Full Scholarship versus UVA

Paying for College
1

<p>I've received the Robert E. Lee scholarship (full tuition, room and board, and fees = $48000 scholarship out of total estimated $52,000 cost) at Washington and Lee (W&L) University. I'm am trying to weigh this with attending the University of Virginia (UVA).</p>

<p>Washington and Lee Pros:
1. full scholarship-->saves parents' money, allows them to help pay for graduate school (I plan on attending Law or Business), and is a small positive for graduate school admissions
2. small liberal arts-->small classes (80% classes have < 25 students) --> developing closer relationships with professors, potentially having a more interactive learning experience, and receiving good recommendations
3. I am interested in business. W&L has only accredited business school in top liberal arts colleges. Developing relationships is important in business. Business is applicable to any field I may pursue in the future. Small classes and small school allows development of relationships.
a. W&L Williams Investment Society- invests > $1 million. I really want to continue learning about investment. I'm currently secretary of school investment club (invests ~ 1k)
b. W&L Mock Convention is cited as one the best undergraduate convention experiences. I love government and politics.
c. Trimester system with 6 week spring term lets students start early at internships. Starting in spring allows interns to do real work before summer crowd comes in and fetching-the-coffee work starts.</p>

<p>Washington and Lee Cons:
1. I am Asian American. I attend a school that is composed of ~ 1/3 Asian students. Most of my friends are Asian American. I don't know how well I will adapt to W&L, where Asian American make up ~ 7% of population according to BusinessWeek. Perhaps attending W&L will be an experience that will better prepare me for the real world.
2. Less prestige compared to UVA. I had not heard of this school before I found its scholarship competition.
3. Does it offer as challenging an academic experience as UVA? I plan to take many challenging courses, no matter which school I enroll at. I want a challenging course load because I want to be able
4. W&L has a substantial Greek presence. I do not want to feel the pressure of joining a fraternity b/c 80% of the guys do, but I don't want to be left out of the party scene either.
5. During my visit to W&L for the scholarship competition, I didn't feel at home. I have no basis of comparison. I have not visited other schools during the school year, but I did visit UVA during the UVA-USC football game, when there were a lot of plastic red cups scattered throughout the beautiful campus. I know I should visit UVA again while school was in session before making my decision.</p>

<p>University of Virginia Pros:
1. Big state school--> lots of opportunities
2. More Asian Americans- 11.4%--> closer to the percentage that I am used to
3. Fairly inexpensive (a little less than $20,000 with financial aid)
4. Theoretically (because there are more people and more girls at UVA), I would meet more girls. I'm not a player, but I am looking for a relationship.
5. Prestigious school. Arguably one the best public universities. Great alumni network for placement into graduate schools.</p>

<p>University of Virginia Cons:
1. Still have to pay money.
2. 100 people from my school will probably attend UVA. I like my friends, but I would rather have a fresh start. B/c so many people from my school attend UVA as their fall back choice, it is assumed that they were not accepted by their top pick--> saying that you will be attending UVA usually gets awkward responses such as "cool" or "nice."</p>

<p>I'm sorry this post is so long. It needed specifics. </p>

<p>Suggestions would be greatly appreciated.</p>

2

<p>I would go with W&L. mostly because of the scholarship. and with less prestige, maybe you will be able to get a higher gpa for grad school. as for the racial diversity part, I’m not sure what I would choose (I’m also asian american).</p>

3

<p>I think your highly underestimating w&l’s academic rigor, it is without a doubt harder than UVA and more of a intimate learning environment, I think the average W&L freshmen GPA is a little under a 3.0, (there is rampant grade deflation) and as far as prestige goes, people who know both W&L and UVA would agree w&l is overall a better school.</p>

4

<p>I didn’t know w&l had grade deflation. Do you think graduate schools will acknowledge the grade deflation in their acceptance decisions? I want to learn and have a good time during college, but I also want to be planning for grad school.</p>

5

<p>Grad schools know which colleges/universities have grade inflation and which have grade deflation. Don’t worry about this. W&L has an excellent record of getting students into graduate schools.</p>

<p>It looks to me like your fears about WL are primarily social. You should go there and stretch yourself. It will be a challenge for you to be in an environment with fewer Asian students, but depending on your career field, this may more closely resemble the working environment that you are going to end up in. If 80% of the boys join frats, 20% don’t. You don’t have to join a frat to be invited to their parties if you have friends in frats. And, you may find out that you don’t like the frat party scene anyway. Lots of people don’t. They find other ways to spend their free time and make friends.</p>

<p>20k x 4 years = 80k This is not chump change. You will be thankful for the savings when you head to grad school. Even if you find that you hate it after a year or two, and decide to transfer to UVA, you will still have saved 20K to 40k. Not insignificant figures either!</p>

<p>W&L looks really good to me. Maybe you need to pay both schools another visit before you decide.</p>

6

<p>The Washington and Lee scholarship award is AWESOME!!! Congrats, and what the above posters have said about W & L is right on. UVA will cost you $80,000+ more BUT if you were full pay like many at W & L that would be $48,000 x 4= $192,000 for four years with no tuition or room/board increases. And that’s just the money.</p>

<p>W & L will provide you with an outstanding education and whatever extra money you have access to(scholarships, working, savings), you can use to enhance your education even MORE!</p>

<p>This will give you the ability to look for internships during the summer that you might not pursue if you were on the hook for an $20,000 tuition at UVA.</p>

