We can agree to disagree. Honors colleges are designed to keep kids from other colleges. Whether WPI is the type of school they had in mind is a matter of opinion. Most of the kids who get into state honors programs these days for engineering have higher ranked options. Many chose honors college for cost reasons. I think your idea of WPI’s academics and mine might be different.
@Eyemgh I think you could easily look up stats for honors colleges (UMASS) and WPI and they would not be the same. You say UMASS, but UMASS is not the choice. It’s the Honors college at UMASS he’s accepted to ( with only 500 kids and taking the top 1-2% of students per their info). Look at the UMASS thread and you’ll see most getting into honors have very very high scores more consistent with T20. I’m not going to go back and forth, it’s a matter of opinion. But it’s not UMass that is on the table.
I understand it’s the honors college at UMASS, and that it’s Amherst to boot. I just didn’t type it out. Sorry if that caused confusion.
In 2018 the average SAT in the honors college was 1409. WPI is test optional, so there isn’t an easy comparison. According to Niche though the average SAT for WPI was 1395. I wouldn’t say there’s a significant difference.
More importantly, the honors college is designed to provide what everyone gets at WPI, the small school experience.
I’m not in any way saying the honors experience would be inferior or superior. I think it would be different, but equivalent. Both will have strengths and weaknesses.
We have visited all the schools. I agree that fundamentally they are all essentially the same in terms of the core academics, but each have their ‘selling’ points to entice kids.
One thing that would attract me to UMASS would be the option of taking a class at Amherst. Just something, probably not in engineering, but something to experience one of the best schools in the world. Or at one of the other schools but probably Amherst would be the draw for me.
I agree. I think that experience would be cool for at least a couple of classes. Not sure how the terms align or what the transportation issues would be. Of course that would only be in the context of it being a suitable fit otherwise.
WPI is also part of a consortium, but there aren’t any schools on par with Amherst (few are), and the terms align poorly.
My daughter graduated WPI two years ago and had a great experience there.
Here are the pros we found for WPI which made it stand apart from other engineering programs:
Study abroad - Literally no other engineering program we looked at came close to the options offered at WPI. My daughter did two study abroad programs, one in Africa and one in Central America. Both were project-based. Great opportunity to expand your view of the world. And WPI now gives students $5,000 towards the study abroad expenses.
Four shortened (7 week) terms with only three classes per term - But you still have the same winter recess and spring break as other schools. Gives you a chance to really focus on the subject matter, IMO similar to real life workload.
Incentive to take challenging classes. WPI offers a “NR” (“No Record”) grade if you get below a C. This encourages students to take challenging courses and not be afraid of tanking their gpa. You can “NR” two classes in your four years and still be set to graduate on time.
EC - Lots of extracurriculars that the students actually engage in. Sports, Greek life, etc. The kids here get involved.
And did I mention a really pretty campus?
If these factors are what your kid is looking for, then WPI would be the right choice. Encourage him to get involved in campus activities right from day one, wherever he goes. Good luck to you!
I want to expand on this. My son didn’t attend WPI, but it was a tooth and nail runner up to Cal Poly. He looked at a LOT of schools. No one, I mean NO ONE does “study” abroad like WPI. It’s because it isn’t classes at another school. It’s being dropped into active projects to do meaningful engineering. They should call it work abroad. They are all around the world, but in the US too. They correspond perfectly with the 7 week terms. It’s a well conceived, well managed program.