Schools with similar student body to MIT

Colleges and Universities A-Z Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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<p>My oldest son is a soph. at MIT and loves it there. It can kick his butt at times but he's doing great and loves, loves, loves the people, particularly in his dorm as he's involved in dorm govt.</p>

<p>My middle son, a high school junior, visited my son and really enjoyed his time there saying that the people he met were great because they were so friendly, collaborative and not just about being cool. He likes nerdy, friendly, down to earth, yet fun, witty and intelligent people. We were there for three days and he had a blast just meeting my older son's friends.</p>

<p>While he has a good SAT of over 2200, good gpa, community college classes including engineering, architecture, math, etc, is on a robotics team that's surprising everyone and winning a lot, and he's been a serious cellist for years with some great stuff including professional work and community service, he also has a math disability (he works <em>really</em> hard at math and will only get as far as Calculus I by end of senior year) as well as some health issues such as Type 1 diabetes.</p>

<p>I doubt he could get into MIT anyways, but even if he managed to do so, I don't think I would ever want him to go across the country like his brother did, especially because MIT is so intense. </p>

<p>What other schools might offer a similar energy, similarly great group of students, yet not be quite so intense and even offer support for students with disabilities? I am thinking Harvey Mudd for one but would love to hear of other schools.</p>

<p>Not sure at all what his major might be-possibly engineering, architecture, or even something like game design or industrial design as he's super creative.</p>

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<p><a href=“http://mit.edu/uaap/sds/students/info_specifics.html”>http://mit.edu/uaap/sds/students/info_specifics.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>Oh, plenty of people at MIT are still trying very hard to be cool. We’re not immune to this sort of thing, it’s just that the definition of “cool” is different :P</p>

<p>In any case, I wouldn’t stop your son from applying. I’m kind of confused why you wouldn’t let your son go across the country like your older son, regardless of MIT.</p>

<p>As for the actual question, I’d look into Olin and UChicago in addition to Harvey Mudd… and MIT :)</p>

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<p>Well, I’m not sure what you mean by ‘math disability’; I assume you just mean he is a good student in math but has to work to get A’s. I also don’t know what you mean by ‘good GPA’. In terms of top 10 schools, ‘good GPA’ typically means straight A’s except for one or two B’s, and hopefully not in the area of study–it’s not a dealbreaker if you don’t, but this is the typical profile.</p>

<p>I did know people with type I diabetes that did well in an intense environment; they were pretty disciplined. Harvey Mudd is somewhat easier to get in, but from talking to people who went there I get the feeling like it is pretty intense. It has grade deflation. The one big difference compared to MIT is that Harvey Mudd is a small school and there is more teacher-student interaction. </p>

<p>Olin is not a good choice for anyone not sure about engineering; it’s the only major they have. The caliber of students at Olin is equal to MIT’s and I suspect their classes are geared toward them.</p>

<p>I would check out Northwestern. Also, U. of Michigan and U. of Virginia both will have serious students, particularly in the engineering departments. U. of Chicago has a similar student profile as MIT, but will be pretty intense–I consider it the liberal arts version of MIT.</p>

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<p>I would also recommend Carnegie Mellon for a similar student base as MIT. It’s rated very high for supporting kids with learning dis-abilities. The computer science program is ranked right up with MIT but it’s a bit easier to get into the engineering program. You get a reach school and a match school all in one application if he applies to both. It’s a school with an artsy, quirky feel with an intense art & theater program and the University of Pittsburgh is in walking distance. University of Pittsburgh is also know for sporting learning dis-abilities too - it’s a good backup school.</p>

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<p>Piper and collegealum,</p>

<p>While my son is pretty good at managing his diabetes, he is definitely not the most disciplined person and he still needs reminders and I don’t know how well he would do carb counting at school. Diabetes is serious enough that I would want to be near by for emergencies unless I really felt he had a great handle on it. His endocrinologist thinks he’ll do fine; I’m not convinced yet.</p>

<p>He will be managing it when he flies with his robotics team to the super-regionals and probably the worlds, so that will be a good first step.</p>

<p>Re. the disability-probably 5 years ago, he tested at 98%ile in reasoning and 14%ile in calculation. Now he’s improved obviously (got a 750 on math SAT) but yes, he has to work really hard at it. He doesn’t hate math and he really liked the AoPS classes he took, but he prefers to use it in context of something else (like he’s taking trig-based physics at the CC and really enjoying it) He has one B and that was in an 8 week accelerated trig class at the community college last semester. I will probably have him retested for a disability before he goes full time to college. He hasn’t yet taken SAT II exams, so we’ll see how that goes this spring and next fall.</p>

<p>So you see, as much as he loved the environment of MIT, I would rather gently guide him elsewhere. My oldest was a super achiever. This son has a lot of potential but is no super achiever and definitely has some special health concerns that can’t be ignored. </p>

