<p>Critter: Yep I’m from Texas, and have been hanging out on the admitted pages. I feel a lot better about the Stanford one, lol. I have also heard from several people that my profile really fits Stanford, so I think your son and I are in the same situation. Thanks for that link! And I’m not sure about the rural/suburban/urban thing, I don’t think I’ll mind too much either way, but it sounds like getting to Cornell is a hassle.</p>
<p>OperaDad: Thanks. I have heard that Stanford is pretty similar to Harvard; could you explain how Harvard and MIT are “kind of similar, but in a different way”?</p>
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Would you say the same about Stanford and Cornell?</p>
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That’s a good idea, I’ll start a thread over there.</p>
<p>One thing not addressed is net cost. With your plans to go on through your PhD, which school is going to give you the best chance of getting out debt free or with the least amount of debt? Also, you are comparing 3 of the top schools in the world. NONE of your choices is better or worse than the other. You have the good fortune to choose by fit. Sounds like you want to go to Stanford, then go. I think you might be getting caught up on the “brand”. You can also look at it this way, you can get your UG at Stanford, your masters at another school and then finish up at MIT. Keep in mind, that the most recent Nobel prize winner in Chemistry and Physics went to state directionals for UG and the Chemistry winner went to Stanford for med school. It isn’t the school that matters so much but what YOU do while you are there.</p>
<p>It sounds like you’re leaning toward Stanford, which is fine, but if Cornell drifts back into the picture, don’t worry too much about transportation. It’s simply a matter of having to change planes. Remember that you can fly to either Ithaca or Syracuse (which is about an hour away). There are buses from the Syracuse airport to Ithaca. And if you fly into the Ithaca airport, you simply take a taxi to Cornell. It’s only a few miles, so the taxi fare is cheap.</p>
<p>Where do you see yourself ending up after graduation? You can end up working anywhere after graduation, but you are more likely to make connections in the East Coast with MIT or Cornell and make connections in California with Stanford.</p>
<p>Maybe there is something I’m not grasping here. Other than fit and preference can there really be any significant differences here that actually matter? Is a Stanford grad really gonna struggle with name recognition or connections on the East Coast? Or MIT on the West Coast?</p>
<p>At Harvard, the kids study hard Sun-Fri, and blow off steam on Fri-Sat. MIT, they work hard too, and find ways to have fun. At both, the kids work hard, but would not trade it for anything. For example, I hear that kids come into Harvard with lots of AP classes, but few, if any, use them. The would rather take the full amount of classes they can take before graduation. MIT claims they design problem sets so that kids have to work with each other. I didn’t get the feeling from Harvard. That doesn’t mean kids do not study together, but it may not be that imperative.</p>
<p>Compared to party schools, you are going to be miserable Sun-Fri being buried in your books, study groups, etc. How and what you do may be different between the schools, but work you will.</p>
<p>I am hearing repeatedly from MIT related people (bias alert?) that MIT>>>Stanford engineering. I thought the #1 vs #2 this was pretty negligible… Opinions?</p>
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I have not gotten any aid packages yet but all 3 meet full need and Stanford especially should be very generous (I have heard Stanford is better for middle class, MIT for lower income). My parents are willing to cover it regardless. And I haven’t really thought this far ahead but I heard that many STEM PhDs are completely covered by fellowships (from my dad’s experience).</p>
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I am really trying to believe that but a lot of current MIT students are telling me that MIT>>>Stanford engineering…</p>
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What do you mean? These are all “brand” schools I guess you could say lol. If you mean because I’m not considering less prestigious schools, it’s mostly because we aren’t rich and since I had the good fortune to get into these generous schools, they are already a bargain.</p>
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I wasn’t planning on getting a masters… Can’t you go straight from BS to PhD? That’s what my father did, back in the day.</p>
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Definitely! I just think it’s a better idea for me to be surrounded by other highly academically-motivated people to help me transition from high school to college, in my personal situation. My dad went from state school to MIT though and he said it was a lotttt harder to get into elite grad schools from state schools. But definitely doable of course. :)</p>
<p>Of course you are hearing that MIT is better from MIT people, the rest of the world knows that they are both good. It’s kind of like hearing from a Met’s fan that the Mets are better than the Yankees or a Green Bay Packer’s fan that they are better than the NO Saints or whatever. Either school is FINE, more than FINE, they are both EXCELLENT and NEITHER is going to help or hurt you more than the other for your future career goals.</p>
<p>As for the PhD programs being funded, for a female, yes, you are correct, however, you will still have costs and not having UG loans are just a bonus and a huge leg up when you start your career once you get out of school.</p>
<p>For financial aid, wait for the packages—there may be one clear winner. Just because they meet need doesn’t mean the packages will be anywhere close to the same and, if your parents can afford to “just pay” for your schooling, you aren’t getting much from any of those schools anyway.</p>
<p>Go with your gut…then help my DS with his decision because he’s driving me nuts waffling back and forth :D.</p>
<p>I don’t think people have said MIT is better. We have said that it is harder.</p>
<p>There is something to be said for having time outside of homework to daydream. Kekule’, the chemist who thought of the structure of the benzene ring, was inspired by a dream he had of a snake chasing its tail. </p>
<p>If you can stay on top of the work at MIT and still think of the concepts you are learning in a mindful way, then I think it can be an advantage because you will necessarily have had to master a large number of advanced topics/techniques/algorithms.</p>
<p>I think one of the biggest differences at MIT versus Stanford is the number of students in technical fields. If you want to be on a campus which is almost exclusively tech, then MIT is a great choice. If you want a school with a more diverse student body, then Stanford may be a better choice.</p>
<p>For my undergrad I went to a decided tech school (Carnegie Mellon) and loved the fact that everybody there, even the creative writing students, were really into technology.</p>
<p>Sure, preference for a liberal arts atmosphere would be a reason to choose Stanford or Cornell over MIT. I know someone who chose Harvard engineering over MIT for that reason.</p>
<p>Uni: Yeah, S was not liking the transportation issue when looking at Cornell either, but we are from the West coast, which makes it more complicated. I know a lot of Texans seem to like CA schools. (Our D’10 is at a school in the LA area.) From our experience, I think the atmosphere tends to be a bit more relaxed from Texas, west. Not better or worse, just different. East of there, our kids felt more like they would be providing diversity, if that makes any sense. I think you and S’13 have a lot in common because he said something similar today about the Stanford page.</p>
<p>As far as FA packages, didn’t you have a glitch with your Dad’s info? I can tell you that S’13s packages all were doable but there are definitely differences. Stanford is very generous (right up there with the best, like Vandy and CMC) with meeting need and no loans. MIT came in about 5k more, but they include loans and the EFC was also more. (From what I have been told and have read over the years, this is normal.) Believe it or not, Yale was even better than Stanford by a fair amount…don’t know how they do it. They came in low, just like their NPC, which I ran three times, just to be sure! Anyway, from what I understand about Cornell, I would expect it to come in about like MIT, so I would suspect in your case Stanford would be the better financial deal, but YMMV. I know it can make a difference in how you look at things in the end. It certainly has with S, to some extent. Good luck!</p>