Thanks
Cost of attending is almost same in both the places.
OK - Ga Tech looked a bit higher to me.
The other thing - and it’s no guarantee - but Purdue hasn’t raised tuition in many years. That’s not to say they won’t in the future.
Really it’s a play on - city vs. suburban and then secondarily weather and airport access, etc.
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Also, very big size difference between the two. I have a senior at Georgia Tech, an entering freshman at Georgia Tech and my nephew is at Purdue. Although I think he has decided to stay, my nephew did apply for transfer to several schools after his first semester. He did not apply to the honors program at Purdue but after he decided to go, he applied to the Geis scholars program which has been helpful. He advice to my son, his cousin, was to apply to Honors. He regretted not doing so. He just feels like Purdue is very big, and it was very difficult to find his “people”. He did live with a friend from his high school but even so it was sort of a rough start. Size was his biggest complaint.
Other than size and location, I think they are pretty similar. STEM focused campuses with excellent reputations and great facilities.
Airport access difference is a good point. Purdue is not easy to get to although the school does have shuttles to airports. He flies into Indianapolis, which is closer, but Chicago may be the better bet for an international flight. Georgia Tech is very close to the Atlanta airport and there is a Marta subway directly from campus to inside the airport. An international flight should be easy to find from Atlanta.
Also, Georgia Tech will have a much more diverse population ethnically than Purdue.
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Is this true? Agree with the other points, but at least in the COE Purdue is something like only 27% in-state students. It has a very large international population. I think I remember seeing GT is 60% Georgia students.
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I was talking about racial/ethnic diversity not geographic diversity - although Purdue is 60% Indiana residents as well according to their website - that may be part of the reason for the difference in ethnic diversity.
Both schools have roughly 70% CS and engineering students from what I remember. Not sure about the breakdown within majors.
For diversity stats for Purdue please see: Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging: Campus Population Overview - Office of Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging - Purdue University
I’m also not sure about the breakdown between majors but the department would be able to share that information.
Students in the College of Engineering plus the CS major make up 34.4% of the undergraduate population at Purdue.
Indiana residents are 47.3% of undergraduates.
All Fall 2022 data from their Data Digest and CS department head.
Race/Ethnicity, by school, by residency, etc., is available in Data Digest, if desired. It’s a very handy tool for those who want to research data about the school.
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Thanks for the info. I read somewhere they were 70 percent STEM - but I guess that includes more than computer science and engineering. Georgia Tech on the other hand is 70% computer science and engineering, roughly.
They need to update their website, which says 59% Indiana residents!
From a pure numbers standpoint, Georgia Tech has roughly 2100 entering freshmen from the state of Georgia. Class size last year was 3575. Purdue has more than twice the number of in state students as Georgia Tech in their freshman class with a class size last year of 9600 - in a state with 4 million less people. This is why focusing on in-state numbers may not tell the whole picture.
After being Deferred in EA, my son was Accepted to FYE last Friday!
The part that confused us (but was an unexpected happy surprise) is that his acceptance also came with admittance to the Honors College. I guess we were under the mistaken impression that only those students admitted during the EA round would be offered Honors College, so any deferred offer wouldn’t be considered. Reading back through everything, we didn’t find any clear indication either way, so guess it was an incorrect assumption. Wanted to post that information here, in case it comes up in future years.
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Thank you! That’s a change from years past so good to know!
Same situation for my son. Deferred during EA, accepted Friday and into Honors College too.
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Congrats to your son! It definitely is counter-intuitive to me, but the only thing I’m confident in at this point is that the decision processes will never be clear 
My son was almost all in on GaTech w/o the Purdue answer, but now we are hopping on a plane Thursday to Indianapolis.
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Does anyone have the stats for admission to FYE program (% accepted)? Is OOS lower than in state? Was anyone offered their 2nd choice major when accepted? We are anxiously awaiting news after D was deferred from EA to RD. The stats overall from the school (69% acceptance rate) obviously is not the same for FYE. Thanks for any info!
The Office of Future Engineers says last year’s engineering acceptance rate was 37% but Purdue’s data digest says 42%.
Dashboards and Data Sources - Business Intelligence Competency Center - Purdue University. (There is a wealth of information on the data digest link that can be sorted by college and residency).
And yes, OOS acceptance rate is lower than instate.
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Thanks
First off, congrats to your son!! Could you tell me if the honors college acceptance was in the same letter as the admissions acceptance–or were they separate? Thanks!
For my son, it was a paragraph within the acceptance letter.
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Decision process is definitely not clear and doesn’t seem fair. We’re off to Perdue for another visit in the near future too. Good luck!
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Yes, in the acceptance letter I believe.
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At the March 6 Purdue’s for You event, they showed that 28% of applicants to FYE were admitted. 21,514 applicants and 5,990 admitted. Of those, 31% are Indiana residents, 51% are OOS, and 18% international.
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