Thank you! It’s just impossible to get a feel for the school from far away. It’s helpful to know about the dorm possibly feeling like a residential experience, because I think for a musician that would be crucial, at least at first. You need to find your collaborators and play together!
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Regarding DePaul, I’m not sure what you want to know about the campus, but it’s located in one of the best neighborhoods in the city. Everything you could possibly want is right there. We toured the campus last spring, and it is very much a city campus. The buildings are, for the most part, right there together, and there is even a defined outdoor space connecting some of them. Some of the housing is a few blocks from the academic buildings. DePaul does have a number of students living in dorms their freshman year (I forget the percentage), but afterwards, the students mostly live in the north side neighborhoods. Some classes are also offered at the Loop campus, and there is also at least one dorm in the Loop. Transportation between the campuses, and the rest of the city for that matter, via the el is very easy.
I don’t have any first hand knowledge of the honors program or need-based aid.
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Thank you for all that info! We’ve seen the DePaul “campus”/buildings near the loop (not to look at the school but stayed in that area when visiting other colleges for my daughter) so I wasn’t sure if it was more of a neighborhood college (like Boston University with a bunch of buildings spread out in one area of the city) or a traditional campus with some green space (like Boston College.) I think the housing for the loop campus is shared with CCC and wow-the best dorms we have ever seen with gorgeous views! I’m sure the LP dorms are more low key but just living in that cool part of the city sounds awesome. I think they only guarantee housing for the 1st year so he’d need to look at off-campus options fairly quickly. Thanks for your insight!
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@BeverlyWest Since you said he liked Jazz. ULL has some fine music options. Still in the heart of Cajun country. With your sons stats it looks like he would get instate tuition plus the Magnolia scholarship. We haven’t visited but I hear the campus is lovely, lots of spirit (I have a friend who lives about 40 minutes outside of New Orleans and recommended it to us).
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Thank you! This is great.
My S23 is the same with his 3 in-state safeties. He truly likes their programs and the opportunities each would give but he just says it wouldn’t be a very different experience. He is also waiting on Northeastern; worried that because we couldn’t visit in-person since we are so far away they won’t consider him. Best of luck to your D23!
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Same schools for us!
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I’ve never seen either of those Boston schools, but I don’t want to give the impression that there is a lot of green space on the LP campus, or that it has any kind of traditional campus vibe. It doesn’t. The small green space is more courtyard between buildings. You know you’re at the DePaul campus because you see some banners that say so, but otherwise, it mainly blends into the city neighborhood. It was not at all what my daughter was interested in.
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They should all cc the parents! 
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I was just thinking how high schools that give the A- and never the A+ mess over their graduates when it comes to the auto merit schools.
When I looked into an auto merit school, I saw we could have had more money if the high school grades differently. Now perhaps the college would recalculate and make this a nonissue. I hope so, because that could be $20,000+ more in tuition based on what I saw.
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@AmyIzzy I would describe DePaul the same way as @cormac05 .
D23 and I toured DePaul in the spring. It was one of D23’s first official campus tours so her impressions were different than mine, initially (she is my youngest of four so I had been on many more tours/campuses than she had). She wants an urban university. She liked DePaul and while the tour was good, I came away with feeling it is more of a commuter-like campus. Yes, freshman live “on campus” but after that, the majority of students live elsewhere. Our tour guide mentioned that most of her friends were in apartments that were at least one stop away on the L. IIRC, she made it sound like for those who do want to stay in campus housing as upperclassmen, it was possible, but the vast majority do not, and due to housing costs in Lincoln Park, it’s not affordable to live walking distance to campus.
Having visited quite a few other urban campuses (among them NEU, BU, Fordham, Columbia, Temple, Brown, Loyola Chicago, American, etc), it just doesn’t have the same campus feel/environment. Nice residential neighborhood, but the “campus” was rather dead compared to Loyola which we visited the next day. By comparison, Loyola had a much more active, vibrant feel, with lots of students walking around, hanging out together inside the student center, library, etc. Even NEU, Brown and BU were livelier than DePaul, despite us touring those during the summer.
D23 did apply, and received the highest merit award. The financial aid package does not come out until February so I’m not sure how it will compare to her other acceptances/packages, but it is not one of her top choices.
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You did great - we too did the “very likely to be admitted” route and took the real reaches for him off the board, and it was the right choice for us.
At one college we visited, they talked about how intense their classes were - it was a point of pride! And there’s nothing wrong with that, but I realized that while I knew my kid could handle those academics, he would be stressed every. single. day. And he didn’t need to do that. There was no good reason for him to be stressed every day, he could get a great education and have a great experience without unrelenting stress.
Every kid is different; mine loves school but he isn’t Type A. Getting into the hardest, most reachiest school just wasn’t going to be the right route for him either. 
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You guys inspired me with your posts to check what’s what and list out the notification dates I didn’t have listed yet.
2023 is in at 5 schools.
With two of the schools, merit and/or Tuition Exchange brought the cost down to the $15-29K range. Two others that gave merit are still around $45,000 (Hello, UVM!). The final one thus far awarded no merit yet we’re hoping for Tuition Exchange, which would provide full tuition and then cost $13,000.
By the end of January, we should hear from five more schools. One is the in-state college for $30K, another is a Tuition Exchange that would be $31K if awarded, and two others are Big 10 in the $55-$70K range.
