to higher ranked schools, Fordham has secretly been her “dream school” and she is itching to go to NYC. The location is fantastic for internship opportunities (well, theoretically, at least, once there is no more need for quarantines). Unfortunately, she did not get offered a spot in their honors program, but we are not sure if that would be a dealbreaker.
I guess my question is this: is Fordham worth the extra money? FSU is actually higher ranked than Fordham (both generally and in accounting specifically), but Fordham has a better location for potential job opportunities. At FSU, she is in honors, and has the opportunity to do research starting her freshman year. She doesn’t have to worry about expenses, ever, because her whole undergrad is covered, including books and travel. At Fordham, she would probably still want to hustle each year looking for additional scholarships each year to offset room/board costs. She’s not in honors, but the school seems small enough that she’d still get fairly good attention from faculty.
Are there any other considerations I should be thinking about here?