<p>For example, students at MIT may become very successful but does that really reflect on the college. Maybe those students would have done just as well at a community college.</p>
<p>Should I choose a lesser college that offers large scholarships or a better college with less scholarships?</p>
<p>The million dollar question on College Confidential. </p>
<p>To answer your question: some people will recommend you go the prestige route; others will urge you to take the scholarship. Each argument has merit for different reasons. (In some fields, the prestige factor is more important than in others. In some it doesn’t make any difference at all.) </p>
<p>Just remember: there are millions of “successful” people out there who never set a foot in a prestigious college. Many of them are doctors, executives, business owners - you name it. </p>
<p>The college name on your diploma doesn’t guarantee - or preclude - success. That’s up to you (and a little luck.)</p>
<p>I’m personally a strong believer of its what you make of it. A certain name on your degree does guarantee you a job, money, and success. I always suggest a middle ground university.</p>
<p>Thanks for the responses!</p>
<p>Heres a question: If you go to a mediocre school (and by mediocre, I don’t mean not-Harvard as people here think:P) and get a high GPA - is that worse than going to a better school, working just as hard, and getting a lower GPA</p>
<p>I’ve always heard it doesnt matter what school you go to but your GPA matters. If you got 4.0 at a low tier and a 3.5 at a higher tier and lets say you were applying to dental school the 4.0 would be admitted and the 3.5 may not.</p>
<p>if that is true then why is getting into MIT so desirable compared to getting a full-ride at a lower level university.</p>
<p>Because universities like that are overrated and people are so obssessed with going to a prestige university when its just a name. They are plenty of people who are very successful who went to a state university…but on here I guess AKA clown colleges.</p>
<p>other perspectives?</p>
<p>It is highly dependent on what career you plan on having. In general, if you want to work in high finance (investment banking, etc), prestige of the university plays a big role.</p>
<p>In general, students would rather go to MIT and get a 3.5 rather than some middle of the road state school and get a 4.0 because:
<p>You can be extremely successful going to a state school or even not going to college. Is it easier to do so when you go to a more “prestigious” school? Probably. But like other posters said, it’s up to you to do the work. Your question is very vague, but if there’s a huge cost difference, I would go with the cheaper and work your ass off, just as you should do if you go to the better school.</p>
<p>There is a lot of “it depends” in the answer. Vaguely stated questions like this often lead to long prestige-war threads that resolve nothing.</p>
<p>for the record, I am not applying to MIT nor would i have a chance of getting in. However I do have 4.0 gpa, 1490/2150 SAT, 32 ACT. </p>
<p>I want to be a mechanical engineer and I have applied to texas a&m @ college station and University of Texas @ Austin, both of which have excellent engineering schools. On the other hand, there are other schools that aren’t prestigious that would be willing offer someone of my abilities great scholarships. Its a frustrating choice.</p>
<p>Are you in-state for Texas? Texas A&M is rather low cost for in-state, and UT Austin is not that expensive either. Or are you looking at the automatic full ride from Prairie View A&M?</p>
<p>The first question is impossible to answer because there are too many subjectives (what is “good”? What does “success” mean?) but the second question is more.</p>
<p>It depends on what “lesser” is, how much the scholarship is, and what the gap between debt at School A (prestigious selective college) and School B (“lesser” school with large scholarship) is.</p>
<p>Personal story: Among other schools, I was admitted to Emory with a package of mostly loans and a small LAC in the top 100 with a full merit package. The college was a good one, and I loved the campus and the atmosphere, it just wasn’t as well-known as Emory. I decided to take the full merit package (my family couldn’t afford Emory’s package anyway, lol). I did well, stumbled on research, graduated with honors. I currently attend Columbia, as an NSF scholar, getting my PhD in public health - and I’m set to graduate next year (5-6 years).</p>
<p>I’m also a believer that college is largely what you make it, but at the same time there are differences in the resources that colleges have to offer. I mean, I loved my small LAC, but our libraries were <em>nothing</em> compared to what Columbia has to offer. They have a state of the art student center - ours was small and dinky compared to this one. They have much better living facilities. And the career center here is amazing! My undergrad LAC was great. But think about stuff like that, too. There’s a difference between turning down MIT for a full scholarship at, say, Reed College or Furman (both great top LACs) and turning down MIT for a full scholarship at, like Augusta State or Clayton State (both of which are regional public colleges in my home state - decent, but not even on the same level). Reed and Furman have the resources to make you nationally successful and probably have good graduation rates, good placement in grad schools and jobs. A school like Augusta State, while good, doesn’t really cater to students who are planning to move away from the Southeastern region or go to graduate school. That doesn’t mean that you can’t go to graduate school from there - but you’ll need to be more of an independent go-getter and seek out opportunities.</p>
<p>In response to the dentist analogy, that doesn’t necessarily apply unless the Dental Admission Test scores are identical or at least very similar. Why do people from Caltech with 3.1-3.4 GPAs get into great med schools? Because those are the same people that can crank out 37+ MCAT scores. With the rigor of a certain program, you’re bound to perform better to offset your GPA. That continuum doesn’t always work the way it should, but it’s important to keep in mind that your level of preparation is just as important as any grade point average. If you’re super self-motivated and can force yourself to learn at a more lenient school what you would at a rigorous school, in my opinion you should be able to pocket a GPA bonus as a result.</p>
<p>It is such a shame that so many people think that prestige is the main reason people choose a higher level school. Many students go because they want the challenge of classes that are taught with greater depth and complexity. Some students are bored to tears in high school and long for the stimulation and pace that can be found at some of these schools. Unfortunately, many second-tier schools may not be as stimulating to some of these students.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, it is always good to go where you can afford to go. If you can’t afford to go to a higher-level school, it is NOT worth it.</p>
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<p>That’s the key. You have very good stats and you’ve worked very hard. You want to go to college with your intellectual peers and stimulate them while they stimulate you. </p>
<p>You are applying to two very large, very high quality programs in Texas. Both will be challenging and difficult. Some people might feel better going to a smaller school with more of a personal feel, and yes, some people want to go to a college like MIT where they teach to the top 10% of the class and everybody else buckles their seatbelts and tries to hang on for dear life. Such an approach worked for me, though it was very stressful. </p>
<p>I would not take a scholarship from a school with a student body that is significantly lower achieving than you just for the money unless I couldn’t get by any other way.</p>
<p>Future success really depends on the person. As long as you can get into top college, whether or not you in fact attend them is irrelevant in most cases (unless you’re poor or an underrepresented minority) You can clearly see this in many people who succeeded and were accepted to Harvard, for example, and either never completed their studies (e.g. Gates, Zuckerberg, etc.) or couldn’t attend for financial reasons (e.g. Nixon)</p>
<p>That doesn’t mean there aren’t advantages to attending top colleges. (e.g. networking) But the fact remains that if a college is unaffordable it’s unaffordable.</p>
<p>A lot of high paying jobs (finance, law, consulting, F500, etc.)/high status jobs (federal government, etc.) involves relationship building. Relationship building is a lot easier when you have commonalities to talk about (a professor at Stanford, skiing at Dartmouth, attending the Harvard-Yale game, etc.). You develop social/networking capital at those schools.</p>
<p>A good college is critical for success. Now, how you define good and how I define good likely differ a lot. For me a good school is at the right price, right rigor, and right programs for your desired career not rankings. If you get the college wrong and either go into boatloads of debt or end up in a really bad program, it can screw stuff up.</p>