<p>This thread is on the front page. Yeah!</p>
<p>She decided Texas was too far from home, Cal Poly SLO was too big and the overnight at the school she is attending sealed the deal. Clearly worriedmom’s son has company ;)</p>
<p>Fortunately, my kid’s top choice – while not the highest ranked school to accept her – offered her the most money. We were lucky in that regard.</p>
<p>^^^^ While I definitely applaud her decision on fit, I also suspect that it would have been a much more difficult decision if cost had been equal across all three choices.</p>
<p>This is, IMHO, one of the biggest advantages in being comfortably full-pay (a quickly shrinking pool of folks): if you pick a “lesser” school in others’ eyes, you will do so without any financial pressure or any self-guessing as to whether choosing finances over fit/prestige–and in many cases, though certainly not all, I think the “prestigious” choice COULD be a better fit, but for teenage rationalization–was the right decision. Perhaps my mind will change once I get to college myself, but hearing all the infatuated first-years declaring that they wouldn’t be nearly as happy at their former (often too expensive) first choice only brings out my cynical side. It sounds like pure rationalization; how can you know if you would have had a better or worse experience at that #1 choice? It would have been a DIFFERENT experience, but maybe better and maybe worse–more likely to be better if you did your research properly before applying and the school was your first choice for good reasons.</p>
<p>Very interesting discussion topic, we greatly appreciate parents share their thoughts and experiences. Thanks!</p>
<p>At the accepted students’ day at higher ranked school, she saw all the faces looked just like her. Her practical side rebelled at the (full) price tag. The location and specific program of the lower ranked school (plus a scholarship and honors program) were the deciding factors. She is very happy with her choice.</p>
<p>Keilexandra: I don’t know if you were referring to my post but if you were, you are mistaken. The higest ranked Texas school actually offered the best financial package by several K.</p>
<p>^ I was referring to Sally’s example, although also to everyone in general who isn’t independently wealthy (mathson is a clearly notable exception of turning down prestige AND money).</p>
<p>D was accepted at the higher ranked school as a double legacy. She visited for the first time on accepted students day and was unimpressed with the campus, plus she found one aspect of the program she was interested in to be particularly troublesome. So she decided to go elsewhere. I do think that underlying her negative feelings was the sense that she hadn’t been accepted on her own merits and would always feel that she didn’t really belong there. Also perhaps a bit of contrariness about attending the same college as her parents. Maybe also some fear she couldn’t actually hack it academically. Probably a mix of all those things. She’s not looking back–all the “what-if’s” are mine.</p>
<p>Don’t know yet because she is still just applying, but my D’s current order of preference puts Northwestern over Princeton (which is still on her list but much lower down). Northwestern is just a much better fit for her interests and personality. I suppose Princeton would be considered “clearly higher ranked”? Stanford fell down low enough on her list that she has decided not to apply at all. You could say she would turn down Stanford for Oberlin. She is fortunate that cost will not be a consideration.</p>
<p>But perhaps the dynamic changes completely once you have your acceptances in hand? In her case if Princeton and Northwestern are the only two schools that accept her, she will do a second visit to each of the two and may well come to a different conclusion. </p>
<p>I guess that would be a topic for another thread…did your preferences change after your acceptances.</p>
<p>S1 turned down MIT for UChicago. Ranking was irrelevant. He loved both, but what drove his decision was the Core (he didn’t want to take Humanities for Engineers – don’t jump on me, MIT folks), math and CS that were both heavy on theory, and most importantly, he felt he’d be challenged to move out of his comfort zone and grow more as a person at Chicago.</p>
<p>He has loved his Chicago experience, and spent this summer working at MIT. Feels like he has gotten the best of both worlds. He has had amazing opportunities at Chicago and has run with them.</p>