<p>CMU definitely seems like an interesting school because of the majors they offer but f. aid isn’t probably going to be enough (we qualify for a lot of need-based aid, but CMU is notorious for not offering too much0 and it’s still far away. Still, it is interesting.</p>

<p>Mudd is intense, yes, I have heard that, but I’ve heard they work with their disabled student well. But if he doesn’t ultimately want to major in engineering, no sense in applying there.</p>

<p>What majors at U Chicago would match?</p>

<p>What about USC? What’s that like?</p>

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<p>sbjdorlo, anyone with a 2200 SAT did pretty good in the math portion! It sounds like you are out west. For California schools with good engineering, a collaborative feel, plus other options of study, I recommend Cal Poly, Santa Clara U, and UC Davis. I visited them all with my son. He thought about USC too but knew it would not be a great fit. Same for UCLA and UCSB. When we were in So Cal we visited Caltech and Mudd. Both are great. Both are intense. </p>

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<p>If you like Mudd, obviously yes, engineering is important, however, he would have access to the consortium. It might be better to apply to Claremont for example and take engineering courses through Mudd (if desired). I don’t know if it is any easier (or necessary) to transfer between the schools if say for example he was going to Mudd but yet then decided engineering was not the life for him.</p>

<p>Umm, knowing you, I can almost assuredly tell you that <em>you</em> would not be happy with your DS at USC. What about UCLA though or Berkeley or even what about Stanford ?</p>

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<p>Someone who got a 750 SAT Math I and can handle accelerated trig sounds like a fine match for MIT to me. Assuming he didn’t skip grades, he’s going to start college as an adult or pretty close to it - I wouldn’t hold him back from great opportunities because of diabetes, I would encourage him to grow more responsible (and realize that some of that doesn’t come until you’re actually doing it).</p>

<p>Being from out west, I don’t think UCLA or UCSB are similar in spirit to MIT at all. Cal Poly Pomona might be a little closer.</p>

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<p>Piper - that’s true, I wasn’t thinking of the “spirit of MIT” when I made those suggestions, although I do think that Stanford could probably have enough similar to MIT’s student body.</p>

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<p>crazymomster-I don’t know anything about USC other than the majors sound pretty cool. Is it too big? Not collaborative? Too much of a football/sports school? They have game design but again, money might not be there. Money is a huge factor, though truthfully, our MIT son, assuming he gets a job after graduation, might help his brother finance a college education.</p>

<p>Stanford does have that great major, something like product design but it’s even more ridiculously hard to get into than MIT! LOL </p>

<p>I think the UCs are maybe too big and not the type of student body my son would want (at least according to what he says now, having seen such a great and spirited group of kids at MIT).</p>

<p>Jeffgordon-yes, SLO is on the list to check out; thanks for the reminder. I know we qualify for a Cal Grant A (at least my oldest did back when he applied to Mudd in 2012), so financially, it might work out; hard to say. But I do hear really good things about SLO. We’ll try to do some visits this spring break or in the summer.</p>

<p>Piper-I know I sound like the over concerned mom…and I am, I guess. Seeing my own mom pass away due to diabetes complications and having had to give my son glucagon once for a super low blood sugar-man that was awful :frowning: - perhaps has jaded my view. But yes, my son will be 18 when he begins college and I know he’s come a long way in self-management. The other idea I had was to talk him into a gap year, but so far, he’s not keen on it. He says he doesn’t want to be “behind” his age mates.</p>

<p>I won’t say no if he wants to apply to MIT, though. He’s very stoic and sort of Eeyore-ish anyways, so he wouldn’t be holding his breath on getting admitted to certain schools. :-)</p>

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<p>Oh yes, Cal Poly Pomona is one I’ve heard good things about and it would probably be a good match/safety school. (We homeschool/part time college, though, and sometimes the UCs and Cal State schools can be so “in the box”, so you never know).</p>

<p>crazymomster-I was thinking that we can visit CMC and Pomona, too. Who knows-maybe I’ll relax once I see him manage things away from us this spring. My oldest son says, “Mom, let him go to a good school!” LOL</p>

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<p>Mudd is still very intense, and extremely so for a kid with a learning disability (trust me, we know about this…). They do have other STEM majors besides engineering (CS, math, chem, physics, bio, for example). It is not a common thing to go to another Claremont college and try to major in engineering at Mudd. Honestly, I think a kid who tried to do that would have a big struggle academically, the Mudd kids are so immersed in all things tech. You don’t lose any of the intensity through that approach, IMHO. They are supportive, but it is still a pretty unyielding environment in terms of core requirements and grading. My kid LOVES it, but if she wasn’t willing to work 16+ hours/day she wouldn’t be making it or enjoying it… Also, the suggestion of going to another Claremont consortium college and transferring also probably is not realistic – they typically only take 1-2 transfers a year, and I can’t see how you would catch up with the core and graduate on time if you transferred in a year late.</p>

