<p>So in the midst of my college application process I have been wondering about this. Do you think it is better to go to a school that is less prestigious (lower ACT average, less renowned, etc.) If you are offered a spot in the universities honors college? Or do you think that you should still go with the more well known school with more prestige and just be a regular undergrad.</p>
<p>My college list is Vanderbilt, Notre Dame, Virginia Tech, University of Dayton and Alabama.</p>
<p>Vandy and Notre Dame are my 2 reach schools. I am a very good match/ safety in the other 3. I am interested in chemical engineering. So what I've seen ACT average wise (Approximately) Vandy and Notre Dame =32, VTech= 26-27, U of Dayton=25-26, Alabama= 24-26.</p>
<p>Dayton told me that based on my test scores and gpa I am guaranteed a spot in the honors college. But for the others (alabama excluded) I would probably never make it into the honors college, (heck ill be lucky to be accepted at all to vandy or ND). </p>
<p>At what point, especially in engineering do you think it is worth it to go for a lower ACT average, and lets face it much less heard of university for the honors college?</p>
<p>This is not taking into account the "fit" of the university, etc. Just based on an academic standpoint.</p>
<p>I’ve heard of Dayton They actually have some excellent coop programs through the Air Force Research Laboratories. And I do know Dayton’s programs are ABET certified.</p>
<p>Any reason you are not applying to any of the usual schools with a high reputation for chemical engineering? Minnesota is one of them, and its out of state cost of attendance list price is relatively low compared to other out of state public universities, or high reputation private universities.</p>
<p>At what point, especially in engineering do you think it is worth it to go for a lower ACT average, and lets face it much less heard of university for the honors college?</p>
<p>Ah…you’re making a very common mistake. When you’re majoring in a STEM major, you don’t look at what the avg ACT is at a school because that doesn’t represent what will be in your classes. Large schools serve a wide variety of students and majors. Those with lower ACTs tend to be in less-demanding majors and those with higher ACTs tend to be in more challenging majors. Who cares what the ACT scores are for students in majors that are across the campus? Those kids may be in majors that are so right-brained that their ACT scores are irrelevant. </p>
<p>Do you really think that many students with lowish ACTs are taking Cal III, General Chem, Differential Equations, Physics, or challenging engineering classes? Seriously, such students might declare engineering for a semester or so, and then quickly change. It’s like pre-med…many may start as “pre-med” but quickly the weeder classes become too challenging.</p>
<p>BTW…All of Bama’s engineering programs are also ABET accredited.</p>
<p>I’m guessing that you have Bama on your list because you qualify for free tuition and 2500 per year. That leaves you with costs of about $10k per year. Very low. And, yes, the Honors college is amazing. You should also apply to the Computer-based honors program.</p>
<p>edited to add…</p>
<p>UWGPA 3.85 WGPA 4.15. ACT: Composite 31,</p>
<p>Yep…free tuition and 2500 per year for being in engineering. BTW…with an ACT 31, there will be many, many with higher stats than yours. Bama enrolled 183 NMF frosh this fall, and many are in engineering.</p>
<p>@Erin’s dad i know! I think I’ve spoken to you before in other threads. My brother goes to Wright-State so clearly i know you are talking about wright patt AFB! @UCB- I’m a Tennessee resident and I am not looking to go too far from home! all of my schools are with 6 hours of me (with exception to UND which is 10…) @mom- I realize ACT is not a good indicator, but I was speaking in generalizations trying to get a feel for the entire student body. And you are completely right about bama for financial reasons. And i know their honors college is good, but I’m also not sure I would be accepted to it. </p>
<p>All in all, i’m just curious what peoples opinions are with regard to lower tier college honors programs compared to more well renowned colleges regular pathway. I know Dayton has a good engineering program, but obviously you don’t hear a bunch of hype about UD engineering like you do Virginia tech engineering, etc. So is it worth it?</p>
<p>*I realize ACT is not a good indicator, but I was speaking in generalizations trying to get a feel for the entire student body. *</p>
<p>ACT average for a school is not a good indicator. As for “getting a feel for the entire student body” is rather irrelevant. Who cares if some theater majors have modest ACTs. You’ll still enjoy their performances. They excel in things that we can only dream about. </p>
<p>*And you are completely right about bama for financial reasons. And i know their honors college is good, but I’m also not sure I would be accepted to it. *</p>
