DS had his heart set on Georgetown but got deferred during EA, waitlisted in March and eventually there is a spot for him . He got in early at Michigan (December), got into LSA honors and his heart slowly started changing…he wants to major in Econ with a minor in International studies/public policy. He may change his mind and try to switch to business school and both colleges have good B-schools (albeit, Ross is a little harder to transfer).
He now wants to turn down Georgetown because he thinks he is “picked last” and does not want a mercy seat…Is he making a mistake? We are trying to tell him that he is “not at the bottom” in Georgetown just as he is “not at the top” in Michigan. We are trying to tell him to make a decision based on intrinsic qualities of the colleges and not the timing of admission offers. We like Michigan, but the location of Georgetown is hard to beat, especially for what he wants to do. Even though we are OOS, Michigan will cost a little less, fortunately we are able to afford either college so that is not a factor.
Looking for some CC wisdom so that we do regret later. I have been lurking on this board since December and tagging some posters who have a wealth of knowledge and give good advice: @Alexandre@blue85, @billcsho@wayneandgarth etc…
You are 100% correct to not base the decision on when he was admitted. If Georgetown admitted him, they are saying he is very qualified. In fact there are thousands of other applicants that they would also say were qualified but they had to turn down due to the size of the class.
Being that cost is not an issue and the programs are outstanding at both Universities, “fit” really is a key selection criteria. I’m curious though on why you say why the DC location may be better for him. Is it because of the Int’l Studies/Public Policy interest?
It seems both schools are great for what he wants to study. If you look at the enrolled freshmen profile, the mid 50 of SAT scores in these 2 schools are very similar. In other words, he will be surrounded by more or less the same quality of students. I would not worry about the timing of admission but which school would fit your son the best. They are very different in many aspects even with the same major. The physical location of the school is probably less important that the campus setting and the size of the school when deciding if the school fits the student. In addition, around half of the students graduated with a different major as initially intended, so do consider other alternatives when making decision. At the end, it would be down to personal choice/feeling. Let your son goes with his instinct whichever one he picks. Has he visited both campuses?
I will start by saying that your son will not “regret” his decision either way. Both are excellent in most regards. If cost is not a concern, I recommend your son go with his gut. Where does he feel he will be happier?
Thanks for quick responses…to answer some questions:
We have not visited Ann Arbor yet; we did not plan during spring break when he was so “sure” that he would get in GT and after that we did not get time…we are on the west coast, so it is not a short hop.
Yes DC is perceived to be better location because of job/internship opportunities, etc in his areas of interest (IR, policy, econ)
The “problem” is that his gut is now saying Michigan, when it was GT a few months ago. We are trying to prevent any regrets if his gut feeling is really just an emotional reaction to timing of offers.
I guess what we are really looking for is to hear that it will not be a mistake to pass up on GT in this field. Trying to close this decision and not look back
Thanks for the kind thoughts. My thoughts: 1) he can’t go wrong with either choice; 2) yes, fit is key; 3) I largely concur with the other posters.
Clearly, given Georgetown’s location near the heart of the political action, if that is one of the goals, it is a good/great school.
However, don’t count out Michigan: 1) the Ford school is well ranked; 2) the poli-sci department is almost unmatched; 3) the school of social research probably is unmatched; 4) the Carson scholars program and other programs create internships and outreach to the Capitol; 5) if you at the numbers of alums under the current administration, I believe Michigan ranks in the top 2 or 3 schools with senior administration schools…this has been a feature of Michigan’s profile since the days of Grover Cleveland; 6) at the graduate level, Ph.D econ hires are largely done from one of 4 schools and Michigan is in that cohort; the undergraduate version of econ is also very strong.
As to a decision based on timing of admission, that is not a very usable decision rule. Admissions have a large component of luck involved. I would ignore any deferral, now that he is in, he is in. However, if that is going to be a forward sticking point, who knows?
Stressedmom - no, there should be no regret whatsoever if choosing Michigan. Blue85 is completely correct in describing Michigan’s strengths in these fields. It’s a stupendous school. I’m sending my 2nd son to school there this Fall.
