I want to major in industrial Engineering. If I go to UF I will have a full ride and all of my dual credits will transfer. Which means I will graduate college at 20 years old. If go to Northwestern or Columbia I will graduate with a degree from a brand name school. I will probably also graduate debt free because my family is middle class. Keep in mind that I want to work and live in Florida right after college. Which would be most the financially beneficial to me in the long run?
Most NU’s IE graduates go and work in consulting or finance. These opportunities will be hard to come from a school like Florida.
Your post suggests that you expect significant financial aid … If this is the case, a school like NU or Columbia is a no-brainer.
Columbia & Northwestern should result in career options not regularly offered to UF grads.
What if I want to work and live in Florida after college? Would Columbia or Northwestern still be economically beneficial?
I don’t know how regional and local Florida companies recruit. But are you pretty sure Florida is where you want to work right after college? Florida doesn’t seem to be the state with plenty of nice industrial engineering jobs.
The choice here isn’t just Northwestern but also an IE program that is consistently ranked in the top-5. On top of that is a chance to get into the managerial analytics certificate program from one of the best B-schools in the world.
You should investigate specifically how grads from UF’s IE program do. You can contact the department and ask them. Be aggressive and ask whatever you want. Now realize also that you’ll probably rank higher in the UF graduating class and among the IE’s than you would from the schools that don’t have a much of a lower tail in the student distribution. By the way how did you come to an interest in IE? It’s not something most high schoolers have even heard of.
I guess nice is subjective. Florida, being the 3rd most populous state, has plenty of IE jobs, mostly in Supply Chain, transportation and logistics, Healthcare, and information/communications system. The manufacturing jobs tend to be in the high tech/aerospace fields. A relatively small % of UF grads go into financial engineering.
UF’s Graduation Survey can give you some insight into outcomes. Keep in mind this survey is completed before graduation. You can select IE as a major.
https://www.crc.ufl.edu/student-outcomes/
You can also use LinkedIn to search for UF (and NW and Columbia) IE Alumni and see which areas of the country and jobs they work in.