<p>Bama has assured admissions into its honors college, so you don’t have to worry. Your ACT 31 is high enough if you apply to honors. However, if you want to apply to Computer Based Honors, that does have competitive admissions. </p>
<p>They will. But if things keep heading the way they are Dayton might end up in front of vtech on my list… What is your opinion on my major question though? We can just base it between Vtech and Dayton. Dayton honors vs Vtech regular, engineering. Would it be foolish to choose Dayton? Would it be smarter to choose Dayton? Or would it be about equal? Dayton may actually end up cheaper then vtech with the merit aid alone that they offer…</p>
<p>I have always wanted a school not huge like bama, but not small like rose hulman. I like vandy’s size, but even thats a little large. Dayton has 7k undergrads which is a size im very fond of</p>
<p>You know that the Engineering ACT is probably (possibly significantly) higher than the school average? For example, ND and Vandy Engineering might have an average ACT of 34. (Like mom2college said). Just as an example, Blair students and Peabody students at Vandy have “lower” stats. What school do you think balances it? Exactly.</p>
<p>Anyway, VT regular over Dayton Honors. If VT is like other schools, you will eventually be able to get into their Honors College (with the right GPA)</p>
<p>Why would you pick Wright State or Dayton over Ohio State for engineering? OSU in Columbus has amazing resources and a great honors program as well. In addition, for an out of state strong student, they are likely to offer you similar merit help.</p>
<p>I am definitely not picking wright state, I was stating that is where my brother goes. It is not on my list. secondly, I said I don’t want a big school like Bama. with about 25k students. OSU is almost double that, so ya… definitely don’t wanna go there. Vtech is about 30k students which is kinda hurting it in my overall decision…I am not a huge fan of really big schools. and I completely understand that ACT averages for engineers are higher than the school! I am just trying to get a feel for the overall school. Clearly the average student is more intelligent at vandy than at a lower level state school. I am just trying to get input on whether or not attending a less prestigious schools honors program is a good or bad idea! And as for Georgia tech, (its under 2 hours away), but I’m not sure i’m a big fan of it. Towards schools like Gtech I hear so many kids talk about how much they hate it there and how merciless it is. Obviously I know engineering is hard, but still. All I hear about Dayton is how much the students love it, how much of a community there is, and how the academics are still great, but you have time for other things. Georgia Tech I hear much of the opposite. As I do with many other schools.</p>
<p>Check out Dayton’s engineering career services website and look for placement data. Compare that to Va Tech. If Dayton’s engineering students are getting good jobs, go to Dayton and don’t look back.</p>
<p>I grew up in Iowa. Many of my HS friends studied engineering at Iowa State. I went to undergrad at Northwestern and knew lots of engineering majors.</p>
<p>10 years after graduation, guess what, they were all doing the same thing. Mid level managers with many having MBAs from assorted Big Ten schools. It didn’t matter where they went undergrad.</p>
<p>*I like vandy’s size, but even thats a little large. Dayton has 7k undergrads which is a size im very fond of *</p>
<p>??? </p>
<p>Vandy has the same number of undergrads…just under $7k undergrads. </p>
<p>Anyway…have you visited Bama and its Honors College? If not, you should. I think you’ll see that although it’s a large school, it is very personable where profs know you by name and everyone is VERY friendly and helpful. This year’s frosh class has over 50% out of state students. That’s amazing for a public that isn’t in a small geographical state. </p>
<p>And, the Honors College which offers very LAC-like courses that will amaze you, limits each class to 15 students…so very personable. The Honors College provides that “small school feel within a big school”. </p>
<p>Bama has a brand new mega-sized Science and Engineering Complex. In the last few years, Bama has built over 700,000 new square feet of engineering facilities with over 200,000 more to be built this next year. So, about 1M sq ft of new STEM facilities. These new facilities have the latest in equipment and are truly breathtaking. </p>
<p>People don’t realize that the South has become the favorite destination for high tech and Fortune 500 companies because it’s less expensive to operate here. The second largest research park in the nation is in Alabama - Cummings Research Park. STEMs don’t graduate without jobs here. </p>
<p>and, since Bama is generous with AP/IB/DE credits, many strong students like yourself are able to use their scholarship money to get their Masters degrees at the same time or easily fit in a double major. Some engineering students are getting MBAs at the same time.</p>
