<p>My son has been accepted to both of these schools for Electrical Engineering and is 100 percent set on attending UT Austin no questions asked, however he has been offered a full ride scholarship to attend UT Dallas for Electrical Engineering and is not willing to consider the offer. </p>
<p>My question is, is there a major difference between the 2 colleges that is worth giving up that big of a scholarship? UTD is actually more expensive to attend then UT Austin. He is the first in our family to attend college, we are extremely proud of him and want the best situation for him, we just simply do not know anything about either college, or if going to this college rather then that college makes that big of a difference in the career field...</p>
<p>Any help and guidance would be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>Thank you</p>
<p>Congrats on your son being the first one to attend college. The social atmosphere is completely different. UT-Austin has the quintessential collegiate feel, while UTD is a commuter school, where students do not interact much outside of the classroom. From a pure networking/college life perspective UT-Austin is way better. Academically, UT-Austin’s EE program is much more rigorous and carry much more prestige if you son chooses to attend graduate school in the future. From an employment perspective, Austin is arguable the best high tech city outside of the Bay Area. The high tech industry recruits heavily at UT-Austin. The same cannot be said of UTD.</p>
<p>From a financial aspect, UT-Austin is pretty cheap to start out with. Upon graduation, your son will be able to recoup the entire four years’ worth of tuition in his yearly salary. The college life/employment/prestige is worth way more than UT-Austin’s tuition over UTD’s.</p>
<p>Thanks…we are extremely proud of him and want nothing but the best for him…we as parents are really torn over this decision, which is his to make, but from a financial look from our end plus everything we are being told from friends and family in the Dallas area, how can you pass up a full scholarship…being told the schools are very comparable in the EE program, that a diploma is a diploma and so on…hence why I am asking and looking for open and honest opinions from others who are much more knowledgeable about college then I am.</p>
<p>As I review this and have stumbled among other post similar it seems that Austin is the much better choice…so lots more praying and researching should lead us down the right path.</p>
<p>Again Thanks!</p>