Hi! Right now I’m deciding between Rice and Wash U to major in biomedical or chemical engineering. I know both are great schools but does anyone know about the social scene at the residential colleges of rice vs. greek life at wash u?
Also does anyone know which college is more generous with merit scholarships??
Any help is appreciated thanks!!
Why are you deciding now? Are you trying to pick an ED school??
I doubt either school is “generous” with merit if you’re simply a run of the mill “top student,” since all their students are “top students”.
What do you need your net cost to be?
Neither WashU nor Rice are “generous” in merit aid whatsoever.
If you need merit aid, strongly suggest exploring other schools.
Good luck!
My ds was accepted to both of these schools but did not matriculate at either. He received merit at Rice (around $22,500 per year or so??? Can’t recall). He was not invited to compete for the merit scholarships at WashU.
Be aware that both schools like demonstrated interest. WashU is need-aware. At least the year my ds applied and was accepted to the schools there was a pretty significant difference (even before taking into account his merit scholarship at Rice) in the total cost of attendance with Rice being lower.
Can’t speak to the residential differences since he does not attend either.
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My ds was accepted to both of these schools but did not matriculate at either. He received merit at Rice (around $22,500 per year or so?
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This is an example of what has been mentioned in a few recent threads. Schools like Rice (and WashU) often target their merit towards students that they think will be accepted to tippy-top schools as an attempt to poach them.
This student is attending Stanford. Likely Rice knew that this was an applicant that would have tippy top acceptances.
It should be irrelevant to applicants if a school is need aware or need blind. It doesn’t affect how much you like a school, but rather only the chance of admission. If you like the school, apply! Meeting full need is often the critical issue.
Thanks for all the help!
@vonlost But being need aware can impact whether the school should be classified as a reach/match, and thus needs to be taken into consideration for students with need (although in this case, both schools are reaches for everyone)
Doesn’t Rice have somewhat lower tuition than other top tier private colleges? It used to be tuition-free.
A school’s being reach or match depends solely on the applicant’s features, not on the school’s endowment size (which causes a school’s being need aware/blind).
Rice’s tuition is about $10k per year below other top schools. Relative bargain. Similar to GATech’s tuition.
I think they’re academic peers overall at the undergrad level, but they have different strengths – definitely research academic fit along those lines.
Also obviously consider cost (run NPC) – and don’t leave out travel cost – and other fit variables like environment and social vibe.
Both are outstanding; just do your due diligence so that you choose the one that’s more outstanding for you.
Neither WashU nor Rice give generous merit aid to many students. Tulane, however, offers both those majors, gives generous merit money to a large percentage of students (not to just the walk-on-water ones), plus has a great social scene in what is possibly America’s funnest city.
Be forewarned that biomedical engineering has lousy job prospects w only a bachelors degree.
My daughter is currently a student at Rice, and she was awarded one large and one small scholarship with an ED application. She was “near” the tippy-top, but not quite there. The only reach school that she applied to was Rice, so it doesn’t appear that she was offered scholarships to lure her away from other top schools.
She had friends who received the same offer that year, and a friend who recently applied for Fall 2016 received the offer. Keep in mind too that there are no additional scholarship applications – your school application covers everything. In that regard it is easy to apply for Rice scholarships.
It seems like a number of my daughter’s friends applied to both Rice and WashU. They definitely appeal to a similar level of student.
My D applied to WUSTL and my understanding is that anyone can apply to their scholarships- they have a great variety of them but it does take effort as you have to write essays and get lor’s. So no, it’s not limited to the invites. You just take the effort to apply. Perhaps if they reach out and invite you, they think you might be a great candidate but anyone can apply.
The only way Rice would know that she was applying to other reach schools was through the FAFSA but doubtful that they concerned themselves with that.
So, Rice may have thought that she applied or would be applying and wanted to lure her in with merit. But she applied ED? So they knew she was serious about attending and they thought she was strong enough to want her. So maybe not so much about luring as it was about her fit to the school and her filling some need for them.
We didn’t file FAFSA, but Rice asks students to list the others schools where they are applying. Full disclosure: we live in North Texas, and our school district appears to have a very close relationship with Rice.
@goingnutsmom - sorry if I was unclear. Of course anyone can apply for WashU’s scholarships. However, only a very few who apply are invited to campus to compete to receive them. There may be other merit scholarships that are awarded without coming to campus to compete, but I am not aware of those.
For my ds’s admission cycle, Rice’s regular application served as the merit scholarship application. There was a fairly long and complex supplement to the Common App for all at Rice. WashU’s regular application had no separate essays above what was required on the Common App. There was a separate application if one wanted to be considered for merit scholarships. That process may be different now.