<p>i would study business at WashU or UVA, and engineering at Rice or Vandy (i.e. not totally sure what i wanna study, but got a decent idea)...
if I ranked them in preference right now (if money wasnt an issue) i'd say WashU, Rice, Vandy, and then UVA. I've visited all of them except WashU, which I'm visiting next weekend. All of the campuses were awesome, imo.
anyway, as far as money goes... i got the olin scholarship (over half-tuition) at WashU, essentially full-tuition in aid at Vandy, and I'm instate for UVA. also, i'm a National Merit finalist so i'd get an extra few thousand a year at any of those schools i think.</p>
<p>so, any opinions on which one i should pick, or at the very least, look very very VERY closely at?</p>
<p>honestly, i think i'd be really happy at any of those schools, so just feel free to say what you like/ dont like about any of them.</p>
<p>Wow! All good choices. Hard to turn down full tuition at Vandy. WashU is a terrific choice, too. Personally, I think engineering is a more rigorous as well as more useful degree than business. I’d choose engineering at Vandy. As I told my son, what do you want to be in the business of? If you want to be in the engineering business, it’s better to have an engineering degree. Easy to get an MBA after an undergraduate degree in eng than to get a graduate degree in engineering after an undergrad in business.</p>
<p>Since you seem to have a dual interest in business and engineering, I’m wondering if you have looked into the engineering management minor at Vanderbilt School of Engineering. I know nothing about it first hand, but here is a short discussion from the VU web site, with some links for details:</p>
<p>If your award at Vanderbilt is need-based, there is an additional 5K per year for national merit; if the award is a merit award, the national merit supplement is 2K per year. I’m not sure how the national merit award is handled with respect to a need-based award; that is, I don’t know if it is stacked onto the grants, or if it replaces some of the grants or work-study.</p>
<p>You have a lot of good options. Check out the details of the various majors, the research opps if that interests you, the treatment of AP credit if that is relevant (it was a big aid to my son gaining access to graduate classes early on at VUSE). Look closely at final costs to you and/or your parents. </p>
<p>thanks everyone! by the way midmo, it’s need-based at Vanderbilt so the nms award is 5,000… thanks for mentioning the Engineering Management minor at Vandy too, that looks cool.
also, i got about 11k in need-based aid at Rice, and a additional 7-8k (on top of the Olin scholarship) in need-based aid at WUSTL, if it matters at all to anyone who sees this in the future… just forgot to mention those in the first post</p>
<p>Here is a useful calculator that will help you figure out which scholarship and financial aid packages really are the best, and will let you also enter some non-financial data: [FinAid</a> | Calculators | Advanced Award Letter Comparison Tool](<a href=“Your Guide for College Financial Aid - Finaid”>Your Guide for College Financial Aid - Finaid) In addition to running all of your numbers, you need to find out if there are restrictions on any of these scholarships. For example, do you need to maintain a certain GPA or stay in a certain major?</p>