<p>CONGRATS!!!</p>

<p>On the admission and in this economy a BIG CONGRATS on the scholarship!!!</p>

<p>Kat</p>

7

<p>You have 2 truly great choices! Congratulations!</p>

<p>RE: W&L – Agree w/popot that rigor will not be an issue & w/happymom that grad school will not be an issue. Also agree that $80K is not chump change. But (depending upon your family’s financial picture) $20K for UVA is still a very good deal.</p>

<p>From family experience, I would say that the culture at W&L isn’t terribly different from UVA (southern, preppy, etc.), but the cultural characteristics are more concentrated at W&L (it’s more southern, more preppy, more Greek, more white). </p>

<p>The drinking issue is real. I have a family member who, because of his mentor role in a teen program, had a commitment not to drink for a year during his time at W&L. He still loved his fraternity brothers and had a good time that year, but it wasn’t easy to feel comfortable in the party scene. And as a non-imbiber, the whole getting-drunk-friends-back-home-safely thing got really old.</p>

<p>The kids at W&L are terrific–they’re bright, courteous, hardworking, upbeat, etc. You sound like a flexible person, so I think you’ll get along ok even though there aren’t many Asians. But I will say that my daughter’s Asian BF would NOT have been happy at W&L, even though several of his friends will be going to UVA and he would probably have been ok there.</p>

<p>A couple of other points: if you want to have sports teams to cheer for and a big alum group to bond with over sports, UVA will give you something that W&L can’t provide. Also, be sure you understand the consequences of the schedule. You won’t be home the same weeks in the summer and in January as most of your friends, and the schedule can work for OR against you in terms of internships & summer jobs.</p>

<p>Again, you have great options. All of the negatives are manageable, so if you were my kid, I’d advise you to focus on which <em>positives</em> are most important to you. Good luck!</p>

8

<p>I disagree that U.Va. is more prestigious than W&L. W&L is more selective admission-wise, especially for a VA resident. And for people who know colleges, it’s one of the top names nationally.</p>

9

<p>W&L is extremely competitive from what I’m seeing on collegeboard.</p>

<p>I’d DEFINITELY pick it.</p>

10

<p>popot–haha, you’ve made three or four statements without providing any sources… “w&l’s academic rigor, it is without a doubt harder than UVA”…really, says who? you? your friends? Noting the average freshman GPA doesn’t really say anything. If you go there, that’s cool, we understand, but at least make the OP know that you’re biased.</p>

11

<p>btw, popot, I just noticed that you’re going around different threads and constantly trying to toot W&L’s horn while putting other schools down, which is cool and all, but if you say that W&L is as “prestigious” and “nationally well-known” as you claim, it really doesn’t you to be going around and reminding people how excellent your school is or how ultra-selective it is (with that 15% acceptance rate, it is more “well known” and “better” than half of the Ivy Leagues like UPenn and Cornell). If it is prestigious and ultra-selective, people will know, don’t worry!</p>

12

<p>I think OP’s concerns are very well stated and legit and fair-minded. My Dad is a VMI grad and I know the town of Lexington is charming but small…our high school also sends scores to UVA, and we live among many Wash and Lee grads. Choosing the quiet life at Wash and Lee is a BIG diff than UVA’s more fluid social life and your social life does matter a lot to you. Choosing to spend 80 thousand dollars is also a negative for UVA when you want to go to grad school in hard times ahead in this country.</p>

<p>You realize you can make high grades at UVA and make it into the number one undergrad business college in the USA there, right? Cause you have what it takes to do that at UVA while enjoying a bigger social life. Since business is your major, not science…I have to take your UVA option more seriously than I would otherwise. There are legit reasons to consider their number one ranked business track and forfeiting your wonderful fantastic scholarship at one of our country’s best LACs.</p>

<p>On the other hand…you can probably transfer into UVA if you are simply not happy later at Wash and Lee…with your abilities.</p>

<p>Wash and Lee has other advantages UVA can’t offer. Intense relationships with professors who will knock themselves out on your behalf for four years is what is different. Wash and Lee is also stellar in connections you can make in corporate America…and has a long history of sending people into great jobs with only four years of learning. You are likely to bond deeply with your classmates even if socially you don’t have quite the variety you hoped for…many students there go abroad junior year to break things up and add that new zest…and you should, too.</p>

<p>I personally know someone who just got inducted into Phi Beta Kappa there and if you got their full ride, you are fully capable of making those kind of grades so ignore the grade deflation concerns entirely. I also know two young men in fantastic jobs living near Georgetown who are grads…it always amazes me that they got those jobs without grad degrees…Wash and Lee graduates so many people of character, depth of field, and they do work you very hard…and the work place is eager to interview these graduates.</p>

<p>For prelaw, you must stay the course, nail your LSAT and have some great GPR and great volunteer history in related areas…all good at either college really. You can succeed in business at either school later on. UVA has a larger alum network but Wash and Lee has incredible networking that you may not recognize is also very powerful. </p>

<p>good luck sorting this out…there is no easy answer to this one. In a recession, if money matters, I think I would go to Wash and Lee and embrace it. Your friends will be from every corner of the USA there. But your career path is something that would not be short changed at UVA…so follow your heart…good luck.</p>

13

<p>If you choose your classes right, you can have very small classes at UVA and have that “intimate relationships” that you’re looking for. When I was a third year, I took a class called “South-Atlantic History” under the History Dept…the class had three students (including me) and the prof. Just because you go to a “bigger” school does not mean that you will not have small classes if that’s what you want.</p>