As if the skills required to major in History (lesser? greater?) are the same skills required to major in architecture (lesser? greater?) or chemistry (lesser? greater?).
This ranking (who’s at the top, who is in the bottom half) isn’t the way the world works. Do you really think that Cal Tech accepts kids who struggle to do the work or are in some way underqualified? or Julliard- who are those “slugs” at the bottom of the class?
Only on CC… avoiding “the bottom of the class” is a poor way to pick a college IMHO. Students bring different strengths- just like in the real world. Steven Hawking couldn’t run a marathon; Bobbie Fisher would have made a terrible psychiatrist; Oprah Winfrey doesn’t design jet engines. People’s giftedness in some areas and deficits in others doesn’t make them “bottom of the class” or under-qualified.
I certainly hope that @TheVulcan continues to add to this thread because there is much to be said about the benefits of going to schools like MIT. I don’t think that enough was explored when @thevulcan discussed their decision making process - specifically the finances. Looking back I think it was MIT (with needs based aide) at 2x the cost of Vandy (with full tuition support). I’m not sure what the exact $$ would be in this case but it seems like MIT was chosen with that cost being acceptable.
If that’s the case, that info may help the (now absent) OP. Why? Well because I do think that MIT would offer much better opportunities along just about any dimension you can think of. Now, there may be some major(s) where Vandy excels vs MIT, but engineering probably is not one of those.
Students that get the opportunity to go one of the handful of truly top ranked engineering colleges are surrounded with support and opportunities that have evolved over years - things that are hard to create. Money does matter, but I would strongly try to make MIT work (over Vandy) if at all financially possible.
All colleges accept some students who struggle to do the work, even though they don’t intend to do so. Those students may drop out or change to an easier (more suitable) major. Or they may carry on struggling and graduate and take easier courses where there is a choice (eg not the math course for Putnam candidates). Julliard is a good example, they have some stars but also “regular” graduates who are far from guaranteed to get a performing arts job afterwards.
It doesn’t mean that the students who struggle won’t be successful afterwards (we all know the famous tech CEOs like Steve Jobs who dropped out) or that they aren’t intelligent. But depending on personality they might not enjoy their experience as much as they would do at another college.
Maybe this differs by college, but we certainly knew within the first term who was in the top half of the class (and within that who were the superstars) and who would always be in the bottom half. Some were content to be outshone academically and focused on other things instead (eg sports and ECs), others found it much harder.
For some folks, the stock market is a minor point. They might own a thriving business, own in real estate, etc. Also, not every person thinks the world is going downhill.
I only say this because money can be made equally in up and down markets. I’m not nervous about the next six months at all. Over the last decade, I’ve seen more people watching the news a lot and repeating the fear. The news is always bad 7x24. I’m not saying that’s your message. I’m only saying, for every point, there is a counterpoint.
You are correct, it would have been approx. $25/K yr at Vandy after the full tuition merit scholarship vs approx. $50K/yr at MIT after need-based aid.
DS is on track to graduate in three years (which we didn’t know at the time as MIT does not accept a lot of AP credits, and we didn’t know how well he would do on MIT’s Advanced Standing Exams that allow one to test out of some intro courses), so we are talking approx $75K difference over 3 years for our particular financial situation.
His summer internship offer after the sophomore year is for approx. $60K plus free housing (not that those are typical even at MIT, but in our case it is hard to complain about the ROI).
I think you get a certain level of additional attention, but it’s not like Stamps, where there maybe half a dozen to a dozen scholars per institution per year, and they get personally groomed in all sorts of ways. (DS was a semi-finalist for GTech one, and we sighed a big sigh of relief when he didn’t get it, because we knew that one would be impossible to turn down:)
There are approx. 250 of these full tuition merit offers made by Vandy each year. I believe approx. half of them accept, so you are looking at a sizeable group (~500 students over four years).