Thanks for the support and good info…In all my roamings on CC forums I know I can count of the Michigan forum regulars to defend, support and promote UM with data. I love it! If Michigan fosters this kind of loyalty there must be many good things beyond the numbers and rankings.
Honestly, I feel kids these days have it much harder than in my day. I know there are a lot of kids who have worked hard and we feel blessed to have these opportunities. This journey has not been easy and I am looking forward to making a decision and be stress free in summer
Thanks again, we will use the long weekend to decide.
“If Michigan fosters this kind of loyalty there must be many good things beyond the numbers and rankings.”
I may be remembering this incorrectly, but I believe that freshman retention is around 97% (maybe 96%?). That figure is pretty high and reflects that Michigan and the students who apply to Michigan are pretty good at assessing the “fit” part of the equation. For some, and in the initial year (maybe two), Michigan will be too large. A large school takes a bit of maturity to navigate, but there are life lessons embedded in some of those struggles which will help a student become an independent and self-sufficient graduate. Back to “fit”: possibly the single most important factor, if the child feels the fit is right s/he will be more likely to perform well and to succeed. Get the fit right and the rest will follow. Good luck. Go Blue!
Congrats on your child’s acceptance to Georgetown and Michigan!
Normally I would join the chorus of those telling your child to follow his or her gut. That, however, may not be the best advice if your child’s gut reaction is more an understandable response to his or her belated acceptance by Georgetown than an otherwise normally reliable indicator of fit.
Your child has two great, albeit very different, choices. On the one hand, Michigan is a large university that offers big-time sports in an outstanding college town. On the other hand, Georgetown is a medium-sized university that has excellent school spirit in a charming town minutes away from the excitement of Washington DC.
Michigan offers more majors than Georgetown does, but Georgetown has one of the strongest international relations departments in the world. While the Honors Program will help make Michigan a more intimate environment for your child, Georgetown will still generally offer smaller classes and closer student-faculty relationships than Michigan does.
Michigan students do well in the job market. But the internship and job opportunities for Georgetown students are singularly outstanding because of the close proximity of the university to Washington DC. Congrats again and good luck with your child’s choice this weekend!
stressedmom, post #5 by blue85 is the best advice you will see on this thread. There is little doubt that when it comes to IR and job placements in government institutions in DC, Georgetown is hard to beat…or match for that matter. That being said, although Michigan does not have an official IR program, it has multiple programs that, in concert with each other, afford undergrads at Michigan a very potent experience in policy and IR.
In addition to his thread, I would add the following:
Michigan's Political Science department is ranked anywhere between #1 and #4 in the nation. The faculty is among the most well connected and active in national policy making. Most Political Science majors at Michigan are in fact prelaw. As such, the few students that are in fact interested in internships in DC usually make it happen through the University's extremely influential faculty. The handful of students I knew who were interested in government work certainly had no trouble finding internships after their Junior year at Michigan.
Michigan recently added a PPE major which looks incredibly good. When you consider that Michigan's Philosophy and Political Science departments are both ranked among the top 5 nationally, and its Economics department among the top 15 nationally, in concert with Michigan's history of innovation in interdisciplinary and inter-departmental cooperation, this program should be truly exceptional.
One comment made by espenser that is completely incorrect is that it is easier to establish connections with faculty at Georgetown. That’s because his comment about class size is only partially correct ; for the most part, only classes at the intro-level at Michigan will be larger. Classes at the intermediate and advanced levels will generally be the same size at virtually all major research university. That is because Michigan’s much larger undergraduate student population is scattered evenly across far more academic disciplines. In many instances (like Philosophy, Physics, Mathematics etc…), Michigan will actually have smaller classes than at many private universities. In popular premed and prelaw majors, classes at Michigan can indeed be larger that at some of its peers (schools like Columbia, Northwestern, Penn and Stanford), but insignificantly so. And since connections with faculty at typically forged in intermediate to advanced level classes, Michigan students are not at any disadvantage when it comes to making those valuable connections and securing research/publishing opportunities, if so inclined. If one wants small classes across the board, and unlimited access to faculty, Georgetown’s SFS, with its hotshot faculty who roam the hallways of Capitol Hill and the State Department, is not the way to go…nor are most elite research universities with their Nobel Prize-seeking faculties. No, in such cases, away to a LAC you go, lest you wish to be left wanting.
