Agree with @eyemgh. My son’s backup plan was Cal Poly SLO, if the UW CS direct admission didn’t work out. Cal Poly charges about $20K for OOS tuition. It doubles the UW in-state tuition, but is less than half of other OOS tuitions, such as UCs and UMich.
@rjkofnovi . “I also think that it’s not worth it to pay full price for ANY top tier school assuming you can attend a school the caliber of U-Dub.”
Strange comment since elite private colleges such as Harvard or Stanford have many benefits (small classes, world class faculty, reputation, academic excellence, best alumni resources, best internships, etc.)
UW is a very good public school but if the parents have the money, going to H or S is a no brainer.
“Strange comment since elite private colleges such as Harvard or Stanford have many benefits (small classes, world class faculty, reputation, academic excellence, best alumni resources, best internships, etc.)”
Michigan is no different. Small classes, world class faculty, reputation, academic excellent, alumni resources, professional/graduate school placement etc…I would add resources and specialized/personalized programs. Perhaps not quite on par with Harvard or Stanford, but certainly on par with Cornell, Johns Hopkins, Northwestern etc…
Going from a rare handful to 200+ is hardly just an expansion.
@Alexandre First off, the comparison was UW to H or S, not UM (which is a much better public university than UW). With that said, Harvard & Stanford in almost all categories “beats” any US public university whether its class size, undergraduate enrollment, endowment, graduation rates, US and world ranking, prestige/reputation, Nobel laureates (UCB is the exception), I could go on and on.
The bottom line is that if you asked 100 HS seniors, if the cost didn’t matter, would you rather go to a public university or a Harvard/Stanford, 95% would choose the later.
@socaldad2002, that is not true of UW, Michigan, or Stanford. All three have large lectures, at least in the early years. All schools, even Podunk U state school, have smaller classes at the advanced levels. All three also extensively use TAs. They all have world class research faculty, but that in no way guarantees that the undergraduate experience will follow. As a matter of fact, my uncle, an academic engineer with a PhD from Stanford, advised my son look elsewhere for undergraduate. Going to Stanford, or any other great research institution, for an undergraduate education is not a no brainer. Two Caltech profs told hime to run away from there.
Harvard is in a world of its own. Long known for its poor undergraduate instruction, you have to look no further than the schools own publications to find articles like “World’s Best University…Worlds Worst Teachers” or “Harvard Undergraduates Are Teaching Each Other and Harvard Doesn’t Want to Talk About It.”
Too many people are drinking the rankings cool-aid and assuming it means anything at all. Research the methodologies, especially the USNWR Engineering rankings, and you’ll see what a folly they are. It’s one data point, but much deeper vetting should be done, especially for a quarter of a million dollars.
@aquapt, UW has had direct admit TO COLLEGE, for a small number of students, for some time now. Any student directly admitted to engineering, still has to compete for major. They just won’t be locked out of engineering completely, but there’s no guarantee they Direct admit to the CS major is a big deal. It removes ALL risk, unless the student flunks out.
I agree socaldad, but you referred to elite private universities, which I assumed extends to universities beyond just Harvard and Stanford. If by private elite you meant Harvard, Stanford, Princeton, MIT and Yale exclusively, then I agree with your statement. But if it extends to other private elites, such as Carnegie Mellon, Cornell, Georgetown, Johns Hopkins, Northwestern, Vanderbilt. WUSTL etc…then I do not think Michigan is all that different.
@eyemgh Are you really suggesting that freshman would be better off going to University of Washington instead of Harvard or Stanford? Sorry, I’m not buying it…
The op wants to know if he should pay a lot more To go to um vs uw for cs. The answer for many is no. It is not. Especially if you talk to people in the field and want access to Seattle tech employers.
Is um subjectively a better school. In most areas that is the consensus. Is it way better. No. Is um and uw cream of the crop. Yes.
This has nothing to do with Harvard and Stanford. And yes most people would pay up for those two. Especially Stanford for cs. But believe it or not uw has been getting some rave reviews in the pe and vc world for the startups coming out of their compared to the Stanford groups.
But for cs uw is a place where things are happening and it’s cheaper. It’s not a no brainer to go to um.
And I have absolutely nothing to do with uw other than a father in law with his PhD from there he went to Harvard ug btw and said uw was an intellectual equal in his field. But that was grad school.
@socaldad2002, we are veering off topic, but I wouldn’t suggest anyone apply to either as an undergrad. Neither emperor has any clothes. Grad school…different story.
@eyemgh , I’m not sure what I said that contradicts what you are saying. UW already had direct admit to some majors, including CS, Informatics, and HCDE, when my daughter applied last year. They have now expanded the number of CS direct-admits, as part of a general expansion of the department. (In-state students are heavily advantaged for CS direct admit however). They also have non-major-specific direct-admit to the engineering school (which does not house CS). Yes, direct-admit to a competitive major is a huge deal that vastly changes the experience as opposed to having to compete for admission to one’s major.
@aquapt, I was just expanding on that concept so readers would know it is still very much the exception and not the rule. 
According to Michigan 2017-18 CDS, the mid-50 percentile range was 1330-1500. The midpoint of that is 1415, not 1450. You have to be careful of what schools market on their admission website. They often inflate their numbers. They are less likely to misreport on CDS (they got rules to follow).
IWannaHelp, it is true that universities tend to inflate figures whenever possible (in some cases, universities report the SAT range for admitted students rather than matriculated students). However, the figures you listed above (1330-1500) was for the 2017 freshman class. The figures for the 2018 freshman class have not yet been published. It is likely that the SAT range and average have gone up some more because Michigan has received a significantly larger number of applicants (11% more), so it is quite possible that the midpoint has increased to 1450, or close to it.
We make a big deal over SAT scores when in reality, at the high score levels, there is VERY little difference. My son for example, scored a 760 on the Math section back when he took the SAT. Among all combined math sections, he missed a single question. There is no substantive difference between 1415 and 1450. In fact College Board doesn’t even break them down. They give a range of 1400-1450. The trouble is, schools use these absolute numbers in their algorithms. In reality, There’s no difference in a student’s readiness to matriculate with those scores. They are equal.
I agree eyemgh.
I would be majoring in Psychology but mainly I want the freedom to explore and take classes not in my major @eyemgh
Right now I’m leaning toward umich because of the fact that at UW you have a hard time getting your major. There are more intangible reasons as well. School pride is a huge part of the community at umich and the school itself has attracted world-class speakers like hillary clinton last year. I feel like I will be more challenged at umich and I also want to get outside my comfort zone. Moving away is a hard decision but ultimately it teaches you a lot about yourself.
If you think you will have a hard time earning a cumulative GPA of 3.2 or higher in the prerequisite courses, Psych 101 (Introductory Psychology), 202 (Biopsychology) and 209 (Fundamentals of Psychological Research), you probably should not enroll at Washington as a prospective psychology major (unless you are willing to consider other majors).