<p>I got into MIT EA and Rice ID. MIT is definitely my top choice (I was up there for a month this summer at a program). But I just found out today that not only did I get into Rice, my 2nd choice, but I received 3 scholarships (distinguished trustee, century scholar, and walsh engineering) totalling $78,000. My parents make too much for me to get any substantial amount of financial aid...so, let's do some math (yay! math):</p>
<p>4 years at MIT at about $42 grand a year (ouch) : $168,000
4 years at Rice: $50,000
For a difference of $118,000!</p>
<p>I can't see myself every saying no to MIT. I love the Boston area (but hate the cold) and I guess in this post I'm trying to justify my decision to decline $78,000 in scholarships. I know that the money saved by going to Rice would help pay for grad school...but going to undergrad at MIT will probably get me into any grad school I want. What do you think?</p>
<p>I'm in the same boat - except not as MUCH in merit money from Rice but I SHOULD qualify for some financial aid at MIT. If I absolutely can't afford MIT, I'm definitely off to Rice, but right now, I'm going for Tech. To me, money, in the end, is just money, if it's that important to you you'll make plenty more coming out of school. Rice is an amazing school as well-- I'm just careful not to make any decisions that I might come to regret.</p>
<p>going to undergrad at Rice will probably get you into any grad school you want as well.</p>
<p>I wouldn't worry all that much about money if your family makes quite a bit. Beyond ca$h, think of the experience for 4 years that you'd want. For you, I'm guessing that's MIT.</p>
<p>P.S. I'm not posting this to open a spot @Rice up for me, as I'm applyin to MIT as well - just in case anyone wondered</p>
<p>In my opinion, MIT is not more than 3 times as good as Rice, and thus, it makes no sense to pay more than 3 times as much for it. In fact, in someways, Rice is better than MIT - smaller classes, more personal attention, warmer weather, Texas Medical Center opportunities, residential colleges, more breadth in case you want to change your focus, etc. I don't think that going to MIT really gives you a better shot at grad schools than Rice either, but you might want to call career services and/or academic advising at Rice and talk to them about it. </p>
<p>You would also save more than 118,000 by going to Rice, assuming that both schools increase prices by approximately the same percentage, and the far lower cost of living in Texas vs. Massachusetts. So say you save $125,000 by going to Rice - that's like your entire graduate education at some schools!</p>
<p>Have you visited both schools? If not, this is definitely something that you should do.</p>
<p>I don't think you can go wrong with either : ) : ) - congrats, what a great dilemma you must be in ;).</p>
<p>However, if money doesn't need to be a factor, don't let it be. You can always work during college, and money can always been made after all your eddy-cation.</p>
<p>What, imo, you shoudl be more concerned about is which school you're going to do better at and get the most out of. 'Do better at' doesn't mean Rice is easy or anything, but like jenskate says, you've got more personal attention to go far as you want at Rice, and more internships etc. That would end up looking better than someone who gets 'lost' (figuratively) at MIT ....</p>
<p>Thanks everyone for the advice! I'm pretty sure MIT is the place for me, and I still have a few months to decide. I'm actually plannning on going to Campus Preview Weekend at MIT and Owl Weekend at Rice in April. Any more opinions would be greatly appreciated though!</p>
<p>You'll get a lot more personal attention at Rice, especially with all those scholarships. You'll be first in line for UG research and special opportunities. </p>
<p>At MIT, you're going to be just another grunt. A grunt at a great school, but a grunt none the less. </p>
<p>I think I read somewhere that 3/4 of Rice graduates get their first choice of graduate school. Come to Rice for undergrad with warm weather, more well rounded people, and less slave labor, and go to MIT graduate school.</p>
<p>Not only will you be first in line for research, as joemama said, but you'll be GUARANTEED to be in a lab doing research on something that you find interesting from your very first semester at Rice (with the century scholars program, which is truly fabulous). Can MIT match that? What kind of research opportunities are there at MIT for freshman?</p>
<p>my S visited MIT and met a grad student there who had gone to Brown as an undergrad. He said his undergrad experience was much more broad than it would have been at MIT as he actually had a life and met people beyond his dorm floor. He said now, he's having a great grad experience at MIT, but he sees that it would have been too limiting to have gone there earlier in his life.</p>
<p>You're not thinking of this the right way. If you could afford to go to MIT, and that's by and far your first choice, but you would only go to Rice just to save money, then you're much better off at MIT.</p>
<p>I lived there for three years while my husband worked at MIT. I never came home to visit because I knew I would never go back. One December we went 30 straight days where the temperature did not exceed 30 degrees. The heating oil bill was terrible. The snow is OK but as it melts there is a sloppy, muddy, dirty sludge everywhere that you have to trudge through. In February or March I would get a new heavy coat in some cheery color just because I had worn the other one for so many months it was depressing There are exactly 7 days of spring, and then it turns to a hot muggy summer with huge mean mosquitos that dwarf any Texas mosquitos I have seen. I would run from the front door to the car and get three bites on the way. They wouldn't spray for them because of environmentalists, and a number of people died from equine encephalitis spread by the the mosquitos. Oh memories! There is lots of skiing up there, if you like crusty ice type snow. I prefer the fluffy powder of New Mexico or Colorado......</p>
<p>Oh yes! Riding the T. There were some wonderful regular musicians that played at different stops. And the winter clothes can be bought at terrific sale prices. Why once my husband saw a homeless person sleeping on a bench with the same coat on that he was wearing! And you see puddles in the subways! And they are not from any water leaks from above!
The greatest thing was being introduced to Thai food in order to satiate a capsaicin addiction in the absence of decent Mexican food.</p>
<p>Lots of folks don't care for Houston, or Texas for that matter. Boston would have been a whole lot more fun if I had lots and lots of money. The cost of living was way out of my league and coupled with the depressing weather to give me something to write about all these years later.</p>
<p>ricemom2009: If city was the criteria, Houston is nothing to brag about - I live there (Humidity, musqito, traffic, fattest city and generally just ugly). And if City determined the strength of a college, MIT, Harvard, UPENN, Hopkins, UChicago, WashU, Columbia, Carnegie Mellon, would have folded long time ago.</p>