<p>OK, all you VANDY lovers out there....</p>
<p>Looking for opinions: Is the higher ranked VANDY is worth paying full freight for, over in-state UIUC or highly discounted Pitt for engineering?</p>
<p>50k a year vs. anything significantly lower?</p>
<p>If you can afford it without worrying, go to Vandy!!!</p>
<p>But if you can’t, I would veer towards the other schools.</p>
<p>As far as I know, UIllinois is a lot better than Vanderbilt for Engineering.</p>
<p>^higher ranked.
I would make the choice based on you want a small school or a large public.</p>
<p>If anything UIUC is a top engineering school</p>
<p>pittsburg is a dump just cross it off no matter what.</p>
<p>Based on my lengthy experience with a variety of large public universities and what I have seen of my son’s experience at VUSE, I think there are some real–and for some students–significant differences between very large publics and medium sized privates that concentrate their attention on undergraduates. If I were you, I’d make some inquiries about course availability, quality of advising, opportunities for research prior to senior year, on-campus housing availability, and accessibility of professors to undergraduates. (The latter will be important when it comes time to get references for graduate programs and internships.) </p>
<p>I want to emphasize that I am not anti-large public schools. Although my son is at Vanderbilt engineering, my daughter (hs junior) is likely to attend a large public university because her projected fields are covered far better at several of them than at any private school. (Although the programs in question are relatively small.)</p>
<p>If you can satisfy yourself that Illinois can offer everything needed at the undergraduate level, and you cannot live a decent life now or in the future paying for Vanderbilt, then Illinois is a great choice.</p>
<p>I never encourage people to go into significant debt, especially when the back-up option is a major research university like Illinois. If the debt is small, and the student is one who might get a bit lost in a relatively impersonal environment, then maybe I would say try to make Vanderbilt work.</p>
<p>Good luck.</p>
<p>FunkyFarmer: Are you saying UPitt is a dump, or the city of Pittsburgh is a dump? What experience do you have with either to be so emphatic?</p>
<p>midmo: my son was accepted to Vandy and U Michigan. His interest is Mechanical Engineering. It goes without saying that a fundamental difference between the two is sheer size. But putting that aside, is your son 1) satisfied with the Engineering program at Vandy, and 2) having fun, making friends and fitting in socially?</p>
<p>I dont know much about UPitt, but i can vouch for the city of Pittsburgh being a dump lol</p>
<p>theglee,</p>
<p>He is quite satisfied, but he is not a mechanical engr. major; he is a computer science major. CS differs in some regards from the other engr. school majors, although some of the freshman courses are the same. As I have mentioned on some other threads–so I hope I am not being repetitious here–he has been involved in research almost from the start, which was important for him. He takes a ridiculous course load, but has still managed to be active in clubs and other organizations, has a lot of friends (as always) and enjoys the university and the city, too. He is no shrinking violet about getting to know people and getting involved in things, but my impression is that Vanderbilt has a lot going on, and it shouldn’t be hard for most students to find their niche. </p>
<p>FWIW, son was accepted to a wide variety of universities, some private, some public, some with highly-ranked engineering schools (including IL and MI) and one with no engineering school at all (where CS is in the math department). In the end, Vanderbilt looked like a great combination of good engineering, accessible research options for undergraduates, opportunity to take A and S classes in the other fields that interest him, and a fun place to be for the next several years. (I guess I should admit here, as I have elsewhere, that $$$ had a role–he has a large scholarship.)</p>
<p>If son had gotten the CV scholarship, it would have made all the difference in the world, and I suspect we would be making the trip out there. But as it is, he only gets the 5K NMF scholarship, and VANDY is EXPENSIVE!!!</p>
<p>With scholarships from UIUC, we would be saving well over 100K, money he could use for grad school or other things. I am a practical person at heart, and so is my son, so it’s hard to discount savings like that, especially when you’re dealing with a quality institution like Illinois.</p>
<p>We are on the fence about Pitt, and are actually going out there this weekend for the Chancellors Scholarship interview and honors day, so I’ll let you know our impressions of Pitt…if it’s a “dump” or not.</p>
<p>Vandy’s Biomedical Engineering program is ranked 13th in the nation</p>