One thing that Vandy does offer on top of full tuition is a “summer stipend for study abroad, research or service projects” of about $7K. This is not a significant amount in a big scheme of things to tilt the scale in my opinion, and there are many, many opportunities available to all MIT students that are fully funded and easily meet or exceed that amount every year if fully taken advantage of.
Our MIT kid had not one but two funded summers. We had hoped it was some sort of prestigious thing but no- apply to the UROP office and wait to get the email that the funds were approved.
It may be. In my son’s case, he’s in a very challenging environment, but I wouldn’t describe it as a “competitive” environment. Students are encouraged to work on many things together.
But many are stretched and many are taking loans - and there seems to be only agreement from the financial experts that the fed will continue to raise rates (starting tomorrow) - and so money will not be cheaper.
You/I are financially ok - but many are strapped and act like leveraging go to school is just expected.
They may lever today and be in a world of hurt in two years from now - is all I’m saying.
Already my 2027 529 is falling pretty hard - ridiculous as I don’t have a kid entering school then - but I purposely put it out there for some risk.
Others are looking at what they have today - and it’s a stretch and aren’t accounting for tuition hikes (some like Elon going up 9%) and higher interest rates - was simply my point.
Each individual’s situation will be different…and of course no one can predict markets with certainty - or we’d be billionaires.
OP’s D plays guitar and writes songs. Go to Vandy and get discovered.
I didn’t see OP say whether MIT would cause hardship or debt but if D likes startups and VC then MIT makes sense. It’s a niche and I strongly believe name matters in this area. But I wouldn’t take on meaningful debt for the name.
Yes, I think an 18 year old taking out loans has no idea of the implications. Tough. Let’s face it, most people cannot pay 80K a year out of current income.
I’ve seen the negative implication of big loans in our extended family.
Or moreso the parents - there are so many that figure, let’s just do it and we’ll figure it out later.
I don’t have loans other than a fixed rate mortgage so I don’t know the impact but I do believe most student loans are floating rate.
In this case, perhaps MIT is worth it - but is it worth it if your family has so much emotional / financial stress, etc?
Only reason I brought it up.
I was worried about paying for college - I have two in now - I’m well prepared financially even for the worst case - but still having to pay $150K a year or $80K a year or whatever - it may sound easy on paper but when the time comes to stroke that check…it’s scary.
Fortunately I’m not near that with the merit my kids have earned.
But if the MIT option would strap a family financially with debt that would raise the blood pressure, that’s a reason enough for me to avoid the school, regardless of potential outcomes.
All salary data has flaws. PayScale is self reported. Scorecard only has data on students that had federally subsidized loans and/or grants.
The reason I reference it, College Scorecard in particular, is that it’s objective. Parents know objectively what school will cost, but often use pie in the sky earnings/opportunity justifications that are never backed up by anything but anecdote.
I’m personal friends with not one, but three Fortune 500 CEOs. No one would look at any of their undergraduate institutions and suggest that they are the routes one should consider to get to where each of them are now.
This is different in healthcare than it is in engineering. Most coveted jobs have GPA barriers irrespective of institution. A 2.0 MIT grad isn’t going to get a look that a 3.8 SJSU grad wouldn’t.
Bottom of the class, and underqualified are different. I’d wager that 100% or very near that are fully qualified to do the work expected of them at MIT. They wouldn’t have let them in if they weren’t. Fifty percent will be in the bottom half of the class though, and that will have it’s own implications, for some mentally, and for some when searching for a job.
I think it’s useful to look at pay scale as a factor when considering a career path/taking out loans/or even adjusting interests to align more closely with better financial outcomes. I also think it’s always important to use several data sources.
Another thing to remember is outliers who can throw off the numbers by a lot. One CEO responding can make the data meaningless in a small data set.
Something can be objective and still be incomplete, inaccurate, or suffer from MANY issues w/r/t data hygiene and comparing things which cannot be compared. (Who has a nicer house- the person who lives in 3,000 square feet on a lake, or the person who lives in a 2,000 square foot apartment in a luxury building with a concierge and a fully equipped gym in the basement?)
