<p>Just curious, for all of you who have been admitted, how do you justify the cost of Johns Hopkins over the cost of a cheaper state school?</p>
<p>smaller classes, more opportunity for student leadership in extra curricular (per capita), more opportunity to get to know professors and conduct research. very strong academic reputation, great career services and pre-professional advising.</p>
<p>etc.</p>
<p>but at the end of the day, you only justify the cost through your own actions and experiences. it’s a great school, and there are lots of opportunities afforded to you. if you aren’t the type that will seek out and take advantage of said resources, you probably can’t justify the cost of attending hopkins or any other prestigious private university.</p>
<p>Been discussed ad infinitum on the Parents forum. For example <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1104698-when-will-people-realize-state-flagships-can-better-than-ivy-league.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1104698-when-will-people-realize-state-flagships-can-better-than-ivy-league.html</a>
Everyone’s financial situation is different. DS1 graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Hopkins and is doing well in grad school and feels it was the right choice for him. DS2 also got into Hopkins but decided to go to State Flagship Honors College and is very happy there. We could afford Hopkins without getting kids into deep debt.</p>
<p>The classes my son is taking, and the quality of the people around him as well as of the profs, would not be available at our local State U as our schools are mediocre at best. If it was Berkeley, UVa, UMich etc. it might be a different story but for us, it was a no brainer.</p>
<p>actually, with the aid that JHU is offering me it’s actually CHEAPER for me to go there than to my state school, which is offering jack **** to me</p>
<p>The kinds of people you’ll find at JHU will most certainly differ from those at a state university, considering it takes a lot more effort to get into schools like JHU. That’s not to say that you won’t find hardworking or brilliant people at a state school, but ihs76 isn’t completely out of place in saying that the “quality of people” would differ at a state school.</p>
<p>OP, it would help if we knew what “cheap state school” you were talking about. If you’re looking at a directional state school, then you can easily pick Hopkins on the basis of superior academics. On the other hand, the academic advantage of JHU over a top state school like Berkeley, UMich, or UVA is less clear. I would still pick JHU over a top 5ish state school because I think that it has a stronger student body, more access to research opportunities, a better reputation, and an all around better undergraduate opportunity. Also some of the top state flagships are pretty expensive and may actually be more expensive than JHU if you applied for FA.</p>
<p>Specifically UCSB. (For engineering)</p>