<p>Newbie here - We live in IL. My son just got accepted to Michigan Engineering - still waiting on U of I. He's looking at Materials Science (IL#1, MI #2 rank), and then Patent Law. He also applied to Stanford (long shot). With U of I being so strong is there a good reason to consider Michigan, or by chance Stanford, for double the price? Are their Law connections better? Is post grad Networking better to pay for the extra $100K?</p>
<p>Is it possible that he’ll want to work as an engineer? If so, unless there are other contributing factors, there shouldn’t be any reason to go out of state. Of course, it’s rarely that simple. I don’t know enough about law school admissions, but I’m assuming that it has a considerable cost, and assuming finances are at least somewhat of a factor, the $$ saved on undergrad will reduce the debt load coming out of law school. Might be putting the cart before the horse to be planning law school applications at this point. Perhaps posting on the law school forum will get you the information you’re looking for.</p>
<p>I don’t understand. If your kid is accepted into the best ranked program in his intended major, and that school is an instate public school, why would you even consider paying for Michigan OOS tuition that is almost as expensive as a private school? </p>
<p>Is this because you feel that Michigan may give him a bit better “connection” for the post grad networking or law entry? I seriously, highly doubt it. Both U of I and Michigan are top flagship schools that are highly respected. I don’t see how Michigan will give him better connections. </p>
<p>Even for Stanford, I would say the added tuition expense is not worth it. There are only a few fields where the undergraduate degree matters that much: the investment banking area. For engineering, top 10 public schools, especially U of I, are very respected. </p>
<p>I think it would be crazy to pay for Michigan OOS tuition when you can attend U of I as an in state student.</p>
<p>I’d consider Michigan if I wanted to end up in Michigan, but otherwise you’d be crazy not to sit your kid down and show him the numbers. I had a coworker whose father did just that, and she happily attended UIUC.</p>
<p>Unless he absolutely loves/hates one campus or the other there is no reason to go OOS. The exception may be his ability to be in the program- some schools admit directly, others don’t guarantee there will be a space in a specific major, a reason some choose other schools over UW.</p>
<p>Stay at U of I for the money.</p>
<p>The two best reasons to go to Michigan instead would be the town (Ann Arbor is awesome) and local internship and research opportunities (lots in Ann Arbor, few in Urbana-Champaign). But the quality of education and job prospects are equal, and U of I is by no means a poor choice; on the contrary, by most measures it’s fantastic.</p>
<p>U of I is second to none in this area. Stay in Illinois, even the football is a toss-up now.</p>
<p>The richest guy that I am friends with is a UI grad.</p>
<p>Having said that, see
<a href=“WSJ in Higher Education | Trusted News & Real-World Insights”>http://wsjclassroom.com/pdfs/wsj_college2_092503.pdf</a></p>
<p>This is a limited study, and has its biases, but it would suggest that as a whole, you might find the overall environment a bit different at UM than UI. And if he gets into Stanford, thats another kettle of fish. Their numbers on this study are in a different league. </p>
<p><a href=“WSJ in Higher Education | Trusted News & Real-World Insights”>WSJ in Higher Education | Trusted News & Real-World Insights;
<p>The cost is a separate issue.</p>
<p>All of his choices will be well respected by law school adcoms and engineering employers. I’m unfamiliar with patent law, but it seems like industry experience and technical expertise are quite valued and getting into a top law school for this discipline is not as critical.</p>
<p>I don’t think a 'furd or Michigan education would provide $100k+ opportunity over Chambana - given his current ambitions.</p>
<p>Save your money. Go to Illinois.</p>
<p>^^^ I wouldn’t rely on that WSJ study, which is deeply flawed. But if you do, note that in sheer numbers sent to “top grad schools” as narrowly and obtusely defined by WSJ, Michigan is much closer to Stanford than to Illinois; it’s lower only as a percentage of its much larger graduating class, but even on that score it’s in the top 30 for all schools and much closer to schools like Caltech and Cornell than to U of I, which is far down the ranking by any measure. And any advantage Stanford might have on this score is mainly attributable to a higher percentage of Stanford grads going into MBA programs, according to WSJ; that makes the data of limited significance for your S.</p>
