Second looking at Virginia Tech. Highly ranked in engineering with a new “signature” engineering building, Goodwin Hall.
UIUC has top aerospace programs as well, you might want to look into it.
Michigan is an excellent school for aerospace, right up there with GT.
Yes, i definitely have Purdue in my list. I have seen about the Neil Armstrong hall there which houses the engineering campus https://engineering.purdue.edu/Engr/AboutUs/Facilities/ArmstrongHall
Will add UF to the list. Thanks.
I don’t know . . . UF has a 70’s ‘utilitarian’ vibe, that’s for sure. But they have some cool stuff too. My son has been happy with the facilities so far (he’s a CS major in the engineering college). His roommate was aero.
Apparently there is a gadget deep in the bowels of the physics building that will take something down to almost the lowest temp possible on earth. (???) Don’t quote me on this though. 
Now the dorms are not the fancy suite-style set-ups that you see in some schools (though UF does have newer suite dorms - just tougher to get as first years).
The nice thing about UF is Gainesville. There is a hippie, artsy vibe in Gainesville that I would have never known existed. There is also a vibrant Asian culture, at least it seems to me. Off-campus housing is relatively inexpensive for students, too, and UF students ride the extensive bus system for ‘free’ (well it’s subsidized of course).
I love how these types of posts devolve into turf battles. 
The bottom line is, there aren’t many ABET accredited Aerospace programs. You’ll do alright no matter where you go if you put in the work, get good grades and get involved in extracurricular projects like CubeSat.
So, here’s another shameless plug…Cal Poly, the developer and home to CubeSat. 
You could also consider Alabama. The facilities are new, you’ll get a bit tuition break, and they have tight Aerospace ties.
Good luck!
@CaucAsianDad , you make a very valid point. Im not going to college for a vacation, but, for studying. I totally get teh spirit of the point. I got a bit worried after I saw the overall environment at GT. Will give it a second look for sure.
@DadTwoGirls , thank you so much for your feedback here. Please note, Im a highschooler trying to find where I wil fit best and these opinions really help. I totally get your opinion on MIT. Thanks
I don’t think you can go wrong at GT. It’s just that you have to want to be in a big city. The positive is that you can fly almost anywhere from ATL.
My gripe about Gainesville is that you’re not super close to a major airport (we do have JAX and ORL). But that will be the case in West Lafayette, too, though there you’re about an hour from the Indy airport.
OP, one other positive about GT is that you will have students from all over, nationally and internationally
We love UF but we are also Floridians who happen to love living in FL. Just wanted to give you full disclosure! 
OP - Please remember you visited GT during the summer. For a true experience please try something like SWARM at Tech. My son did and that was when he fell in love with the school and will be attending this year. He didn’t just see an empty classroom but actually attended a class. Nothing lights up a room like a group of engaging students. A classroom is a just a classroom but the students make the school.
I also do get that some people are just not urban people. I also have experience with VTech engineering. Great school. Great students too. Beautiful spacious campus.
My B went to GTech in the old days, too, became a fine engineer and loved his college experience. My other B went to Emory in a different part of town (was not an engineer) had a great but different experience. OP, it could be GTech is not the right place for you, which is fine. Go where you are comfortable.
FWIW my immigrant H went to MIT and lived in the typical cheap student off campus housing of the day. His folks came to visit from abroad. MIT is one of the greatest engineering schools in the world, right? H’s parents expected fantastic facilities, including housing. Boy, were they shocked!
^^second or third the VT suggestion. Two family members went/there now. It’s a great campus with wonderful school spirit and nice people (and a fantastic engineering school of course). Blacksburg is a smaller town, too, which has its positives and negatives.
Second the suggestion for Alabama. Fantastic scholarship opportunities for top students, campus full of brand new state of the art facilities, dorms, etc. Deep industry ties with the state’s aerospace industries (NASA and DoD in Huntsville, Airbus in Mobile, etc.)
There is no logical connection in this statement.
