perceptions of rice nationwide and in texas

Colleges and Universities A-Z Rice University
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<p>haha i was just kidding, I know not every texan is like that but I know my share of them. I do live in TX but I wasn't born here, I'm actually from NYC. And the "bigger and better" thing is a stereotype. I do believe the "bigger" part is true, because everything here IS big (hamburgers, trucks, state schools, some of the people, etc)
I do like Texas, just not in the summer. This time of year though, it can even be lovely. I just came back from a soccer match with friends (I wasn't even wearing a jacket), and the coldest it got with wind chill was 60 degrees. That's unthinkable this time of year up north.</p>

<p>Another stereotype I've found to be true is that everyone owns a gun here. Ok, not EVERYONE, but according to my history teacher there are more guns than people in TX lol</p>

<p>But overall, you guys are cool :)</p>

42

<p>This is pretty far away from the original topic, but I'll go with it. Most of the people I know that are too proud of Texas are those who go to the state schools (UT, A&M, etc.). In fact, some of my peers don't even know where Rice is, asking me why I would go to a no-name school. </p>

<p>I guess this goes back to the "educated people" point, though, because these same people could probably not name half of the Ivies, or where ANY of them are.</p>

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<p>Yeah a lot of people think MIT and Stanford are Ivies... don't listen to them, they'll be working for us Rice grads in a few years :)</p>

44

<p>Well, I can honestly say that no one that's from where I am has even heard of Rice and are completely unaware of its prestige. One girl was like "Yeah, I got some stuff from them...Where is it?"</p>

<p>And when I told my aunt I wanted to go to Rice she said, "You mean in Colorado?"</p>

<p>The most common reaction I got was "I've never even heard of that". Most of my teachers were the same way. I'm really surprised that more people don't know more about it.</p>

45

<p>But from what I've heard, when it comes time for companies to hire you (especially in the South), the recruiters know Rice and know that it is a top school. That's what I've heard from past graduates, anyway. So I guess you won't get prestige and respect from regular people up north, but you will get a good job. Anyone agree?</p>

46

<p>Yep .... If your main concern is impressing people by dropping the name of your school, Rice is a horrible choice if you plan on being outside Texas. If you're concerned about reputation with grad schools and employers, Rice does pretty well.</p>

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<p>This generation of kids seems so worried about "prestige!" Choose Rice for the right reasons - great school, close-knit res college system, tons of opportunities for research/study abroad/work, mentoring, fun and laidback kids, good professors. Don't worry about the prestige. You will find that the experiences you have at Rice will open many doors, and that the Rice degree carries with it a lot of respect in the academic world and with major employers. If you are worried about careers, check the names of companies interviewing at the Rice job fairs. But really, stop worrying about prestige!</p>

48

<p>Everything IS bigger and better in Texas. What's the issue?</p>

<p>You can't go wrong with a Rice education and a Rice degree.</p>

49

<p>I'm currently a senior at Rice majoring in mechanical engineering and will be graduating in May. By the way, I feel old...I haven't been on CC since I was applying to college 4 years ago.</p>

<p>Anyway, I hope I can add to this discussion somewhat. I am mentioning this all from an engineering major's perspective, so some of these points may be a bit irrelevant if the original poster is intending to major in history.</p>

<p>I'm originally from Texas myself, but my parents moved to Phoenix a little under two years ago. </p>

<p>In regard to Rice's perception in Texas and elsewhere, here's what I've noticed:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>I agree with the previous poster who mentioned that if you want an "MIT response" when you tell people you go to Rice from out-of-state, that won't be the case. One of my roommates freshman year was from LA and another was from Baltimore, and they both told me they got "You're going where? Oh, that's nice..." responses.</p></li>
<li><p>That being said, Rice gets a lot of respect in Texas, especially in Houston. My third roommate was from Houston and people from Texas, especially in Houston, strive to get into Rice. As many people have mentioned, I think the the problem people perceive with Texas is the uber-conservative, good ol' boy, red-state stereotype. While I can't argue that all of that is untrue, some of that is exaggerated, and the bigger cities tend to be more moderate (I would argue that Dallas is rather conservative, but Austin is pretty liberal).</p></li>
<li><p>Employers and grad school do recognize Rice as somewhere that produces good, solid graduates. When I was interviewing for jobs (most of which were out-of-state), I was amazed at the number of my interviewers who were like "Wow...Rice. That's such a great school." I would advise against going somewhere just for the name, because that may come back to haunt you come senior year. Case in point: another one of the interns at my job this summer went to Columbia for her BS in mechanical engineering. While she has the Ivy name, I have heard from her and other Columbia grads that they had problems finding jobs because Columbia tends to be known as more of a liberal arts school. So, yes you could go to Yale or Brown and get an engineering degree and have the Ivy League education, but employers/grad schools may raise an eyebrow or two at a degree like that. I don't think Rice has this problem.</p></li>
<li><p>I would say that one of Rice's drawbacks is its graduate programs. I think UT may have some of the stronger graduate programs, but I think Rice is the better undergraduate program. UT is a great school, but it is plagued with a lot of the typical problems of a very large state school such as extremely large classes, lack of housing, etc. And as others have mentioned, alums of any state school from that state are going to think their school is the best. I don't think this is just the case in Texas (as I mentioned earlier, my parents live in Phoenix now, and here it's pretty much all Arizona State with the occasional reference to the University of Arizona).</p></li>
<li><p>If you're premed, Rice is a great place to go as it's a big feeder for a lot of the top med school (especially Baylor) and has lots of connections/volunteer opportunities through the Texas Medical Center, which I read somewhere is the largest concentration of hospitals/health professions schools/etc. in the Western hemisphere.</p></li>
<li><p>The alumni contacts are there and obviously aren't as a plentiful as UT or A&M (I swear every other car in Houston has a "Texas Exes" or "A&M Century Club" windshield sticker/license plate frame), but I notice most people don't need them for the job search. That being said, I would point out that you will have to work to find a job and one will not just "fall in your lap" because you went to Rice.</p></li>
<li><p>If your end goal is just to get a job somewhere, your degree "pedigree" will not make a huge difference as you are graduating with just a Bachelor's. There may be a slightly higher initial pay if you go to say, MIT, but this probably won't be much higher than $5K. GPA, extracurriculars, work experience, etc. being the same or similar, Company X will pay the BSME/BSEE/BSChE/etc. graduate from State U, Rice, or MIT very similar or identical salaries. And if your end goal is graduate school, then that degree will carry more weight (where, pedigree does play a large role).</p></li>
</ol>

