<p>I am a dad trying to provide my daughter with more information to help her make a decision about grad school. She is extremely busy and I volunteered to do some more research. She is down to Cornell and UIUC. She has been accepted at both schools and has money offers in hand that will keep her out of poverty. She will major in Electrical Engineering and wants to stay through to a PhD. I lean to the Cornell program due to my Buck Rogers Sci fi youth. The UIUC program is higher ranked, seems more practical for the near term but does not seem to have the name recognition to non-engineering community.
Opinions?</p>
<p>I did 3 years at UIUC before transferring to Georgia Tech and finishing my BS in Aerospace Engineering.
Cornell obviously has much better name recognition but within the engineering community UIUC is much better regarded. If your daughter isn't sure she wants to do Engineering i would recommend she go to Cornell since it also offers excellent programs in the sciences and humanities. If she is sure she wants to do Electrical Engineering I HIGHLY recommend UIUC. It is generally considered the top public school in ECE (yes, slightly better than Berkeley). The rankings don't always reflect this. UIUC was #2 for a long time but now has slightly slipped to #4. Admission is extremely competetive especially for grad school. Plenty of my junior friends who studied ECE at UIUC ended up going to Stanford and MIT for grad school. because they did not get in UIUC. The acceptance rate hovers around 10%. You can't go wrong with Illinois ECE.</p>
<p>Both are excellent schools and have tremendous name recognition in ECE. If she is going to be there for a PhD, she may want to consider other, quality of life factors such as surrounding area (both are very remote and cold in the winter, but the Finger Lakes area is certainly more scenic with other things to do - especially in the summer. However, if she like sports, UIUC has a lot more going on.</p>
<p>However, back to academics, I would think someone who is interested in a PhD would be picking a school on a lot more than just general reputation. Doesn't she have a feel for the type of specialty that she would like to pursue and professors who may be tops in that field? Is she aware of particular research that is being done at either school that intrigues her?</p>
<p>I would definately let the intangibles decide this. Both schools are excellent, enough said. Look at campus size, campus life, location, climate, etc. for the decision. Ask her what she wants in a school and find the one that best meets that. It would probably be best to visit both schools.</p>
<p>If you're getting a PhD, the name recognition to the non-engineering community does not matter a bit, assuming you get an industry or academic job afterward. UIUC is the better choice academically, but your daughter may decide that other factors are important as well.</p>
<p>Well, I'm <em>at</em> UIUC...</p>
<p>I did my undergrad at Rice, and I absolutely loved it there. I thrived in the smaller environment. I narrowed my grad program search down to two schools: Cornell and UIUC. I visited both. </p>
<p>UIUC presented a very incredible weekend for prospective students, wining and dining us, having us tour the department and its absolutely incredible testing facilities. They wooed us with tales of vast stipends and gave us private meetings with several professors all day long, so that we could talk to them about their research. They flattered every aspect of our intelligence, saying that we were the "best of the best," and I've gotta say... I haven't talked to a single person who wasn't incredibly impressed after that weekend. They talked a big game. Walking around the campus contemplating my options during that weekend, I distinctly remember thinking, "This place will give me the most incredible options out there... it's the best-ranked program, I'll get a ton of funding, but... it's huge, and I don't particularly feel comfortable here... Maybe I'll get used to it."</p>
<p>I also went to the Cornell recruitment weekend, and it was really good, too. The program I was looking at was their MEng program, and while it wasn't as highly ranked and I wasn't going to receive as much money, I'm thinking now that I would've been a lot happier at Cornell.</p>
<p>UIUC didn't turn out to be what I'd expected. Yes, the academics here are incredible. The professors are incredibly renowned. However, they led us to believe that there would be more interaction between the grad students and the professors than there actually is, and I've had nothing but administrative frustrations since I got here. Now, instead of having money for grad school, because of a series of snafus, I'm paying tuition this semester before I graduate and leave... a far cry from my original plan of staying here for seven years or so and pursuing my PhD.</p>
<p>My case is reasonably rare, and I know that most of what happened to me was just a case of exceedingly lousy luck, but I just wanted to say that no matter how stellar a program is, don't discount how well the program "fits" you (or in this case, your daughter). Yes, UIUC will give her excellent opportunities, but I'm not sure it's worth the trouble if it's not the right program for her. Cornell's an excellent program as well, and really, employers are just looking to see that she's got a solid education, they're not pulling out their USN&WRs to check rankings. See how she feels once she visits each of the places, and encourage her to see how the area feels, and whether she can see herself living there for quite a while to come. See if she develops a rapport with any of the professors at either of the places, and see what she thinks of the current students at both of the places... Does she feel comfortable with her future colleagues?</p>
<p>I wish I'd trusted my gut instinct in this case. I'm leaving UIUC with an excellent education, a very good masters degree, but I'm having to take the remaining shreds of my sanity with me in a ziplock bag, and I'd just rather not see another person be blinded by the "number one" aura of a program (any top program, not just UIUC...!) rather than to evaluate whether or not they'd actually be productive and (reasonably) happy students there. So... it is possible to go wrong with Illinois, ECE or any other program... if it's not the right program for you. Trust your gut, and tell your daughter to trust hers, too.</p>
<p>she would do electromagnetics at UIUC or High Density Plasma Physics at Cornell. Both have solid faculties. Part of the problem is that this area of physics really only lends itself to jobs in academia or the national labs (she has worked two summers there). Electromagnetics is very versatile. Even though UIUC is in the middle of nowhere it feels too much more urban than anything here in Oklahoma or Texas. Ithaca seems to have a real nice small town atmosphere, kind of like small towns in Colorado or New Mexico. The faculty she has met in both places have been great. Contrary to some other posts the stress level seems lower at Cornell than at UIUC. I am not sure if anything can match the stress level where she is Texas A&M</p>
<p>Lots of very good advice on this thread. I'll add this:</p>
<p>Two things a happy grad student make: relationship with faculty advisor and colleagues (in other words, research) and adequate funding. Has she visited yet? She really needs to ferret out the proper professional atmosphere for her. What are the respective profs at each school publishing? Has she familiarized herself with their current journal articles to find a good fit? What are the current grad students publishing? What do current grad students at each school say about funding and their advisor relationships? Are there any key faculty that may be leaving either school in the near future? Are her prospective advisors tenured? How long is it taking current grad students to finish? What percentage of incoming grad students complete the dissertation? Where are they going and what are they doing postdoc? If part of her funding involves being a TA, she'll want to ask lots of questions about that, too. She should speak to her Aggies faculty who have their ears to the ground; e.g., is there any under-the-public-radar scuttlebutt about up-and-coming young faculty stars at either school? Even if she loves one school over the other, she's going to end up very unhappy if the professional fit is wrong.</p>
<p>The types of things aibarr posted are the issues that your daughter should address in her visits to both schools. Best of luck to her!</p>