<p>jdasmom--It's not official yet, but we bought the hoodie on Tuesday, and one for his little sister!</p>
<p>Weenie: One thing that helped my daughter decide was looking at the Admitted Students sites on the college's websites. RPI's in particular is good - they have a message board and the kids can even leave messages for other students. She has been corresponding on a regular basis with several students and I think that had a lot to do with her decision since several of them had already decided to attend RPI. Good luck. It sounds like any of the schools will be a great choice.</p>
<p>Dad'o'2 - You really can't believe how many times over I've spent that $80K. :D</p>
<p>weenie: It's been really fun watching your angst over the past year or so. It's like you have reached a cressendo, like maybe you are going to blow your top or collapse!It's been funny!</p>
<p>Here's my 2 cents . Go with the one he likes that is a tech school. The reason is, if he likes it he will receive a superior engineering education. If he doesn't like it, and you and I know many kids have written in here they don't like whatever choice they made, he can then go to a less expensive college and still get a great education. I am a firm believer in trying the hardest course and then moving down if grades, talents, expectations don't pan out. Nothing lost if you don't try. Just my 2 cents.</p>
<p>(My son changed majors after one year.Didn't like first choice.)</p>
<p>backhandgrip,
i think some people use your model re: marriage partners
pick the toughest one first, and if it doesn't turn out, go to something easier</p>
<p>lol humm....very wise!</p>
<p>3 tuitions. Good God. All at once? Pullingmyhairout another good handle for you!</p>
<p>paying3tuitions: Actually, I can just see it. The great fun you had with all those little kids running around the house, at least 2 in diapers at the same time. You were the untimate Family Circus. And it weent on for years and years and got financially harder and harder. And then came time for college. But I bet you would have NEVER changed a thing!Maybe your life is, and always will be , a family circus!</p>
<p>weenie..wish I had an insightful nugget..good luck sorting. The boy who helped me pass Trig went to RPI. Saw him again 25 years later. He is the CEO of a major major corporation. He also said RPI was not fun for him socially..too much drinking and maybe not enough balance socially. Yeah, this is a quarter of a century old comment. But he clearly got a tremendous education and he matured into appreciating the school and what it did for him.</p>
<p>Thanks so much for everybody's comments and a few grins. You've helped me a lot. (Even Mr. Weenie read this thread - that's how tense it feels around here! :D )</p>
<hr>
<p>I was just thinking though, that like many CC parents, it seems I care a lot more about where he ends up than he does. Sheesh.</p>
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</p>
<p>LOL! </p>
<p>Reading this thread (especially my own posts!), it seems like many of the rest of us CC parents care more about where son-of-weenie ends up than he does! That's just because, like most of the folks posting passionate arguments on this forum, we are all trying to rationalize our own decisions and convince ourselves that we are doing the right thing!</p>
<p>Maybe daughters care more than sons. Maybe they just talk more. I'll find out in the next 3 years.</p>
<p>Don't count on that Dad'o'2. My daughter was agonizing over making her decision for the past couple of months. She is normally a "talker" but I couldn't get her to sit down and discuss how to go about making her choice. On the ride home from visiting her brother at RPI on Easter, she announced that she felt very comfortable on campus and finally made her choice. Like Weenie's son, she had 7 schools to choose from and liked different things about each. We joked at one point that if RPI were in Burlington VT the choice would have been very easy indeed.</p>
<p>
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Maybe daughters care more than sons. Maybe they just talk more. I'll find out in the next 3 years.
