<p>The kind of education one is expected to get at a given college is often a factor in deciding what college a kid will attend. Suppose you have a S/D that got into multiple colleges you could afford to send your kid to and that you let your kid decide what major one intends to declare, be it on the application or after one or multiple semesters at a given college.</p>
<p>College A (more specialized education):</p>
<ul>
<li>Declaration of major is made at the time of application</li>
<li>3-6 credits of general education courses (out of 120)</li>
<li>Most courses are geared towards one's major, thus one gets more depth within one's chosen field</li>
</ul>
<p>College B (more general education):</p>
<ul>
<li>Declaration of major is made after 1-3 semesters at that college</li>
<li>45 credits of general education courses (out of 120)</li>
<li>One trades field-specific depth for educational breadth by attending this college, since there are less courses for the major</li>
</ul>
<p>Of course, there is more to look for in a college than what kind of education one is getting at that college but it does matter.</p>
<p>Is this another one of those “hypothetical” questions where one of the options is actually your situation? If so, why don’t you tell us which one is you right from the start so we don’t have to guess?</p>
<p>You could be writing about one of my sons, who is now a college sophomore.</p>
<p>He applied to some universities as an engineering major (your college A), and some as an undecided major (your college B). He wasn’t sure which direction he wanted to pursue at the time he was applying.</p>
<p>He was accepted to Vanderbilt and U-MD in engineering, and a number of other universities as an undecided major. He chose to attend UNC Chapel Hill as an undecided major and is very happy. He is pre-med, and has taken every minute of the past three semesters in deciding his major. UNC is exactly where he should be. He was not absolutely sure what he wanted to major in at the time he was applying. He has been able to take a wide variety of core classes in the liberal arts, spent a minimester in South Africa last summer, and is working on applying for a grant to work with a UNC Med School lab in a different African country this coming summer. He would be miserable in a tightly controlled engineering program.</p>
<p>Some kids know exactly what direction they want to take in life when they are applying to colleges. Most do not.</p>
<p>My oldest went to CMU applied to the School of Computer Science. He used his kajillion AP credits to get out of nearly all the gen ed requirements. I think he took two required writing courses (one of which was a technical writing course required by his department, one semester of world history, and one school of computer science required get to know Pittsburgh course.) Everything else was math, physics or comp sci. He’s been superfocused since he was seven. Sometimes you can’t fight city hall.</p>
<p>My other son went to college thinking probably International Relations. Took a variety of courses. Still likes IR. He’s bummed because his department is being mean about counting courses taken as part of his junior year abroad, so he’ll actually end up taking only the minimum gen ed courses he has to take, because he has to double up on IR requirements.</p>
<p>I don’t think there’s one right answer, though a lot depends on what your background is going in.</p>
<p>Contrary to popular perception, College A is unlikely to be an engineering-focused school; those schools which have that little in the way of breadth requirements tend to be liberal arts focused schools like Brown, Amherst, and Evergreen State. ABET accreditation for engineering does require humanities and social studies courses, so Brown requires them for engineering majors even though its has no breadth requirements for other majors.</p>
<p>Indeed, some of the engineering focused schools like MIT have very heavy general education requirements of up to half of one’s courses, though courses can double up on general education and one’s major.</p>
<p>Declaration of major at time of application is usually a characteristic of colleges where some majors are at full capacity. The California State Universities are like that, but do not fit the College A model because they have extensive general education requirements.</p>
<p>This is really a very artificial and limiting comparison, since a large percentage of colleges do not fit either the College A or College B model. Also, a lot of majors do not require enormous numbers of courses or credits (and colleges with a lot of breadth requirements let students count courses for both their majors and applicable breadth categories).</p>
<p>I’m not facing that choice myself nor that I have a relative facing it. I’m about to graduate from a “college A” kind of college in a semester. (A typical program at a Quebec U looks like a “college A” from this perspective)</p>
<p>Only I know that this choice is a choice that many college-bound kids, and their parents thereof, face.</p>
<p>I think one of the considerations is whether a student is expected to graduate and hit the work world running or whether their college experience is intended to contain learning some subjects that do not translate into work directly. Going on to grad school may be the outcome instead. </p>
<p>Some schools are education oriented and others are more career oriented. You can tell by the type of majors they offer. It is a decision the student and their family usually make together.</p>
<p>When you’re saying “general education courses,” do you maybe mean truly-elective electives? So after you’ve done all the stuff you have to do to meet one requirement or another, that’s how many credits you have left to use absolutely any way you want? (I agree, telling us the real question rather than setting it up as an elaborate hypothetical always works better.)</p>
<p>I anticipate that my D is going to have to make the “tech school or LAC-like school” choice at some point. I suspect a LAC-like school is going to be a better fit for the kind of kid she is, and would point her in that direction, accordingly. But that reflects on her as a kid, not the school as a school. </p>
<p>I would strongly dissuade her from a specialized school with loans as the primary form of financial aid (like RHIT, for instance), because failing to graduate but being burdened with a significant amount of debt is a bad place to be.</p>
<p>Well as per myself I would like my children to get the education which enables them to get a good job, which will suits their interest and most important what they will be capable of. For me that kind of education will be best for my children.</p>
<p>I’d prefer that my kids went to College B. I’d like them to have the opportunity to take lots of electives that interest them, and to be educated in a wide range of subjects. I’d like them to have a chance to explore a bit before having to choose a major. And I think it would be easier to finally settle on a major at this type of school. At a school like School A, a student who is torn between two interests might feel that picking one will totally eliminate the chance to study the other… thus making it harder to choose between the two. At School B, they could choose a “practical” major (that maybe isn’t super interesting) but still have the chance to take courses in another area that they find more intriguing or personally fulfilling.</p>
<p>Either one is fine with me. So long as my kid makes friends, graduates in four years and get into grad school, I don’t care one way or the other.</p>
<p>It completely depends on the child. For my son, he wants a degree in computer science. But, he still is very good at writing and loves things like politics, so, he will get a BS in Computer Science from a liberal arts school. If he had been more in to the math and science side of things, he would be going to a university with an engineering school. </p>
<p>We do not know what my daughter will major in for sure. BUT, we do know she loves and is devoted to music. She practices several hours a day. She might end up going to a conservatory. If not, then she will probably go to liberal arts school, not sure. We are clueless!!!</p>
<p>Very, very, very few people know definitively at 18 what they want to do. I’d never want to limit my child like that unless that’s absolutely what they want to do.</p>
<p>Both S1 and S2 wanted to double major in a science and music. So an LAC that was strong in music and science without too many distribution requirements was perfect for them and that is where they both are now. </p>
<p>lmkh70 - definitely keep both options open for your daughter, the conservatory and the LAC. Also a music school such as Hartt or Ithaca in a small university is good environment. She should apply to several types of colleges because she will continue to grow during her senior year and it is good to have options in the spring. Some east coast LACs (the ones that we visited) with strong music programs are Vassar, Wesleyan, Williams, Bard, Hamilton and Skidmore. Hopefully you can do some visits and hear the orchestras - that helped us immensely. S1 knew immediately that Vassar was for him after hearing their orchestra rehearsal.</p>
<p>Whether a school is a liberal arts college or university does not really mean much in terms of how easily he could fit a computer science major and desired out-of-major electives into an eight semester schedule.</p>