<p>That said, I think it’s a no-brainer for your S to attend U of I given the cost differential. (I say this as a proud and grateful Michigan alum who loved every minute of my time there). U of I a great engineering school, arguably tops in the country in his field. If he gets good grades and scores well on the LSAT he’ll be competitive at any top law school in the country whether he does his engineering undergrad at U of I, Michigan, or Stanford. All three will be recognized by top law schools as top-notch, rigorous programs. The only advantage he could possibly gain in law school admissions is if the undergrad grading scale is easier at one of these schools, giving him a higher undergrad GPA. That’s more likely to be an elite private like Stanford than a top public, according to data I’ve seen on grade inflation at various schools; but that may be less true in engineering than in other fields, because engineering profs need to insist on tough, rigorous objective standards, lest they graduate incompetent engineers who put people’s lives at risk. No place in that curriculum for softball As and gentlemen’s Bs. (If I were being catty I’d say society faces no comparable risk from incompetent historians or English majors; incompetent economists, perhaps . . . but let’s not go there).</p>
<p>Here’s one recent data compilation showing the average GPA roughly 0.30 higher at private schools than at publics (private average=3.30, public average=3.01):</p>
<p>[National</a> Trends in Grade Inflation, American Colleges and Universities](<a href=“http://gradeinflation.com/]National”>http://gradeinflation.com/)</p>
<p>I agree with everything bclinton says except the part about econ majors, since I was one. LOL.</p>
<p>He should go to IL UNLESS there is some compelling personal reason why he wants to be at U-M. Stanford would be a completely different equation and I can’t ring in on that–except IL remains an outstanding education for the price.</p>
<p>Votes are in - IL it is! Thanks to all, from this first time poster.</p>
<p>Good choice!!!</p>
<p>Do you know that U of I (Champaign Urbana, that is) is a powerhouse when it comes to engineering and comp sci??? World Wide Web was invented there!</p>
<p>Your son will absolutely stand tall, shoulder to shoulder with graduates from top schools in the world.</p>
<p>The only down side is, miles and miles, and miles of corn field whichever direction you run. But then again, parking is super easy!</p>
<p>Good luck.</p>
<p>A couple of things - </p>
<ul>
<li><p>He could very easily decide between now and graduation to do something other than patent (or any) law. A lot of engineers stay in engineering. A lot of them are also about ready to be done with studies for a while after 4 years of engineering - especially in a more rigorous program. In other words, although it’s good to keep in mind the eventual end goal of the moment, it’s probably better to focus on the more near term goal which is the engineering degree.</p></li>
<li><p>He may as well apply to Stanford anyway if he’s interested. If he’s accepted you can see what the actual cost will be after any FinAid he might get and then the decision can be made. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>You have a couple of good relatively local choices in UI and UM for engineering though. Another key factor for him could be proximity to home. He may wish to go further away from home for college or he might want to stay near home. He also might want to ga quite far away for college. All of these are viable factors in the decision.</p>
<p>
Not really. The WWW was invented by Tim Berners-Lee while at CERN in Europe. A graphical browser for the WWW was developed at UIUC but that wasn’t the invention of the WWW or the internet itself. </p>
<p>The internet itself was invented at UCLA -
[UCLA</a>, birthplace of the Internet, celebrates 40th anniversary of network’s creation / UCLA Newsroom](<a href=“http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/birthplace-of-the-internet-celebrates-111333.aspx]UCLA”>Newsroom | UCLA)
</p>
<p>Ooppsssssss…</p>
<p>You are right: I mean WWW graphical browser.</p>
<p>By the way, ARPANET was a department of defense project. Our tax money brought about this innovation.</p>
<p>I have a S who is majoring in material science. Most schools we looked at, the material science department is not very big and does not graduate students in numbers such as mechanical or civil. I haven’t seen that graduates that have decent GPA have much trouble getting jobs. Last year was an exception because of the economy and many students at my S’s school went on to graduate school. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that my child won’t have a problem when he enters the job market.</p>
<p>I’m sorry to the Michigan lovers out there but I and my kids were not thrilled with the Michigan Engineering campus. It’s not on main campus, I don’t think you could even walk there, you have to take a bus. Honestly it has all the charm of an office park. It seemed to me that you have main campus in one part of Ann Arbor, the engineering campus in another, and where most freshman live in another part of Ann Arbor all of which you have to take buses to. We love downtown Ann Arbor and main campus but as an engineering student I don’t think they would spend much time there.</p>
<p>Go to U of I and save the money.</p>
