Cost constraints? I.e. have you talked to your parents how much they will contribute to your college costs?
In-state, GMU, ODU, and VCU also have both ME and CS.
VT, PSU, NCSU all admit to a first year engineering program, from which students must then pass a secondary admission process based on college courses and grades to enter a major. Check on how difficult the process is for each school. UVA and Pittsburgh have a similar process, but declaring a major does not require anything more than a 2.0 GPA.
$50K is a very healthy budget. Depending on how the SAT/ACT play out and the desire to stay East leads me to nominate Olin, Copper Union and Northeastern along with the ones already mentioned. All are hard to get into with NE being likely the easiest.
You should work on bringing your class rank up for any shot at UVA or VT engineering. As noted, VCU, GMU, and ODU are instate options and an easier admit for engineering. There are also community college articulation agreements that could also be worth looking into. Good luck.
@curiousParent3 , are you the Parent or the Student?
For that budget, in-state is likely going to be the best bet.
For in-state Engineering in Virginia, UVA and VT are difficult admits from the majority of schools. I know of a few privates where being ranked top third is enough o be “in-range”, but every public in our area does not seem to get Engineering kids in below top 15%ish. So, first, work on grades and rank. Also make sure the schedule includes the most rigorous STEM classes offered, for the best shot at those top two publics.
Consider SAT/ACT prep this summer with testing end of summer/early fall, as the math level looks to be appropriate for successful testing early in junior year.
You claim to want to stay in the northeast, yet you have MSU on your school list. If you are considering Big10 schools, you might want to research UIUC and Purdue, both of which are strong in CompSci and MechE. Note that Pitt has a cross registration agreement with CMU (#1 for CompSci).
Prep hard for your SATs. You will need a strong score - especially math - to get into a highly ranked engineering school.
As a high school sophomore, you’re early in the process. But I’d recommend you become familiar with ABET, which is the accreditation that is highly-desired for a number of engineering fields like civil and mechanical engineering (though in other areas, probably including computer engineering, it’s not as big of a deal one way or the other). You can search for programs here (I’ve already limited it to Bachelor’s programs in the U.S.).
When beginning a college search, particularly so early, I think it best to start at the base, finding schools that are extremely likely to accept you, be affordable, and that you would be happy to attend. You are extraordinarily lucky to be a Virginia resident…it has so many great universities besides its best-known ones:
I’d start with a look at these in-state publics:
George Mason
Old Dominion
Virginia Commonwealth
Then I would expand outwards and explore:
New Jersey Institute of Technology
North Carolina A&T - HBCU
Rowan (NJ)
Stevens Institute of Technology (NJ) - possible to get sufficient merit aid to bring this into budget, but could be iffy
Temple (PA )
The College of New Jersey
U. of North Carolina - Charlotte (they’re also well-known for the racecar affiliations and for cybersecurity…could be a very interesting place for you, depending on your interests)
U. of Pittsburgh (PA )
West Virginia U.
If you’re looking for a smaller school experience, let us know and there may be some additional suggestions. The ones above are mid to large in size.
Admissions to engineering at UIUC are pretty tough, and the OP’s kid’s GPA is at the bottom of their mid-50%. The acceptance rates that are published for UIUC are across all applicants, but students are admitted directly to their programs, and admission rates differ substantially between programs.
Moreover, OOS costs for UIUC will be higher than the OP’s budget.