"One comment made by espenser that is completely incorrect is that it is easier to establish connections with faculty at Georgetown. That's because his comment about class size is only partially correct; for the most part, only classes at the intro-level at Michigan will be larger. Classes at the intermediate and advanced levels will generally be the same size at virtually all major research university."
As close student-faculty relationships often organically arise from small class size, the above post correctly correlates these factors. It also acknowledges that “classes at the intro-level at Michigan will be larger” than at Georgetown and thus implicitly less conducive to inculcating strong student-faculty relationships. Since introductory courses often dominate a student’s freshman and even sophomore year, it logically follows that lower division students at Georgetown have a relative advantage over their counterparts at Michigan in this regard.
The above poster downplays this advantage by arguing that “[c]lasses at the intermediate and advanced levels will generally be the same size at virtually all major research university.” Statistics, however, suggest that Michigan, on average, has larger classes than Georgetown in all courses, not just introductory classes. Thus, where 47.1 percent of the classes at Michigan have less than 20 students and 84 percent have fewer than 50 students. By contrast, 61 percent of the classes at Georgetown have less than 20 students and 78 percent have fewer than 30 students.*
"And since connections with faculty at typically forged in intermediate to advanced level classes, Michigan students are not at any disadvantage when it comes to making those valuable connections and securing research/publishing opportunities, if so inclined."
This may be true at Michigan and its large, state-school peer institutions. But one of the advantages of attending a top, medium-sized university like Georgetown is that students typically don’t have to wait until their junior year to cultivate good faculty relationships in smaller, upper-level courses. Instead, they can develop these relationships in the numerous small courses they take freshman year.
"If one wants small classes across the board, and unlimited access to faculty, Georgetown's SFS, with its hotshot faculty who roam the hallways of Capitol Hill and the State Department, is not the way to go...nor are most elite research universities with their Nobel Prize-seeking faculties. No, in such cases, away to a LAC you go, lest you wish to be left wanting."
In my view, it is better to analyze the question of small classes and professor access on a continuum that begins with liberal arts colleges, continues to medium-sized universities, and concludes with large, state universities. Along this continuum, medium-sized universities typically cannot match the small classes and access to professors that liberal arts colleges offer. Nevertheless, they often more closely approximate this liberal arts’ ideal than state universities do. This is especially true at Georgetown where the Jesuit ethos of cura personalis (care for the person) emphasizes close attention to the needs of each individual student.
Our son talked to many people in his school and surrounding community and made his decision. He picked Michigan!
Here is his reasoning:
While GT was his top choice for better part of the pre-notification period, he now thinks it was mostly superficial. With UM (and a few other very good) admissions in hand, he thought more about what he wants to do in the context of the colleges that offered him a spot. He argues that this is where he started leaning towards UM (do we have a lawyer in the making or what? He says that the notification timing did hurt his ego and made him react and he gave reasons that were not rational…but really, he says he will have fun be happy at Michigan.
He applied to Michigan partly because he had looked at PPE program (Thanks for bringing it up again, Alexandre - it does sound like a good program, please let me know if you have any more information about the outcome of students who went through PPE) and how it tied to his interests (academic and extracurricular - he was a MUN, JSA & Debate kid who took Philosophy classes in HS). He even wrote about this program in his essay.
He thinks he needs a broad based major like Econ and add a minor (or courses) in IR/public policy areas. He will discuss this more when he meets his adviser. There are some others who are advising him to go into business school, but he is still undecided about that path. If he was 100% certain that IR is the way to go he would have applied to SFS @ GT (he applied and got into College). Class sizes, Jesuit values & mission, Washington DC and many other intangibles do set GT apart in a class of its own and it would have been a fine choice.
Being a 49er fan, he said if it is good enough for Harbaugh, it is good enough for me
Many thanks to all who responded, looking forward to the next four years!
Go Blue!
stressedmom, thanks for the update. He really could not go wrong between those two amazing universities, but it seems like he has chosen based on fit, which is always best. I would also not worry about class size. As your son will quickly confirm, class size will seldom, if ever, be a problem.
<== smiley face…