<p>a) Money. Many of my friends weren’t even allowed to consider out-of-state schools or privates for this reason and this reason alone. It seems to be common, at least where I’m from, for parents to save for four years of a public college education and no more, leaving middle-class kids SOL when it comes to non-in-state publics.</p>
<p>b) Proximity to home. Maybe it’s just a Southern thing, but many people don’t leave their home state–or even stray more than two or three hours away–for college. Some students want the opportunity to come home every couple of weekends for a homecooked meal with mom, and some parents just don’t want their kids to stray too far from the nest. (Mine, on the other hand, are sending me as far away as possible, lol. They’d be furious if I stayed in-state.)</p>
<p>I feel as though I should clarify something here. Private school is not necessarily more expensive than state school. Private schools often have a lot more resources and flexibility with financial aid, so they can often offer a package that is competitive with state school prices. I have had many friends go to a private school because it ended up being cheaper than Penn State would have been. </p>
<p>The sticker price is not always the price you will pay (of course there is always someone else paying sticker so you don’t have to, but that’s beside the point).</p>
<p>Hey! I’m from South Carolina and going to the University of South Carolina in the fall. =)</p>
<p>My school sends about one student a year to an ivy league and a lot of our students go to/are accepted to top schools. (Vanderbilt, University of Chicago, Northwestern, Duke, WashU, UVA, W&L to name a few) That being said… these things happened:
A girl who got into Wake Forest chose to go to Clemson.
A girl who got into NYU chose to go to CofC.
A girl who got into University of North Carolina, University of Virginia, and Northwestern University chose to go to Davidson.</p>
<p>I don’t think it had anything to do with money with these people. They just chose to go to a school that suited them.</p>
<p>Me, personally, I could have easily gotten into higher ranking schools, but I decided that USC was the school for me. It is in no means a bad school. It is what you make it.</p>
<p>As a freshman, I would never have seen myself at USC, but when I got to be a senior, I really changed my mind and thought that that was the school that fit my personality best and the school that offered me the most options. There are a lot of advantages to going to a huge university.</p>
<p>And BTW, USC is ranked #1 in International Business… so it does have some really good programs available.</p>
<p>But I would not recommend choosing a school based on its prestige. You need to choose a school based on your personality and what suits you best. And that’s probably going to change from freshman to senior year.</p>