The Prestige Factor

Parents Forum
41

@choguy1

“He will likely major in biomedical engineering as a fall-back should he change his mind.”

So, conceptually, this seems to make sense as the best fall back major that is closely aligned with pre-med, and a few students do it. The problem with it for many students is that they will have to compete with engineers who are usually stronger students than most majors for grades, average grades vary a lot by major and grades in engineering tend to be quite low, and Medical schools want to see very high grades.

The upshot is that it takes a certain student to get through an engineering program with the 3.8 gpa needed for medical school, when the average engineer only has a 2.8 gpa.

It is a great decision if he is a strong enough student to pull it off, it just needs to be considered carefully.

42

@Much2learn

Thank you. Very good thoughts on this. There is a biomedical sciences major. He felt it was a little too general - but still more specific than a standard biology major. Perhaps he should re-think it. The Honors college will already make things more challenging. He definitely understands the requirement for high gpa - he gave up on his dream of playing baseball in college because he felt there was no way he could handle both. His long-term goal is to become a doctor not to play MLB.

43

Why can’t he play baseball on college? There ARE students who play sports and go on to medical school. What about club sports? It makes me sad to hear that a kid will give up something they really like. He doesn’t have to play division 1 baseball…or be a recruited athlete…but surely he can play baseball…if he wants to.

44

I think biomed engineering is the way to go. Good fallback just in case.

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I was using http://www.ceri.msu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Recruiting-Trends-2016-17-Brief-3-Starting-Salaries-10-2-16.pdf . Reading in more detail, I see that while published by MSU, it includes numerous other colleges. In any case, it does not change my point – while CS tends to have a wider salary range than most majors, I wouldn’t say engineering majors have a narrow salary range. The other salary links above also do not show a narrow range for both CS and engineering.

46

Many medical school admits play a sport in college. Anecdotally student athletes often say their sport usually comes up in med school interviews, and say they believe the sport increased their chance of being admitted. When I previously looked at med school admit history at my college, the lower GPA, non-URM admits were often stellar athletes, suggesting some kind of benefit, although I wouldn’t assume being an athlete is an excuse for poor grades. It doesn’t have to be a choice of med school or a sport – not both.

47

Regarding CS, a crucial distinction has to be made:
It’s not the prestige of the institution that matters but the rigor.
Now, granted, pretty much all of the super-low admit rate research U’s will give you a strong enough CS education to be competitive for any job. So will all of the unis that aren’t generally considered elite in general but are known to be strong in CS. So will some other schools (some with low admit rates and thus considered prestigious, and some that are not).
People should do the research here.

As for brand name and opportunities, yes, there is correlation there for various industries, but (and this is speaking as an Ivy-equivalent grad who’s made it in to the upper-middle-class despite parents making an income that anyone would consider poor), unless you have liquid discretionary assets in the 7 figures (excluding retirement funds), it’s really hard to justify spending more than $100K-$150K total on undergrad when those kids that are good enough to get in to the elite institutions that would make you consider spending full-pay amounts could go other routes that cost much less but still offer a lot of opportunities (and there is a world outside of undergrad).
I personally would rather spring for an elite MBA or other grad degree (if prestige is needed for whatever reason).

And yeah, peers in HS may be an awful influence, especially since, for most teenagers, that is the only world they know. Humans are social animals and conditioned to care about what their peer group think, but one tack you could use is ask a kid: How much of your self-worth should be dependent on what others think and how much should come down to confidence in your own abilities?

The guy who built the largest hedge fund in the world went to CW Post (LIU) for undergrad. He later went to HBS, but that just shows that if you are driven, talented, and smart, schools like HBS will want you.

48

Location can still matter. For example, smaller Silicon Valley computer companies may not do much (or any) travel recruiting, if the recruiting at local schools provides enough new graduates and intern/co-op students.

The big famous name computer companies recruit widely.

49

Some “top universities” may not have as strong CS departments as others, including some less selective schools. For example, Emory’s CS offerings are fairly limited, while Georgetown and Tulane each have upper level CS offerings strongly skewed toward particular subareas – great for those who prefer those subareas, but perhaps not so great for someone looking for a more general CS education.

50

@Much2learn- Thank you for the list, I appreciate it. A couple of thoughts and questions:

  1. In general, how do you evaluate the rigor of a program? Are theoretical based programs considered more rigorous than “hands-on” programs like Cal Poly and Worcester Polytech?
  2. What are your thoughts on going to an average CS program in an area with amazing internships? I know of 2 students at an average state school with amazing internships. Juniors and Seniors in college making serious money. They say the CS programs can’t keep up with what they are learning in their internships, and that the value in going to college is teaching you how to think critically.
51

Two comments: First, the best studies on the impact of prestigious private schools on the economic futures of middle class (and above) kids who attend conclude that the school has little impact on their economic futures. These studies isolated the “school impact” by looking only at kids who were admitted into a “prestigious” private universities and instead (for whatever reason) attended a state flagship type school. So, it is really the kids that make the school, not the other way around. (paraphrasing across similar studies). Anecdotally, the lead investor in my company couldn’t go to his dream school (Northwestern) way back in the day because of money issues and, instead, attended UTA. He has been very economically successful, to say the least. Second, in Silicon Valley, where you studied CS means nothing to companies who need CS professionals. It doesn’t take them very long to figure out if you know what you are doing (or of you don’t). Your school might make a (small) difference if by some (statistically) remote chance, you need to raise money someday - but that is about it.