The methodology that USNews uses to rank undergraduate aerospace engineering programs is as follows:
Note that factors like crime & safety, neighborhood amenities, and campus aesthetics are completely ignored (this is true of the USNews general undergraduate rankings as well). USNews has never claimed otherwise.
So what do the USNews undergraduate aerospace engineering rankings measure? Well, there is good reason to doubt that the deans and faculty surveyed by USNews actually have accurate knowledge of the undergraduate programs at dozens of other engineering schools. But since they are all PhDs, they probably do have some knowledge of each program’s general research reputation. So that’s probably what the survey results (which then become the rankings) really reflect.
So GA Tech’s high ranking for undergraduate aerospace engineering probably means that the faculty have an outstanding reputation for research. That’s something, but it may not have much relevance as far as the quality of the undergraduate experience is concerned.
A friend of mine went on the UM engineering tour with his son and they were really impressed with the labs, facilities, etc. so if you have the numbers to get into GT OOS, apply to UM, along with Purdue as people have mentioned.
I’m glad you’re not going to pick a school based just on the rankings, as there are many threads on cc that attest to how they can be manipulated and how most of the metrics don’t directly impact a student’s experience there.
@UnniIndian Not trying to be hard on you, just trying to get you thinking. Every choice will likely come with compromises, so make sure you have the correct priorities. Better to be dealing with these things now than after you move in.
@SouthFloridaMom9 My D chose UF over UCF (she moves in tomorrow!). The difference in the dorms is night and day, especially compared to the UCF Honors dorms, but she chose the school with the best academics for her field of study.
That makes sense @CaucAsianDad. We did not look at UCF which - in hindsight - I realize was not a smart move on our part. I have heard that the UCF honors dorms are nice.
So glad your daughter chose the Gator Nation - congratulations! Hope she has a great experience. If there is anything I can do please let me know. I also hope that you joined the FB family group for the Class of 2021. Our 2020 group is very helpful.
@UnniIndian , you are making a mountain out of a molehill! Since you are of Indian descent, let me tell you that I attended one of the Indian Institute of Technology’s. These institutes do not have the best equipment or facilities but does produce lots of brilliant engineers and the faculty of the top Eng schools in the US is full of ex-alumni from the IITs. In fact, the President of CMU is from one of these IITs. Not saying that GTech is anything like this especially for a casual and peripheral onlooker.
My D2 is studying Mechanical Eng at GTech. She has never complained about the facilities in her department or lack thereof. In fact, she relishes the number of internal research/internships opportunities that are available within the campus, many of these dealing with the latest in technology.
I am not even sure what you mean by the type of folks in the vicinity of the GTech campus. I studied in Cambridge (HBS) in the 90s and live in the Columbia Univ area of Manhattan now and I can assure it you will get similar vibes from many of city colleges. It is your call whether you would prefer an urban setting or not. My D2 is currently doing a summer internship in Greenville, SC and makes a trip nearly every other weekend to Atlanta to hang out with her friends there. My D1, who attends Pitt Med, also in a downtown, is now on a volunteer trip to Malawi. What is up with you kids nowadays when you see city/lifestyle scenarios that you are not accustomed to ?!? Do you think you will have so many options with your future employer?
@i012575 Thank you for your open feedback. If you have two daughters in college, you must be in your end-40s or early 50s. You would have seen the world, had experiences that refined your thoughts and gave you the critical thinking, judgemental and/or rational thinking abilities. Im afterall a 16 year old student who has been in protective cover of my parents and community network all my life. When i get exposed to a new world, its natural for me to get excited, or, concerned. As I have said repeatedly, I’m in respect GTech immensely. When I just step out of the college and see dozens of people living off the streets, or, when you go to the nearby Walmart just a mile away and see security with guns on entry points and the whole parking lot is littered and crappy, Im worried. For some, it may not matter - they could just ignore it and move on. Should it really matter for me?? I don’t really know. But, it mattered on first impression. That’s why I took the effort to seek opinion. When I see GTech Aerospace faculties, they have all been there for 20-30 years and have published tons of research papers. There is a reason why they are all staying there and I wanted to understand that piece on what makes it interesting enough for them.