<p>fourkidsmom--Seconding Candace!
I am NOT a science/tech person, nor is my kid, but I do live in NY Capital Region and can tell you that RPI does wonderful things and has amazing students working on incredibly interesting and stimulating projects. They offer lots of hands-on opportunities, close interaction with professors, internships and special projects. RPI also does a lot with building bridges across disciplines, which I think is a fascinating niche. Here's a first-hand example: several RPI comp sci students (undergrad as well as grad) have been engaged in a project with the museum I work for (art and history), developing an interactive web-based game designed for ages 6-12. </p>
<p>Sports may not be as big as at Syracuse, but there is a lot of school spirit around hockey, which is king at RPI.</p>
<p>no idea of how great the program is but there are girls galore and an engineering dept at The College Of New Jersey, and an entire separate school of engineering at Rutgers University.</p>
<p>I didn't mean to imply that "more girls" equals a better college experience, but did want to point out that many engineering schools have a more limited environment than larger universities.</p>
<p>My son's at Carnegie Mellon and it sounds like your S has tons of the characteristics of kids in the Comp Sci dept. They are very very strong on Robotics. They are also big on team-based work; one of the reasons employers love the school. The only English class is freshman Interpretation & Argument, one semester. You can browse the CMU boards to get an idea of the social life - there really is one. And Pittsburgh has a strong Jewish culture and active Hillel and Chabad organizations.</p>
<p>CMU is not an easy admit but certainly worth considering. But it's not really a good school for changing majors; it can be done but not as easily as elsewhere. World class opportunities and instructors; my S is taking a class from a McArthur Grant genius.</p>
<p>If looking in Northeastern U.S....Students with test anxiety issues would probably do well at Clarkson (great school and fairly easy to get into),
Rochester Institute of Technology (larger, but also fairly easy to get into),
Lafayette-Lehigh-Bucknell (wonderful engineering colleges at smaller colleges,
fairly challenging as far as admission, lots of personal attention and small classes, graduates are very successful.)</p>
<p>fourkidsmom, lots of good advice here. Some advice about the Rensselaer Medal. It is awarded by the student's hs in the spring of JUNIOR year and RPI gives the hs's leeway in the methodology for selecting the RM student.</p>
<p>Our son was designated his hs's Rensellaer Medalist but he was not best math/science student in his class. He was probably in the top 5 or 10, but not the best. Because RPI was one of his top college choices at the time, he did a bit of lobbying with his GC for specific consideration. His GC went to bat for him, he was the RMedalist, is attendint RPI and doing simply fantastic there.</p>
<p>We would not have allowed him to lobby his GC if RPI had not been one of his top 2 choices but it was and we gave him the okay because he was sure none of the other "contenders" even had RPI on their radar. In fact, to the best of my knowledge only one or two others is a science or engineering major.</p>
<p>I really hate the way the RPI medal is awarded. We had a friend who advised us to lobby for it, but we didn't - we still have hopes that Mathson will end up elsewhere. But it sure would be nice if it didn't get wasted since it goes to the top student who then goes on to HYPSM. I realize the medal is designed as an advertising tool/enticement, but it still seems a shame.</p>