If you can’t think of anything better to spend 200,000k on then sure why not?
I myself would get me a lamborghini. wasting that on a college seems weird though but to each his own. all the schools teach the same thing.
lol
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!
You got this!!! Work hard and aim for a U.S. school (most have great financial aid). Anyways, a 200K debt is NOT worth it.
I’m not sure what sort of elaboration you need. The real value of Oxbridge is in the networking that goes on there. You get yourself in with the elites in the UK and get the inside track on the related lucrative careers. It’s a social benefit as much as an educational one. This is similar to Harvard and Princeton and Yale here in the States.
Here’s the thing, though: Boeing and Ford and Dow Chemical and whoever else couldn’t give have a cent what British elite you know. They want to know if you will help them increase their bottom line.
“can you please elaborate on why for engineering oxford isn’t any better if I want to stay in the US for a job?”
Employers in the US will know US schools well, and will actively recruit from universities in the US. In most cases you will be interviewing with hiring managers who graduated from universities in the US. US engineering schools that are ABET certified have the advantage that US employers will be familiar with ABET certification and will know that these provide a solid education that you and they can count on.
If you go to any school that requires $200,000 in total debt, there is a real possibility that your ability to borrow more money will end before you get your degree. There will be a very real risk of ending up with most of the debt without any degree at all. This could be a disaster.
The Oxford Engineering degree is indeed a great degree- but, as everybody else has said, it’s not $200,000 (of money you simply don’t have) better.
Engineering is a comparatively ‘flat’ playing field. In the US, the ABET accreditation is the gold standard: graduate with a degree in engineering from any ABET certified university and your degree will be recognized. It’s true that MIT has a bit more prestige than State U, and the % who go on to do superstar stuff may be higher from MIT than State U- but you will find people from State U working alongside people with MIT degrees, in the same company, for the same salary, in great jobs all over the US. There are a small number of fields where the fancy name can be materially helpful in getting started in a career (investment banking is the poster child for that)- but engineering is really not one of them.
Moreover, the school calendar in the UK is enough different than that in the UK, and the density of local contacts will be so much less with your UK engineering profs, that getting the kind of high-quality summer internships that leads to good jobs in the country in which you are legally allowed to work will be harder coming from Oxford than from a US university.
Note that I am a huge fan of Oxford (& have an Oxonian collegekid). But for a US citizen, with no right to work in the UK, in a subject where local connections are plausibly more important than some, and with no obvious way to finance it, it does not look like the path for you.
The only way that debt is reasonable is if it’s attached to a 30 year mortgage.
Not going to happen! 
Even if you got into Oxford, there’s no way on planet Earth you would get $200k in loans to pay for it. If your dad makes $20k a year, you really should consider a scholarship. That would a win/win for everyone.
If your parents make 20k or so and you’d be a viable candidate to Oxford, there are lots of top us universities that’d be interested in you where you’d pay NOTHING to attend. No debt obviously.
Are you by any chance female or URM? Then look into fly ins (top colleges treat you like a recruited athlete and fly you in to visit and evaluate you.)
So, what are your stats?
What sort of school do you attend? Are you in a rural area or a city?
I’m about to just stop beating a dead horse and just let this subject go but…if I was to decide to get a job in the UK, can I explain to oxford that i plan on staying in the UK permanently and getting a citizenship there…can they somehow charge me as a resident and not a international student or somehow give me a refund later? To become a uk citizen would require me to live 5 yrs there which is 4 yrs of college plus an additional 1 yr.
No, no university will not retroactively refund you money, and in fact even if you were already a citizen you have to have been tax-resident in the UK for the last 3 years to get domestic tuition rates. Remember that UK universities (like state universities in the US) are tax-payer funded, and (same as the US) the tuition break goes to those taxpayers. True example: UK citizens, lived in the UK all their lives until they were posted abroad. 5 years later their daughter went ‘home’ to the UK for university: they paid international fees.
Also, time on a student visa does not count towards the 5 year residency requirement: http://www.1st4immigration.com/british-citizenship.php
200k is silly but, you could study there for a semester or a year as a visiting student. Most colleges have programs that allow for international study that will be a much more practical route .It looks like you can apply directly to Oxford but, they also partner with other US universities. For example, I notice both UCLA and UCB both offer summer programs at Oxford, and the London School of Econ.
http://eap.ucop.edu/OurPrograms/united_kingdom_england/Pages/default.aspx
http://studyabroad.berkeley.edu/explore/programs?region=6&language=41&term=All&country=All&sponsor=All&order=name&sort=asc&page=3
https://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/undergraduate/international-students/events/visiting-students?wssl=1
No. You can’t.
Why Oxford when there are so many US colleges that won’t cost you anything? Are your parents immigrants from the Commonwealth?
What State do you live in?
This is an interesting thread , to say the least. With parents with an income of $20,000, go to or stay at the school that will give you a good education for a reasonable price. $200,000 in undergrad debt is clearly absurd .
Tbh, going to the highschool that I did made me feel like my value as a person depended completely on the prestige of the college i went to. But I realize now, especially for engineering, that the prestige of an university won’t get you very far on its own. I’m just really trying to explain that to my uber condescending parents.
Tell them where the CEO of Apple, Tim Cook went to school…Auburn.
What you’re saying makes no sense though. Why A FOREIGN university?
Do you live outside the us?
What sort of school do you attend?
Are your parents immigrants from the Commonwealth?
What state do you live in?
What are your stats?
If you attend the sort of school where prestige of college is something Juniors are immersed in, go see a college adviser immediately - the advising team will be good and will set things straight.
Do you understand that MIT, Stanford, Harvey Mudd, Cornell, Northwestern, Waterloo in Canada… are all considered top-notch worldwide and Oxford doesn’t have a monopoly?
For engineering, an ABET accredited college is what you need but obviously if, like MIT, your endowment is 1million per student, it opens some opportunities not all ABET accredited colleges have. But for engineering you don’t need prestige so that keeps lots of good options open.
So you have uber condescending parent that make less than $20K/year? Please help us understand what put Oxford (and $200K of loans) into their head. I’m just can’t come up with a scenario that makes sense.
Me neither. Makes no sense but we still respond!