<p>MY NJ daughter refused to apply to Rutgers. Rutgers, like many public universities is receiving less and less state funding. Medicare is siphoning off money that used to go to K-12 and college.</p>
<p>Neighbors’ kids attend Penn State, Del, UMD, UMass, and Miami of Ohio.
I think what they are looking for is a better laid out campus, and more of the college experience. The academics at Rutgers is good to very good. The class size and attention to individuals isn’t great. </p>
<p>Attending TCNJ or getting into a public with a great honors college, would provide more of that small school attention.
Please remember that NJ is 2nd or 3rd in affluence and SAT scores are extremely high.
The state cutoff for NMF is 221; the same score as NE Boarding Schools and MA.
NJ doesn’t have the quality of colleges as does MA or PA.
NJ also has a massive Indian population, that is highly educated and ambitious for their kids.
NJ also has many people who work on Wall Street, and many others who graduated from Columbia or Princeton. Northern NJ is similar to Westchester and Fairfield County, CT for the percentage of people commuting to the city for highly paid positions.</p>
<p>Thirty thousand is a lot to pay for an education that you aren’t excited about.
If you can afford to pay more, you can attend a private school that gives merit scholarships.</p>
<p>My older daughter applied to Pitt, Binghamton and UVM. She also applied to privates that give merit aid. She now attends a selective private that offered her a merit scholarship.</p>