So perhaps the best of possible worlds is saying you got into prestigious private school x, but chose to go to a different school. By the way, my lead investor still wishes he could have attended Northwestern - over 40 years later.

52

Strong CS courses and curricula include foundational theory and hands-on practice doing assignments and projects that implement the theory into actual practice. For example, you could be learning about compiler theory in lecture/discussion, and then go home or to the computer lab to work on the assigned project which is to write a compiler.

There are two angles to evaluate:

  1. What upper level CS courses are offered, and how frequently? This can be done by looking at course catalogs and schedules. This angle is not that difficult to evaluate.
  2. The more difficult part of the evaluation would require the assistance of someone who has knowledge of the field, in terms of evaluating the quality and content of the courses, based on their syllabi, assignments, projects, exams, etc., if those are available on the web site.
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@ucbalumnus: That’s fair.

@Redslp: It depends. And what would you consider a “theoretical” CS program (besides the U of C . . . and maybe Yale)? Almost all the top CS programs will give both a strong grounding in theory as well as demand extensive coding projects.

As for how I judge rigor, I like to look at OS finals when I can find them.

54

@redslp I love your questions. I wish I had great answers, but I will try.

In general, how do you evaluate the rigor of a program?

I think you learn some from the average salaries, and placement percentages. I think the engineering based programs tend to be more rigorous too. It is also helpful to understand the quality of students because without top students, they can’t be as intensive. I also ask students when visiting campus. Find out what students say about workload, and try to get them to be a specific as possible because they will all tell you it is difficult. Ask them how much time they put in, how extensive the projects are, whether they are engaged in clubs, hack-a-thons, internships, and other activities outside of class that also develop relevant skills. Where are students interning? Etc. If you are talking to seniors who have already accepted a job, also ask them what companies they had offers from and turned down.

Are theoretical based programs considered more rigorous than “hands-on” programs like Cal Poly and Worcester Polytech?

In my opinion, the best programs require a lot of both. Students should understand why and be able to do. Either one without the other is quite limiting. I don’t have an opinion about those two schools in CS although I have heard good things about both schools overall.

What are your thoughts on going to an average CS program in an area with amazing internships?

I encouraged my student to focus on positions that interested her over the company name, or money. I don’t really know if that is the best strategy, but it worked out well for her. After freshman year she worked as a research assistant web scraping and constructed a data base for a professor doing research. After sophomore year she had an internship in IoT. After junior year she worked in AI. I don’t think any of those were the best paying. I know that Junior summer, she had three offers that were higher, but she went for the experience she wanted. She did make good money, but was focused on what she could learn. I think that was helpful for her because she is always interested in complex backend development issues, and does not like to work on the front end if she can avoid it.

She felt she was well prepared for her internships, but also learned a lot. I have never heard her say anything like that comment about only learning critical thinking in school. That is not her experience, but she has taken more coursework than most students so that could have made a difference too.

55

Engineering-based or ABET accredited CS majors require more math and non-CS science. For example, ABET accreditation for CS requires one fourth of the curriculum to be in math and non-CS science (in addition to one third of the curriculum to be in CS). Non-ABET-accredited CS majors may require only around one eighth of the curriculum in math and no non-CS science, although some do require as much math and non-CS science as ABET accreditation minimums.

56

@thumper1

Many kids may be able to handle sports and getting into med school but he thinks he’s not one of them - and I kind of agree. He’s a pretty intense kid, somewhat of a perfectionist and stresses when he feels like he can’t give something 100% effort. The way he is wired, I don’t think it would work for him. I have encouraged him to look into club sports as an alternative. He hesitated, but said he might consider it. He likes to workout so he’ll definitely be doing that regularly but it certainly isn’t the same. Makes me kind of sad too - I have watched him play baseball since age 4. He has many baseball accomplishments and he has worked very hard to improve over the years. He was never a DI talent but had some DIII coaches interested. Interestingly, during his interview with one of the prestigious private universities the admissions counselor apparently asked him a lot about his pitching exploits and whether he was interested in playing for the school. In retrospect, maybe he should have shouted “yes” but instead he said something about concentrating on his education and maybe he’s like to play club. At least he has decided he would like to continue playing trumpet in school - especially jazz.

57

@Rivet2000 if your kid wants to go to medical school and you want to keep the cost down, seriously consider some Honors Colleges which will not only give you substantial merit scholarship but also guarantee a student’s admission to their medical school if the student maintains let’s say 3.3 gpa. I would do that if my kid wanted to go to medical school but he cannot stand the sight of blood. A pity because I feel he has a great demeanor to become a great doctor.

58

@ucbalumnus: Given the huge enrollment pressure on CS courses at many universities, I think you might have to add something like “can undergraduate majors get the CS courses they want?”

59

@CollegeDad2020 Agree with the conclusion, but our kid’s enjoying his 4 years at Stanford a lot more than at an OOS Honors College or at Berkeley/UCLA was the biggest factor for us. Of course, we don’t know for fact that this will be the case actually but he thought so at this point and chose this route even after our money talk. I personally thought it would be so cool to say “Our kid got into Stanford but chose to attend an Honors College which gave a great scholarship and invest the money saved in stocks.” How cool is that? But my kid thought it was cooler to actually attend Stanford and find out for himself what makes Stanford tick. I just told him to not believe all the hype and have some practical skills by the time he graduates.

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@websensation That’s currently the plan. We’ll be looking for honors colleges with great biomed engineering programs that offer hefty aid. If, on the other hand, she changes her mind and shifts to CS (like her bother did) we’ll go back to the same approach we used with her brother.