We all know that Rutgers is ranked 65. But how do you rank the Honors College?
For example, to choose public schools with similar enrollment:
It is better w/r/t postgrad employment and grad schools to go to U Michigan or U Florida without honors, or Rutgers with the Honors College?
It doesn’t change the ranking of Rutgers itself. It does make certain resources available to you including more access to research and a greater preference to other on campus opportunities. It also gives you better dorming options, but the school itself doesn’t change. It just gives you extra perks. The classes are still the same (except you take honors classes with other honors kids which are usually more thoroughly taught than regular classes) and you get a community of honors students who are similarly motivated to you. A class that is exclusive to the honors college is the forum class in which you create a social innovation and then you have the opportunity to pitch that solution to companies for money. 2 people competed for the Hult prize from rutgers which is more than Harvard and has a reward of $1million, it is kind of like the nobel prize for college students and one team actually won.
I think that your chances for postgraduate employment options or for graduate schools will depend a lot more on what you do in university, rather than which school you go to. Internships or research opportunities or “major related” part time or summer jobs will matter. Grades and letters of reference will matter. The universities that you mentioned are all very good. You can get a great education at any of them.
I would probably be most concerned about (i) budget; and (ii) the degree to which any school has a program (or programs) which is (are) a good fit for what you want to study.
Ignore the rankings. These are all very good schools.
@hopingforbest11 You might want to read “Inside Honors 2018-2019” by John Willingham to try to answer your question…
Also, I think that the overall university ranking is not as important as the ranking for the specific program you plan to enroll in.