<p>Again, I apologize for the extremely long post. To summarize, Rice isn't the place to go if you want to name drop to Grandma in Maine (the MIT intern at my summer job always got a hushed gasp when she said where she went to school...that rarely happened to me), but employers and grad school admission committees do recognize the quality of Rice's education.</p>

<p>Feel free to ask me any questions directly.</p>

50

<p>Thanks for the great post, smj. Do you plan on going to graduate school or will you be getting a job?</p>

51

<p>

The largest medical center in the world, actually.</p>

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<p>Ah, I'm mistaken. Thanks for the correction, NYSkins. I see you're a Rice student, too...would you agree with (most of) what I said? Feel free to correct/add to what I said. :)</p>

<p>Beef, I decided to go the job route. I'm interested in going to law school and looking into IP law later, but I felt I really wasn't ready to go to any sort of graduate education yet. I also wasn't 100% sure whether I wanted to do law school or not (well, I suppose no one's 100% sure, but I wasn't even 50% sure), and I felt it would be best to take a break and figure out exactly what I want to do. So that was pretty much a roundabout way of saying I'm getting a job.</p>

53

<p>I’d say, as a Rice student from Maryland, that Rice generally does not get the respect it deserves from people outside of Texas, at least on the east coast. When I first applied to the university, a lot of my friends were like, “Oh Rice…cool…where’s that? Is it a good school?” The summer after I got in and enrolled, I worked in a lab at the U.S. Department of Agriculture where many of the scientists also did not know Rice, surprisingly. Actually, when one of my co-workers and I discussed the costs of private versus public universities, he assumed Rice was an standard public school and said that he would “send his kid to somewhere like University of Maryland, Clemson, or Rice” and that it’s not worth the money unless “the school is prestigious like Johns Hopkins.” I kept to myself, but I found it amusing that a university like Hopkins, though similar in calibur at the academic level, garners a different level of respect from the average person. </p>

<p>I think it depends on the field of research and location though, since the dad of a friend of mine who works in a high position at a large company told me after I matriculated that he knows and works with several Rice grads and that employers value a degree from Rice highly. Also, when asked at the doctor office where I was headed to school, my doctor easily recognized the name of Rice and engaged in a nice conversation with me about the biomedical research that the university.</p>

<p>I think Rice’s lack of “prestige” mostly is due to three aspects, its regional demographics (roughly half of students are from Texas), its lack of an extensive and internationally respected graduate program, and its relatively young age compared to universities, say, in the Ivy League. I think all of that will change in the coming years. If we current students cannot see ostensible changes by the time we graduate and enter the workforce, at least our children will. President Leebron is the proponent of a plan to increase Rice University’s international eminence, part of which includes discussion of a merger between Rice and Baylor College of Medicine, one of the most respected medical institutions in the world.</p>

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<p>In the music world, especially among younger orchestral players, saying that you go or went to Rice wins instant respect …</p>

55

<p>Here is the thing, who cares about the common people in the world knowing about your school? I mean seriously, most people don’t even know that Brown and Dartmouth (especially Dartmouth) are Ivies and even universities. Some people don’t even know that Cornell Engineering is actually overall better than all the other Ivies (this isn’t a true fact but it is widely known and accepted). Some people only know JHU as a medical place, they don’t even know that their Environmental Engineering is great or that Duke has one of the best BME program. Actually simple to say, many common people don’t even know what Biomedical Engineering is. However, it doesn’t matter if other people know it or not, employers know the greatness of Rice education and that’s what matters. It doesn’t even matter if the common people know it, employers have done many research on schools and they know which schools have great graduates and which ones don’t.</p>