<p>I work for one of the world’s largest chemical companies and can confirm that we hire chemical engineers from both Dayton and Virginia Tech. For that matter, we also hire from U. of Tennessee. I do think you should review the information from each school’s placement offices, but this should only be part of what you evaluate when you make your choice.</p>
<p>Honors colleges can be a great choice for those attending a larger school. Honors colleges offer valuable perks and let you meet some of the top students at your college. However they are often oversold with glossy pamphlets implying a small LAC has been set up inside the larger university giving ann elite private education at the public school price. On this forum you’ll read posters who also say/imply that.</p>
<p>Depending on the program offerings may range from separate honors classes to taking just one honors seminar per semester. And some of the “honors” offerings may just be a special discussion section of the regular class (at many U’s you meet 2-3x a week in a large class with the prof, then everyone meets weekly in a smaller group with a TA). You really need to dig in to find what a particular school offers.</p>
<p>Keep in mind honors programs typically offer the small classes and hand-picked profs only the 1st two years of college. They can do this because doesn’t take that many classes to come up with a set that will meet the lower-division requirements for most majors. It is rare to find more than a token amount of upper-division classes since the honors program simply doesn’t have enough faculty members to create entire major(s). So the last two years most/all classes are taken with the rest of the students in the regular U’s classes. The teaching of the profs will be geared towards the normal U level, the discussions and student involvement in class will be dominated by the regular students, and so on. Class sizes may balloon, too, if you’re in a popular major.</p>
<p>Peer effects are big, too; when almost everyone around you at school is a strong student you have lots of good student to emulate in class or outside it such as doing research or internships. If the top kids are a few hundred strong dispersed among tens of thousands at the U then strong examples may be harder to see. When it comes to finding a job, employers are less likely to send recruiters to a campus with a limited number of honors seniors when they can get a campus-full at more highly regarded schools.</p>
<p>Honors colleges do offer some valuable perks, in addition to the classes. Typical ones include registering for classes before everyone else so you get the classes you want (a perk worth its weight in gold!), special counselors, guaranteed housing, special library privileges. They will mark your diploma recognition. But I would be dubious about attending a college for its honors program in place of a more highly regarded U if finances are not an issue. </p>
<p>As for engineering specifically, the classes to get a degree are much more standardized (due to ABET) than for most other majors. While employers may draw distinctions between broad tiers of schools, favoring Berkeley over San Jose State for example, you will have good job prospects with a degree from any acredited program.</p>
<p>Some schools do not have “honors colleges”, but do have honors courses that students can select.</p>
<p>Interestingly, at Berkeley, honors math courses are less likely to be full than the corresponding regular math courses, even though they are much smaller. For fall 2011, second semester freshman calculus (mostly taken in the fall by freshmen with AP credit) has two regular lectures of over 300 students each that are about 95% full, while the honors course has only 13 students, which is 35% of its capacity of 37.</p>
<p>Mikemac - you are the only poster to answer the OP’s question. My thoughts on the question are: think about what will be on your resume. Do graduates of honors colleges put “honors college” on their resume next to the name of their school? If they do that right out of college, do they do that 10 or more years down the road? When you are networking and you tell someone you graduated from U. of Md., say, do you say, “U. of Md. honors college?” That’s the hesitation I have about choosing a “lesser” school that has an honors college over a more recognized school. Now, it may be different if you are planning to go to graduate school. If you do well at the honors college and get into a prestigious graduate school as a result, you have the graduate school on your resume as well as undergraduate. But your undergraduate school will always be on your resume, and when people ask in casual conversation where you went to school, they’re not asking about graduate school.</p>
They actually have some excellent coop programs through the Air Force Research Laboratories. And I do know Dayton’s programs are ABET certified.</p>