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</p>
<p>They care more AND they talk more.</p>
<p>(I have a son who is a junior in college and a daughter who is a senior in high school.)</p>
<p>Weenie,</p>
<p>I can't help you with most of your picks, but I do know a bit about Ohio University; I live in Ohio, and my son gave Ohio U. a serious look last year.</p>
<p>The university has many things going for it - the campus is beautiful, Athens is a prototypical college town, and it's inexpensive (my son could have attended <em>almost</em> for free). However, in Ohio, it is often ranked as the fourth best state college, behind OSU, Miami, and Cincinnati, especially for engineering - OSU and Cincinnati are known for having excellent engineering programs.</p>
<p>My own hesistation about the college comes from the fact that it is quite isolated (Athens is over an hour from the Columbus area) and it seems to be the last bastion of 60's hippie liberals in the state. Wait - I forgot about Oberlin and Antioch - never mind the last comment. :) Our campus tour left me with the distinct impression that Ohio's party school reputation was well-deserved.</p>
<p>In the end, an acceptance letter from Notre Dame made my son's choice easy.</p>
<p>Good Luck!</p>
<p>Engineers, at least in software, are not all alike. A good school would teach not just subject matter but a habit of resourceful problem-solving. You can test people on subject matter from here to eternity but if they don't know how to optimize a problem solution under constraints they aren't going to be a great engineer.</p>
<p>So if the more expensive school can show better problem solving skills by its graduates, its worth it in $$$ and in quality IMO. Of course, if the debt required is repayable in a reasonable scenario.</p>
<p>OU-Athens is rather provincial in its student body- and the student body is not particularly intellectual. (Sorry, I'm an alum, and I really enjoyed my time there, but.... ) Engineering department was fairly recently marked by accusations of plagery in the graduate department, and the plagery was confirmed. I'm not sure what effect that had on the undergrad program, but the whole process left a large black mark on the OU engineering name.</p>
<p>anxiousmom: I know what you mean by "provincial." It really felt like all the kids there were from Ohio only. I know that isn't true - but it felt that way. I'm not worried about the plagiarism thing. For one thing, no one here as even heard of OU, much less the plagiarism scandal (but that is, of course, another problem). Also, they have dealt very seriously with the plagiarism problem (check their recent news releases), which is more than I can say of some much higher ranked schools who have had their own plagiarism problems.</p>
<p>Anyway, although I really liked a LOT of things about OU (not the least was that they have confirmed that my son would be living in honors housing due to the scholarship he got), it appears to be falling off the list.</p>
<p>I only know RPI and WPI on your list, but I felt they were more different than I expected. At least in computer science I thought the WPI presentation was more helpful. Anyway if you like the sounds of either the freshman experience programs or the final projects I'd give the nod to WPI. The projects have the advantage of giving kids working world experience and credit at the same time which co-ops don't really. OTOH RPI's Incubator program sounds great if that is your interest. WPI seemed very, very small to me, but that could be an advantage. I also thought it was an advantage that there was no obvious best dorm to be in for freshmen. WPI has very good placements in New England. My brother (computer software) hires lots of WPI graduates. RPI's reach extends further south. It's well known in NYC area. RPI had blimps flying overhead at the accepted students lunch. Three acapella groups singing, a number of groups very visible outside despite the rain as well as the usual gym presentations. WPI was a little more low key there. I think WPI and RPI are both fine schools, but they do have slightly (very slightly!) different feels to them.</p>
<p>weenie--</p>
<p>So if OU is slipping off the list you are down to three excellent tech schools. Like I said, no wrong answers, so you might as son-of-weenie go with his gut (especially if he agrees with Mr. Weenie!) I haven't heard you talking much about Rose-Hulman lately. Is it still in the running? </p>
<p>My S says he is 99.9% sure his decision will be RPI, and has written it on the fun History teacher's decisions board at school. We're flying up to Cleveland tonight to see Case tomorrow anyway (airfare and hotels are already booked and non-refundable). I think it will be good for him to visit even if he is sure he isn't going there, just to reinforce his decision.</p>
<p>Dad'o'2 - You've been such a great support! :) I think that while Rose still seems to be on the list, he doesn't seems so enthralled with it that it's worth going that far away. The airplane tickets run over $350 to get there from here...</p>
<p>Thanks for your thoughts mathmom. We were at the open house thing (I was the only one applauding the pep band). We missed the WPI open house (oddly scheduled for a Wednesday when schools in NYS are in session), so I don't know what they did there. We did have a nice visit to WPI in spite of (or maybe because of) it being a "regular" day. Maybe the thing lacking was much interaction with profs. (Son sat in on a class, but was pretty much anonymous.)</p>
<p>My D is considering OU for grad school but my S just came back from RPI the other night and wants to go there ( even though he is undecided on WHAT engineering program he could choose ).</p>
<p>RPI advocates : Is the advisement supergood there to help this undecided camp of kids ????</p>
<p>His advisement at his State Honor school was very good ( plus , Honor students register first ) & I am worried about bad advisement ( and that prerequisite laptop computer that I hear is a total bummer ) at RPI .</p>
<p>We need to know by this weekend too..............</p>