<p>I am attending NYU-Poly in the fall but stevens was a very close second. Stevens is a wonderful institution and you cannot go wrong choosing to attend it.</p>
<p>Yes, NYU-Poly is a great school too. The view and size won my son over. His short list was Stevens, NYU-Poly, Lehigh, and RPI, in that order. It was a tough decision.</p>
<p>His reasoning… the short version, making it sound far simpler that it was…
RPI was in the arm-pit of NY. 
Lehigh was a bit too rural for him. NYU-Poly merged into it’s surroundings a bit too much for him. There wasn’t enough of a clear delineation between school and community… and he was also looking for smaller.</p>
<p>Stevens was “just right.” A separate and distinct campus from Hoboken. Awesome views. Small with an almost second to none professor to student ratio… and the promise/commitment that PhD students would never teach subject matter, just assist in labs.</p>
<p>Of the four, NYU-Poly and Stevens were the ones that had absolutely stellar placement stats, fantastic intern and CoOp opporunities, both here and abroad, great mean salary stats, location, location, location, etc… It was most difficult for him to choose between the two.</p>
<p>And of course, NYU has the name, for those fixated on rankings. ;-)</p>
<p>If we’re getting paid Google salaries, $43k for Purdue OOS is cheap. If we’re getting paid non-Google salaries, then, well. What is ‘expensive’ is that Purdue is a rather stingy school while a lot of the Starfleet Academies are more expensive on paper but only Saudi royalty on full scholarship pay the book fare.</p>
<p>Notice that Starfleet Academy also refers to a lot of schools that the Hoi Polloi don’t know about - Rose-Hulman, Case Western, WPI, Auburn, and the like. The world does not revolve around West Lafayette, IN, granted, but neither does it revolve around Silicon Valley. It’s all local. </p>
<p>I lived for a few years in Detroit, MI. The automotive industry is (surprise) comprised of vast numbers of Purdue, U Michigan (way too many :)), OSU, Wisconsin, Michgan State, Notre Dame (lots), and the occasional UIUC and a few auto industry schools (Lawrence, Kettering). It’s a very local job market. </p>
<p>We’re double legacy at Purdue and perhaps my second kid will end up there (better go there, she was born in the middle of the semester 
while we were there) The older is attending a Starfleet Academy (Purdue does not have architecture). As always, selecting where to go is a few simple questions:</p>
<ol>
<li>can you get in</li>
<li>can you afford it</li>
<li>can you graduate</li>
<li>is it a ‘brand name’ esp for future research or grad school if your career plans call for it</li>
</ol>
<p>Thanks to a huge influx of OOS’ers, Purdue is getting harder and harder to get in, IS or OOS. I hear kids with 3.75’s and good SAT’s not getting in (many of my coworkers’ kids follow their parents) and some programs are insanely difficult to get in (nursing :)). </p>
<p>It all boils down to fit. DD1 wanted architecture in a large state flagship so she OOS’d. She’s comfortable in a huge school. DD2 wants a smaller, more focused school that focuses more on liberal arts while offering her choices in comp sci and economics (and film, and french, sigh…). If the OP is comfortable with sea-of-humanity sized Calculus classes at 730am, all is good, but a lot of kids are not. </p>
<p>US News rankings were not in my mind when me and the Mrs. applied for grad school there. We kind of figured it was a good program when we (a) saw alarmingly high numbers of publications from faculty (nothing like searching for material for a homework and finding half the papers on the subject were written by the prof) (b) saw the caliber of students (c) the very heavy handed but challenging project and homework assignments and (d) the ‘gravitas’ of the faculty in industry, journals, books, etc. </p>
<p>Only towards the end did I get a copy of USNWR and saw we were like #2 or #3 and our jaw dropped.</p>
<p>BTW, head on regarding the inbreeding of Big 10 and industry in fly-over country… Every once in a while we hire someone from a Starfleet Academy and initially they’re Lost In Space (could not resist) during any kind of social activity or water cooler talk about Prof Such and Such or ECE 538… There’s quite a bit of not invented here syndrome and we address it by trying to recruit outside the Big 10 some and opening offices in the coast…</p>
<p>turbo93,
OK… double legacy and in fly-over-country. Got it. Your perception that everything is local/regional is based on the world in which you live. The rest of the country runs a little different. ;-)</p>
<p>I don’t mean to knock Purdue. I’ll say it again and again that Purdue is a great school. But for the sake of the OP and those reading this thread, I’ll point out that there is a reason why a high school student can have a 3.75 and still get into Purdue. There is a reason why Purdue’s tuition is so affordable. There is a reason why they have such a high acceptance rate compared to other engineering schools.</p>
<p>As for the professors writing the books… That takes place at a lot of the universities. Of course they are going to favor publications from their own faculty. I went to what you would call a Star Fleet Academy and the books we used were… surprise, surprise… written by members of our faculty. </p>
