Thank you all for your valuable responses! I have decided to apply ED to M&T program for two reasons.
- Being in a group of 50 students seems like a big advantage and during my 4 weeks at Penn, it was obvious that everyone regarded M&T students as geniuses, including professors and admissions. This would definitely be a big advantage in many different aspects (a moral boost and a competitive advantage).
- I feel that I could write a better essay since I have attended a 4 week program at the campus (LBW) and have interacted with students, faculty and admissions staff.
I also realised that if I happen not to get any job of my liking after the program, I can apply to the dual-masters program at Stanford (MS in CS and MBa in 3 years) which will give me the advantages that you had mentioned regarding going to Stanford. The dual program is very competitive but I’d imagine it’ll be not too much more competitive than Stanford undergrad.
One more quick question though…should I pursue EE or CS in college assuming that I’d want a job similar to that of a Program/ Project Manager at the tech companies or a job as a VC.