Ole Miss vs. MSU vs. Bama

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Mississippi
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<p>I sure hope this isn't a sore subject! I know very, very little about colleges in the south. I do know that there can be a huge rivalry between colleges that are somewhat geographically close. So, please ... no offense intended by this question! I know next to NOTHING about any of these 3 colleges. We've perused the websites, and that's about it --aside from one summer visit to Bama.</p>

<p>My hs senior son and I LOVED Bama. We intended to visit all 3 of the colleges on the same visit, but my work got in the way. So, we've only been to Bama.</p>

<p>All 3 of these colleges offer huge NMF scholarships. All 3 offer mechanical engineering degrees. All 3 have lots of fans on CC.</p>

<p>Can anybody put a "compare & contrast" in a nutshell for us?</p>

<p>My son is interested in a great honors program, a very good engineering program, and the ability to play in a good orchestra as a non-major.</p>

<p>Any takers? (I'm holding my breath ... where I live, people are extremely loyal to one particular school or another and seem to take offense at comparison attempts. If this is a touchy subject, please don't rake me over the coals or give me unhelpful, angry answers! I'm trying to be good!) :)</p>

<p>FYI – I’m going to post this in the other two forums as well.</p>

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<p>My son is a freshman at Ole Miss. We looked into Ole Miss, Bama, and MSU, and he applied and was admitted to Ole Miss and Bama.</p>

<p>We never visited MSU, but I get the impression that it has the strongest engineering program among these three schools. Where we live, Starkville has a reputation as not being a very interesting college town.</p>

<p>Alabama is much bigger than the other two, both in the physical size of its campus and the number of students. If you want a major university experience, with the opportunity to major in almost anything, big-time sports, and lots of people, Bama seems like the best choice to me. Engineering is also quite strong here.</p>

<p>Ole Miss is the one I know the most about. Go here if you want the opportunities of a big university but the look and feel of a smaller college. The center of campus has a quiet, park-like feeling, with stately old buildings, very “old South”. The outer regions of the campus have newer buildings but retain the pretty landscaping and peaceful atmosphere. I’ve walked around the campus and would call it big enough, neither small nor huge.</p>

<p>The Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College is one of the most praised in the nation—certainly one of the best in the South—and the Residential College has the newest buildings and best dining hall. (Many students belong to both.) The engineering program’s reputation is fine but not great; I’m an engineer myself and would say that Bama and MSU are better.</p>

<p>Oxford is not an exciting college town, but it’s nice. In one direction from campus you have downtown Oxford, which is small but has a beautiful town square surrounded by cool shops and good restaurants and clubs. In the other direction you have the main drag, a mile-long stretch with numerous chain restaurants, Wal-Mart, movie theater, and such. It’s not New York City by any means, but you won’t be missing any of the necessities. Downtown and the main drag are not exactly right next to campus, but they’re close enough to walk if the weather is nice, and there’s a shuttle bus running most of the day.</p>

<p>Academically, Ole Miss, Bama, and MSU are comparable. Statistically, Bama gets the best-qualified students on average, but not by a lot, and Ole Miss’s Honors College skews the university’s overall numbers upward by attracting some extremely well-qualified students.</p>

<p>I know nothing about orchestra, sorry. I might also mention that Ole Miss has two Language Flagship programs (Chinese and Arabic), and that the Modern Languages department overall is much stronger than Bama’s, if that happens to interest your son. Finally, Ole Miss’s pre-game tailgate parties on the Grove during football season are legendary.</p>

<p>I hope these observations are helpful!</p>

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<p>By the way, it seems like hardly anyone reads the Ole Miss forum, so you might want to post this in the Parents Forum to get more replies.</p>

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<p>My son is also a freshman at Ole Miss. He was all set to attend a UNH or URI as we have family in New England and he’s into hockey. We always assumed that he would be up north. However, a “on a whim” visit to Ole Miss and he was sold. Although I can’t speak to the Engineering Department and the other schools, I can say that we have been really pleased with Ole Miss so far. The OOS cost is very reasonable, the campus is very nice and my son seems very happy there (so far!). About 45% of students are from OOS. As mentioned by others, the surrounding area has what students need. Football is huge and my son purchased an “all access” pass to the home games of every fall/winter sport for $125. He’s in an older dorm but everything is air conditioned. I would recommend looking at the Residential College as the facilities are nice and the concept is a good one. My son did not opt to apply but kind of wished he had after staying in the College during orientation. I knew NOTHING about the SEC schools and now I’m a big fan:)! Good luck!</p>

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<p>hi mantori.suzuki. Thanks so much for responding. You shared some really useful information!</p>

<p>From responses on the various threads, I think maybe Starkville (MSU) may not be very appealing to my son, even though it may have the best engineering of the bunch.</p>

<p>From the way you describe Ole Miss, it may well warrant a visit. My son wants pretty much exactly what you described – all the opportunities of a big university with the look and the feel of a smaller college. But then again, he does want as good of an engineering program as he can get. And if you’re an engineer, and YOU think that Bama would be a better bet for engineers … well, he does really like what he saw at Bama. So maybe we’re done looking for now. Oh brother. This is the hard part – narrowing down that college list.</p>

<p>The Ole Miss honors college sounds great. I researched it further. It’s widely respected, as you said. And the residential college sounds great, too.</p>

<p>My son doesn’t need the exciting college town. Oxford sounds like the kind of town he would prefer, actually. His favorite social activities are pretty low-key.</p>

<p>I think you and I might have “talked” on another thread about the Chinese language program. At first, my son was very interested in learning Chinese along with engineering. But he has recently changed his mind for some reason. Maybe because of the difficulty of the language in addition to the fact that he has so many other interests and priorities in his college search?</p>

<p>If we visit Ole Miss, we’ll be sure to come back to this thread and share our opinions.</p>

<p>Thanks again for your feedback, mantori!</p>

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<p>It’s nice to hear that your son is so happy in his new, “surprise” home, momrules! I hope my son is just as happy at this time next year!</p>

<p>Your son’s experience with Ole Miss sounds a little like my son’s experience with Bama so far. (He’s still a high school senior, though.) He wasn’t really expecting to like Bama that much. But he knew it had great scholarships, a good honors college, orchestra, and engineering. So he checked it out. And he loved it!</p>

<p>We’re actually pretty excited about that find. But we’re not sure we’re ready to seal the deal and call our college search complete. We can’t quite tell if we should make another visit out that way to see Ole Miss or MSU. (I actually think MSU might be out of the picture at this point, since there are a few things about it that make it less than ideal – despite its reputation for engineering.)</p>

<p>Thanks again for your feedback, momrules!</p>

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<p>That’s a good reason. From my son’s experience so far, I would say that he shouldn’t major in Chinese unless he’s 95% sure he’s going to love it, because it is so foreign (literally and figuratively) and the amount of work is pretty daunting.</p>

<p>Please do let us know how you like Ole Miss if you visit! I recommend staying at the Inn at Ole Miss on campus. It’s only a few bucks more than other nearby hotels, you can park there all day, the rooms are nice, and breakfast is included. It’s not the Four Seasons—more like a Marriott—but it’s nice.</p>

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<p>Thanks, mantori! We’ll look into the Inn. And we’ll definitely report back if we visit.</p>

<p>I agree with the whole Chinese thing. In fact, I remember reading your posts about your son’s summer experience in the language program. It sounded intense!</p>

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<p>Super intense, but it was the only class the kids took in the two Summer terms, so there were few distractions, and they all did pretty well. I believe all but one of the 18 who started have stuck with it!</p>