<p>As for “the ‘gravitas’ of the faculty in industry, journals, books, etc.”, again, this is everywhere. I was truly impressed by the staff and their academic and professional accomplishments of every college we visited. Every university had stories of industry ground breaking accomplishments and achievements by faculty… National and Global awards, etc… Every university had examples of faculty leading their engineering students to winning major national challenges. </p>
<p>None of these things are unique to Purdue in the slightest.</p>
<p>I’m thrown by the references to Google salaries and suggestion that only Saudi royals pay the book fare. </p>
<p>The estimate they sent my son is $62,320. He was accepted for the 5 year masters program, but missed Stevens Scholar by only 20 points… doh!! He will receive $15K merit and he’ll take out an annual $5K loan, so he has “some skin in the game.” I will pay the rest… which will be equivalent of me paying the entire OOS tuition at Purdue without any relief whatsoever. This was somewhat similar to the other colleges he was looking at (NYU, Lehigh, RPI). So again, you miss the mark.</p>
<p>I am told I could probably play one college against the other and eek out another couple/few thousand from Stevens, but I really don’t have the time for that nonsense. It’s a very small school and my son is being welcomed with wide open arms. I’m not going to pee in the pool. ;-)</p>
<p>He never considered a school more than 5 hours from home. If Purdue was closer, it would have made his radar, but would have been a solid safety for him.</p>
<p>Both myself and the Mrs. are true citizens of the world, having 3 continents, 6 US cities, 7 degrees, and a combined 28 years of college between us. Believe me, we’ve seen the world. We’ve seen the business world too. </p>
<p>By ‘books’ I mean books that are quite popular and used elsewhere, not merely written by one prof for one class in one school. Also the amount of research papers and general research. I’m mostly referring to “who is this guy” vs. “OMG, it’s this guy”. The ‘brand name’ profs… At Purdue we had a lot more OMG’s.</p>
<p>In terms of cost of attendance, if I understand right, Stevens knocks $15k of COA, so it’s in the ‘range’ (62 vs 43 is different than (62-15) vs 43). That is common. </p>
<p>If you had Saudi classmates you’d know whether they pay full OOS. I had, plenty. Lots of governments do that. </p>
<p>The bottom line is to consider final out of pocket cost, reputation, and fit. COA and fit are easy, reputation may be harder to quantify in terms of value. Back in the early 80’s when I was about to leave Elbonia for college in the US I told everyone I was headed to Lafayette. And everyone went “oh, so you’re going to Purdue”. Alas, it was Lafayette, LA, but I was amused that in both my birth country and my wife’s (some Asian place) they may not know Kim Kardashian from Oprah Winfrey, but they have heard of a few schools and the usual USNWR listed ones are well known. I’m sure if I had gone back with a Harvey Mudd or Rose Hulman or Auburn degree they’d be wondering… So for some people this counts. </p>
<p>To understand what ‘alumni networks’ really means, talk to Ivy Leaguers, Notre Dame, U Michigan, Duke, and the like alums. Great schools all, but we’re talking connections and presence that are well beyond what regular colleges seem to provide. </p>
<p>Best of Luck!</p>
<p>turbo93,
What you’re describing are true luminaries. These guys don’t typically set up camp in Indiana. They are in Boston, NYC, LA, San Francisco, etc… </p>
<p>And the old boys network is dead and gone. If you’re lucky and an alum takes kindly to you, they might make an interview happen, but again, that advantage ends pretty quick. None of us have time for that. We are under too much pressure to perform and produce quality work at a scary pace. It’s a tough world out here. It’s nothing like when I started in the early 80’s. Perform or be gone. If you’ve found a little hideaway or old-school company where the reality I know hasn’t reached yet, good for you. Enjoy it as long as possible.</p>
<p>Best of luck to you too. </p>
<p>We’ll have to agree to disagree. Your experience, your take on the professors at Purdue compared to other schools, just about everything you say… may not be 180 degrees out of phase with my experiences, observations (and hiring practices), but they are significantly out of phase with them.</p>
<p>Kindest regards to you and yours.</p>
<p>@RallySavage
Assuming you stopped checking the UMD forum based on this post, but wanted to let you know there has been activity on your post there…interesting comments from IronTerp who did the internal transfer thing. So, wanted to bring this to your attention just in case you were still remotely interested.</p>
<p>Looks like your question raised some interesting points of view here! I think you can’t go wrong with whatever school your son chooses. I don’t believe there is one right answer other than the one that your son decides feels the most comfortable with. I am sure he will do well and succeed wherever he ends up.</p>