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<p>I agree up to a point, but part of this is misleading. Back in my day, engineering was on the Central Campus, and to this day one of the most famous campus landmarks is the archway on the southeast corner of the Diag known as the “Engineering Arch” (or (“Engine Arch”), because that’s where the engineering school was. Some time ago they moved the entire engineering school to North Campus where they got a lot more space and superb state-of-the-art facilities. I agree with deb922, though, that North Campus is a rather cold and charmless place, certainly not my cup of tea; and it feels like a world apart from Central Campus, even though it’s only a 10-minute express bus ride away. If you spent all your time out there, I can see how you would feel cut off from Central Campus and downtown Ann Arbor. But that’s not your only option, and perhaps not your best one.</p>
<p>The part that’s misleading is the characterization of the Hill area, where one of the largest concentrations of undergrad residence halls is located (and where a lot of freshman live), as “in another part of Ann Arbor” from the Central Campus, which “you have to take buses to.” Not so. If you look at a campus map, the Central Campus and the Hill/Medical Campus are laid out in partially overlapping rectangles, with the Hill/Medical Campus immediately to the northeast of Central Campus, an easy 10-minute walk to the Diag at the heart of Central Campus. I lived in a Hill residence hall in my freshman and sophomore years and I never knew anyone who took a bus to Central Campus. I often made that short walk 2 or 3 times a day when my classes didn’t line up back-to-back. In fact, I don’t ever remember missing a lunch back on the Hill, walking back after morning classes on Central Campus and then right back to Central Campus for afternoon classes. I’d imagine many engineering freshmen and sophomores live in Hill dorms. They’d have to take the free campus shuttle to North Campus for their engineering classes, but their math and basic science classes as well as any humanities or social science classes—that is, typically 3 out of 4 classes in each of your first three semesters, and 2 out of 4 in your fourth semester—would be on Central Campus. Only in the third and fourth year would most Engineering students begin to spend most of their class time on North Campus. So if they live in a Hill dorm, or better yet in a Central Campus dorm (though these are harder for freshmen to get), they’re not going to feel cut off. There are a couple of large residence halls on North Campus, and some people actually prefer to live out there, including probably some engineering students, though personally I’d find that rather isolating. By junior and senior year you’ll typically have developed a close circle of friends and, if you’re like most Michigan students, you’ll likely end up in a house or apartment with some friends, so the whole residence hall thing becomes pretty irrelevant. You’ll also have found your favorite haunts, most of them around Central Campus or downtown Ann Arbor, and you’ll go there out of habit, but your days will be spent inside classrooms and labs on North Campus, so the the lack of exterior charm just won’t affect you much. Bottom line, it’s not nearly as bleak as deb922 depicts it.</p>
<p>Sorry you didn’t talk to anyone who could set you straight on this when you visited, deb922.</p>
<p>I was in a similar situation 2 years ago - my parents were pushing me to go in-state for U of I biological engineering, but I was debating between U of I and MIT. After visiting both campuses, I ultimately decided that U of I was too large, fratty, and close to home for me, and I’ve been happily attending MIT for 2 years.</p>
<p>Obviously, there is less of a difference between U of I, Michigan, and Stanford, but after talking to several engineering students in the program, I was disappointed with the U of I student body. Another thing that really rubbed me the wrong way was the Dean of Engineering - I went to a presentation for admitted students where he essentially stood at the front of the room and talked about how U of I was better than the rest of the Big 10 for half an hour. At the end of the presentation, when I asked him about research opportunities, class size etc. etc. vs. MIT, he essentially responded ‘why would you pay twice as much when we’ll give you as good of an education?’ A valid argument from my parents’ point of view, but it left me with a bad taste in my mouth.</p>
<p>Compare that to MIT, where the head of the EECS department was more than happy to discuss my individual interests, gave examples of places where I could do research, and told me that it would be a tough decision, and that they would be happy to have me but understood that money is a big issue, there really was no contest.</p>
<p>I know that it’s a very personal choice, but if your son is looking for any sort of individual opportunities or attention, the impression that I got at the U of I presentation was that it was better to go somewhere else.</p>