<p>U of Chicago is not a school well suited for LD kids, either, especially in the science type majors. The admissions office can’t even direct you to who to talk to about disabilities (At accepted students weekend: “Um, the housing people… Oh, you don’t mean a PHYSICAL disability… we will try to find out… (hours later)… We have name for you… Oh, no, you can’t go to his office, he doesn’t really have an office… you will just have to call or email”)</p>

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<p>intparent-you bring up good points. I really <em>want</em> Mudd to be a great fit for my son, but yes, I think it’s just as hard as MIt, well, just as intense and hard. I do like the smaller size and feel like the professors would maybe work more to help kids succeed. Is that true?</p>

<p>I think if he ended up at another Claremont school, he wouldn’t be majoring in engineering. That’s the hardest thing. He really has a lot of different avenues he could go down. With my oldest, it was so easy-math! (Though he’s actually interning as a software developer, of all the things, as he was never really into programming but did self-teach Python) With this son, I really see more the creative side of engineering and design, but who really knows. He could surprise me-he already has! LOL</p>

<p>I guess I have heard that about U Chicago…</p>

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<p>It is a myth that people are in advanced calculus classes for them to get into MIT. Many people are barely getting to calculus AB or BC when they are applying. Sure there are many who have gone to calculus 3 or something but not everyone of those gets admitted and not everyone who is just getting getting to first level of calculus is rejected.</p>

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<p>sbjdorlo,
I am in a similar situation with one son at MIT and a younger son that programs but also leans toward the creative side – writing, design, building stuff – and who wants a more laid back college experience because he wants lots of time to follow the muse on projects of his own choosing.</p>

<p>He applied to UCS, and if he had to choose more schools in California, probably would have looked at UC Santa Cruz which also has a game design major. UCSC fits the bill for “nerdy, friendly, down to earth, yet fun, witty and intelligent people,” but you won’t find the same frequency of extremely high intelligence that your older son enjoys at MIT. There will be other students that were homeschooled at UCSC.</p>

<p>I second also looking at SLO and UCSB. Both are up-and-coming, but I don’t know about their culture.</p>

<p>By the way, I totally get it about being nervous about his diabetes. “MIT” and “healthy” are not usually words I think of together unless conjoined with “I wish.”</p>

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<p>@sbjdorlo, did you ever “meet” mootmom? She used to post here a lot, but I don’t know if the two of you overlapped. She was in a similar situation – a CA mom who had a son two or three years behind me at MIT, and another son ~4 years younger who was smart and creative, but not necessarily a good match for MIT in terms of academics (if I remember correctly, he may even have been interested in game design!). I’ll see if I can get ahold of her for you, as she might have some good ideas about CA schools for someone like your son.</p>

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<p>My kid has found almost all the professors to be very supportive. And the other students are, too. But she is still working crazy hard. Not getting enough sleep or eating well, either, from what I can tell… which could add challenges for a student with diabetes. My kid also had only gotten solidly thru AP Calc AB before arriving (teacher was supposed to tutor for BC, but was taken ill and wasn’t able to do so her senior year). That has also been a struggle – technically you don’t need BC at Mudd, but almost everyone there has had it plus a lot have had more beyond that. And they don’t place many students out of the intro core classes – they just race through a lot of the material because a lot of the kids have seen a lot of it before. So my kid also has that catching up to do… don’t get me wrong, she LOVES it. But a kid really has to want it if they have an LD and/or don’t have high level math & science classes when they get there.</p>

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<p>mollie,</p>

<p>I don’t think I did ever meet mootmom. I would love to “talk” with her. (And if I could figure out the new CC, I’m sure I could do a search for that name!)</p>

<p>Yes, I’m sure my son might surprise me in the next year, but my gut feeling is that he will end up going a different route than engineering but it would be really great if he could find his “tribe” somewhere. He really felt that when he was at MIT.</p>

<p>intparent, I’m hoping my son can visit Mudd this spring and sit in on a class or two. He should get a sense pretty quickly on the level and intensity of the place.</p>

<p>I do understand about the disadvantages of coming in with weaker coursework, I really do.</p>

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<p>Having spent some time at Cal State LA - a school that is pretty different from MIT - I didn’t find it harder to find my “tribe” there. My CSULA tribe and MIT tribe is very different, but both schools were diverse enough that I was able to find a good fit for me. (I went to CSULA in summer/fall 2008, and still keep in touch with my friends there. In fact, I visited one friend - who moved to Wisconsin - just this past October.)</p>

<p>Just throwing that out there. I think attending a sufficiently large school means you’re bound to run into people you click with :)</p>