<p>I currently intend on majoring in engineering in college, and possibly moving onto medical school or business school after. I was accepted into Cooper and Penngineering, but I'm having difficulty choosing. What college would give me the most after-school opportunities?</p>
<p>Money is a factor; I'm currently appealing for more aid from Penn, hopefully making Penn only 10k more a year than Cooper, but as of now it's still 20k more. I don't think I want to be a doctor, but I haven't completely gotten rid of the thought. Business is looking more appealing. Cooper is much better for a non-bioengineering degree and would mean I wouldn't have to take out any loans, but Penn probably has better pre-professional help and bioengineering and probably gives more wiggle room if engineering is a bust.</p>
<p>Tuition is free. I would still have to pay for room and board, etc (which comes out to 20k), but my parents are willing to cover 15k and I can pay off the other 5k with work study/summer jobs. Penn would be 40k (including financial grant).</p>
<p>My uncle chose Cooper Union over Harvard years back. My grandparents had no ability to pay for Harvard, so that ultimately led him to choose Cooper. He’s always been pretty bitter about not having been able to go to any Ivy League college. (He was very jealous when his daughter was going to Brown). He had a lot of trouble getting jobs, but he ultimately made his own company, which is doing okay. </p>
<p>I mean, if you really have no financial means, you could go to Cooper, but you might have regrets in the long run.</p>
<p>Well, I think Cooper is very well respected. Ultimately, college is what you make of it. If going to Cooper will save you a lot of money and Penn won’t pick up the financial slack, you should go to Cooper.</p>
<p>It’s more so of a question if getting an engineering degree at UPenn will be as good or better to get me a job in the engineering market, and if that job could help pay for 10-20k of debt per year + grad school. Thoughts?</p>
<p>My husband is a graduate of Cooper Union. I know nothing about Penn’s engineering program, but I can say that a Cooper degree is definitely recognized and respected by any company hiring engineers. (Not so much the general public, of course.) Cooper is a place for incredibly motivated, independent, and brilliant kids. The word “scrappy” always comes to mind. There are no entitled lazy rich kids there, and I would say employers appreciate that fact. The biggest problem with Cooper is the courseload, which I saw (accurately) described as “murderous” on the Princeton Review site. Don’t say you weren’t warned! ;-)</p>
<p>And no offense intended, SusieBra, but if your uncle is still “bitter” that he didn’t get to go to Harvard and “jealous” of his daughter for going to Brown… it could be a personality issue, rather than his degree, that has caused his problems finding jobs, no?</p>
<p>I’ve seen more or less the same as what sugarski has seen based on my experience as a Cooper alum. It’s well recognized and well respected in the fields of art, architecture and engineering, but outside of these fields people don’t really know much about it. Cooper is a very specialized institution.</p>
<p>I don’t really know anybody who had problems getting jobs from my year, but I don’t know what the situation was like years ago (I’m a fairly recent grad).</p>