Lastly, the remaining three could cost $0, $29K, $41K, $55K or $80K, depending upon financial aid, merit, and/or Tuition Exchange.
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As a former engineer and later involved in recruiting … higher ranked engineering program grads will be more heavily recruited for national opportunities, by bigger name companies. More regional engineering program tend to be recruited regionally, maybe less by the corporate office (unless HQ’d in the region) and more for the jobs in local operations. So the biggest difference is the geographic range of opportunities. Want to stay in the region after school, a regional school is terrific. As far as Ivy recruitment … I tend to think their engineers are targeted by the hot growth techs, VCs, management consulting – less the roll up sleeves MEs, Civils, etc. in typical engineering jobs. Course, this is all generalization. Always exceptions.
Pay range will be close regardless of the program as firms have salary ranges for new grads that have to be somewhat close – may be some boost (10-15%?) for more prestigious programs, but that evens out after a few years. Too much a spread and it creates problems when your new hires start talking over beers.
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sounds like my S23 (no performing arts though). He applied to 12 (1 safety, 1 likely, 10 reach for everyone). He has already been Deferred from his ED and Accepted into his safety with merit. He’s done 3 interviews and requested 2 more and is doing 2 videos this weekend. He’s exhausted. I’m exhausted. (He has a twin sister but she’s managing her own process without much input from me. She applied to “only” 7 schools: 1 safety, 1 likely, 1 match, 4 reach for everyone–no decisions out yet.)
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This wasn’t my son’s experience at all from this year. He was offered positions with four Fortune 500s and a large private company.
The lowest offer was $75K + $10K signon. The highest was $80K base with potential 21% bonus (they claim they earn it every year) + $10K sign on.
All five were rotationals (so come with added relo money) - so multi years/cities - and when he tried to negotiate with two of the five, they came back with - doesn’t matter where you go - everyone makes the same - but where they adjust is for cost of living - so one job offer was solid but was outside of Boston with a defense company. He got the same money from another in the lower cost midwest. The comment when he tried to negotiate was - if this job was in Fairfax VA, then you’d have a COL adjustment for that rotation. With the job he accepted, he will get a COL adjustment if he goes take a rotation, for example, in California - up to another $700 a month.
He goes to Alabama which yes, does have a national presence, but is nowhere in any listing of top engineering schools. When I look at the cohort kids on linkedin that he’s shared at all these companies he’s interviewed with - I see directionals, schools I didn’t even know had engineering (they do and are ABET) and some big names. It runs the gamut.
Perhaps the field is hot now. One company, a Fortune 125 he declined, came back with $13K more in salary and $5K more in sign on bonus just because he said no and they assumed it was a monetary issue (it wasn’t).
They and a major defense contractor offered him positions the same day he had his first interview. That’s not good btw - he had no sense of the company. Much better was the one company that flew him in - he didn’t get an offer but he had a good sense of the people and environment.
Perhaps today the supply vs. demand dynamic is simply putting the student int he driver’s seat.
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I bow to your brilliance.
ETA: After posting that I realized it may have come across as sarcastic, but no, I’m completely serious. The auto-linking annoys me even when it links to the school I meant, but when it links to the one I didn’t, yeah, that’s beyond irritating.
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Yes ! Exhausting! For her not me as she has spreadsheets and manages it all, but just watching all the hours pour in, on top of homework and the ECs(25-30hrs a week) is a lot to see your kid go through. How these kids manage to get it all done and sleep fairly normal hours/stay in a good head space is beyond me. Good Luck to your twins!!
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And even in small cities.
My D19 is at Mississippi State, where a huge majority of students live off campus after their first year—but sophomore year, her off-campus apartment was closer to her classes than her first-year on-campus dorm.
So yeah, there’s commuter and then there’s commuter. No idea how to reliably differentiate between those without actual firsthand observation, though.
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I’m right with you on the Tuition Exchange rollercoaster. Our kid hasn’t received any TE notices yet, despite being admitted to 5 TE schools and 4 others. He’s in at 3 schools where we’re pretty sure he’ll get TE. That would put those in the range of $ possibility, and he’d strongly consider 2 of them. Delaware and Pitt are major wildcards since the TE covers full tuition, but he’s unlikely to get the awards, so those are majorly back-burnered. But then Pitt gave a surprisingly good merit award so they may be back in the running regardless of TE.
Within a week, he’ll know if he’s in at another TE school (prob not affordable anyway). The other is an in-state. Cheap and outstanding school, but he probably won’t attend.
He’s in at both current parent employers – one of which was his main safety school and would have been his likely final choice. He’s also in at 2 soon-to-be parent employer schools. All of the parent employers offered huge merit irrespective of employment. He has yet to visit 2 due to it being a late development, but there is 1 that he says he is likely to attend, so we are planning a visit.
Finally, he’ll hear back on admission for the last 3 TE schools in March. One will likely be unaffordable regardless, and 2 of them may come through with enough $. It’s making spouse and I a bit crazy, but our son has lots of options and is chill with all of it. He was relieved to discover he has until May 1 to decide and we strongly suggested he try to decide sooner than that 
.
But we have absolutely accomplished what we set out to do: give him choices. He was only going to apply to 2 parent employers and 1 in-state public, with intentions of attending the in-state (which he now doesn’t want to do).
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