<p>Hi,</p>
<p>I posted this in the schools forum, but I also want to post it here hopefully to get a parents' perspective.</p>
<p>My daughter applied to 6 schools this year and so far has been accepted to 4 of them. While this is a very happy problem, it is proving to be a very confusing decision. She is planning to major in Bioengineering at this point and here are her favorites out of the list of the schools she applied to and their status:</p>
<p>• University of Washington – accepted as freshman direct admit to college of Bioengineering (we live in WA – tuition & housing is covered by GET investment and college savings). UW will also accept her AP credits and community college credits towards her degree there, so she will enter with almost all of her Freshman credits already done.</p>
<p>• University of California San Diego – accepted as Regents Scholar ($2k scholarship, but still have added $23k in out of state tuition)</p>
<p>• CalTech – accepted, no financial aid offered yet. (we are $30k/year short in our college fund without financial aid)</p>
<p>• Harvey Mudd - accepted, no financial aid offered yet. (we are $35k/year short in our college fund without financial aid)</p>
<p>• Stanford – have not heard from them yet; expected to hear this Friday. (we are $30k/year short in our college fund without financial aid)</p>
<p>Her top 3 favorites were UW, CalTech and Stanford equally ranked. She likes different things about each of the 3. We applied to UCSD at the last minute so that she had another safety besides UW, but the more we learn about it, the more attractive it is.</p>
<p>Here are the questions I am hoping you can help with:</p>
<p>• Between UW and UCSD, which do you think has the stronger BioE program and why? </p>
<p>• The UW BioE program ranks at #5 or #6 in several different program rankings in the last 2 years, but UCSD always ranked above UW on those charts. Why?</p>
<p>• What about between UW, CalTech and Stanford – which BioE program is better? Why do the Stanford and CalTech BioE programs consistently rank lower than UW and UCSD?</p>
<p>• Does a UW Freshman Direct Admit to BioE trump all the other schools? How hard is it to get accepted to the BioE colleges at Stanford and CalTech?</p>
<p>• My daughter loves the atmosphere and housing structure at CalTech, but she is concerned that the narrow focus of classes available will limit options to take drawing, painting and dance classes, which are her stress release. Is the BioE program and culture there worth that limitation? When we visited, the students there looked very stressed (speaking as a mom).</p>
<p>• If you or your kid had this same list of choices, how would you rank the schools?</p>
<p>• Should finances win out in this situation? UW is paid for and any scholarships she gets will add to funds that she can use for Grad school if she chooses UW. Each of the other schools will require big scholarships or that we make major sacrifices to afford the tuition (e.g. wiping out investments, refinancing the house, etc.) and we have a son who will be going to college in 4 years. We are freelancers and our income is just below the 200k limit, so I am not expecting much in financial aid. But even with that income, the expense of health insurance, current tuition and the seattle cost of living, we don’t have disposable income outside of what we currently are saving for retirement (we are in our 50s).</p>
<p>• Will she miss out on the full college experience if she attends and lives on campus at UW instead of going further away from home?</p>
<p>Sorry this post is so long and I know that my daughter and we are very blessed with this long list of choices and the finances we do have, but I am hoping that your insights can help us make this decision.</p>
<p>Thanks for your help,</p>
<p>Stephany</p>