As a background about me I’m an International from Egypt. I’ve placed both schools as match schools. And from the student reviews I found on Niche I can see that both have their own cons worthy of attention -yet they are the best I found.
MSU: Cons (Large Halls)
Penn State: Cons (Lack of Diversity, the tough relations with professors, and finally the Isolated campus)
From a financial perspective, they have the same price so this won’t be a difference.
It is premature to decide between schools until you have been accepted and know what options are affordable.
If you want a smaller school, why don’t you look at some from the start?
I would suggest you try to get a college guide book or two which can help you to get a better sense of the schools (ex. Fiske, Insiders Guide, Princeton Review) and maybe give you more options.
@happy1 I already have a list consisting of 11 colleges and I want to narrow to 10. So, Either MSU or Penn has to be excluded. In this way I have 3 Match schools (so I have a plenty of options.
Secondly, I can’t understand how would the university size matter with me in my case? All I get is that big schools have more facilities and more diverse community (as international I’m looking for that)… but of course on the expense of a large halls.
It is true that all the 10 universities are big. So can you suggest any other alternatives in the Northeast and West coast? (stats 1760 SAT and 3.97 GPA).
I only thought the size of the university mattered to you because you mentioned large lectures and lack of direct interaction with professors as negatives. Those things would be less of an issue in a mid-size university or a LAC. The size of a school you prefer is a strictly personal choice – some love the large schools, others thrive in smaller environments. The good smaller to mid-size schools generally have thriving international populations and excellent facilities. You can try using the SuperMatch function on the left (under find a college) for some other ideas.
I find U San Francisco a good match, but would a university affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church have any issues with internationals from other religions? /
Just a nitpicky tip – “Penn” is another school (University of Pennsylvania). We’re Penn State and only Penn State, because people from Penn would be offended to be confused with a lowly state school, and people from Penn State have too much pride to be confused with anyone else.
Tbh if you’re applying to 10 colleges, will one more make a difference? Don’t have to choose now.
Classes at Penn State aren’t that huge as they say. The only Tim you’ll see 300+ are general requirements like social science arts and humanities. Besides that, Penn State is so smart that they have so many sections of the same course at different times! As soon you take your major courses, the enrollment tend to be lower!!
I’ve had around 300 classmates in gen chem 1 and 2, physics 1 and 2, macroeconomics, orgo 1, and at least thermodynamics for this upcoming semester, maybe others.
Well then I guess folks majoring in Environmental sci/Engineering ,to the nature that there aren’t much who major in it, won’t make the class size a big issue. Thanks for clarifying
Are you limited to 10 colleges? Because 10 vs.11 doesn’t make a huge difference.
I’d suggest PennState because if you want to get off campus during breaks, you can “easily” (5 hours, Megabus…) go to New York City, Dc, Philadelpia, Pittsburgh, all cities that are interesting to internationals.
(Both campuses are isolated but you’d need nothing because the college towns are great.)
Neither is on CommonApp so it doesn’t matter.
In addition, other colleges don’t see where else you’re applying. You could be applying to 20 universities on the CommonApp.