<p>mmmm… Does a higher ranked college really matter when you don’t like it?</p>
<p>I convinced my bff to turn down Columbia SEAS for Carnegie Mellon.</p>
<p>This was my argument: what do you care about more: prestige or academics? If Carnegie Mellon does have the best computer science program in the nation, as you argue, then that is the right choice for you.</p>
<p>An acquaintance of mine turned down Harvard for Georgetown. Both of his parents are Georgetown alums, he applied EA to Georgetown, and he has always loved it.</p>
<p>I think I lucked out. I’m in-state at UT McCombs, and the only BBA program I would rather be in is Penn, but that would cost over twice as much. I also considered econ at Northwestern and U Chicago, but ended up only applying at UT because it was the only one I could afford. A lot of my close friends here are from out-of-state and consider McCombs worth paying twice as much as I do for, so I guess it worked out pretty well.</p>
<p>Forgive my jaded perspective, but at the undergrad level, perhaps only HYPS plus MIT, UChicago, Cal Tech and a few highly select others (Julliard? UC Berkeley? etc) have enough ultra-prestige power to actually impress others–if that is important to an individual. As far as quality of education, the rankings just don’t tell the whole story and particular majors, undergrad curriculum, and the size of classes and professor attention is not clearly rewarded as US News ranks. While the name value of a top U may hold cache, in many regions, attending a great local college is equally helpful or even more helpful when the grad is networking for job opps. </p>
<p>But we shouldn’t mistake the rarefied HYPS with other schools. If prestige is the currency that this thread is implicitly honoring, selecting #20 college over #28 is not of higher value even using that one thin benchmark. Ask most people which college is more highly ranked–Georgetown or UVA? I hang out on CC a lot and even I don’t know! While many ccers long to get into an ivy, out in the real world (heh), people believe U Penn is a state school so… higher ranked? Why give US News so much power over your student’s happiness as to let these numbers influence too greatly their decision?</p>
<p>So I agree with icedragon–
“Does a higher ranked college really matter when you don’t like it?”</p>
<p>My son’s friend turned down Berkeley engineering for Cornell. Both parents were mad, but the son loves to be in NY. They’re from Italy.</p>
<p>icedragon,
Yup. You got it. We know folks who turned down H, MIT, etc. for the flagship (research, early grad work, full ride) and are blissfully happy. We also know folks who went to said tippy-top schools and are sorry they did.</p>
<p>My daughter turned down Carnegie Mellon, where she was accepted after being waitlisted for several reasons:</p>
<ol>
<li>Waitlisted kids get last choices for residence halls.</li>
<li>Waitlisted kids are treated as second class kids. While Carnegie Mellon will negotiate aid based on what other comparable schools offer, they will not negotiate with waitlisted kids. This made her feel second rate.</li>
<li>Carnegie Mellon’s program in their design schools was Visual Communication. She wanted something more akin to digital arts. Thus, their choice of majors in the design program wasn’t a good fit anyway.</li>
<li>The price at University of Cincinnati was about 70% less in cost, net of scholarships, than that of Carnegie Mellon. Price-wise, it was a no-brainer.</li>
<li>I think she was a bit turned off by the snootiness ( is this a word?) of the tour guides. Their “this is CARNEGIE MELLON, so you should go here,” just didn’t cut it for her.</li>
</ol>
<p>Frankly, I think paying 53K+ per year for college is a bit insane ( unless your name is Trump) especially when a kid can get either a free ride or has a much cheaper alternative.</p>
<p>Last years Valedictorian at my school turned down Princeton for Harvard because he was getting more money, and Harvard’s location was more attractive to him.</p>
<p>DD turned down Yale for Swarthmore because it just was a perfect match and she wanted the small size.</p>
<p>DS turned down Caltech for Olin for similar reasons.</p>
<p>I was going to say they both run from “elitism” but that sounds funny, since the schools they are at are both elite in different ways. But–the fact that most people either wouldn’t have made the same choice or (more common) haven’t even heard of their schools is a positive for them!</p>