<p>It would be interesting to hear how she feels about her choice of GMU over WUSTL, she would be a great person for my D to talk to. We only have two days, unfortunately, till our comittment is due. Could someone tell me how to access the archives with the EvilRobot thread about his choice of Vanderbilt over Yale? I can't seem to locate the original thread but did find his freshman yr update and it seems he made a great choice. My D's boyfriend is going to Vandy but she didn't apply since we live walking distance to the campus and she wanted to go away to school. It is a pretty nice fallback school!</p>
<p>i am choosing to go to maryland on a full merit scholarship over stanford/duke/georgetown/hopkins who offered me no fin/merit aid...it is a tough decision that i am still struggling with to this day and can sympathize with your daughter...if your daughter goes to washu is she willing to work during college? has she considered other expenses such as pocket money, books, computers? these little factors can sometimes play a key role in ones sanity while in college...to say the least</p>
<p>An extra $35k x 4 = $$alot</p>
<p>If she's smart enough to get into an Honors program, then she'll have a great GPA and have first pick at internship/research/whatever opportunities, which will set her up nicely for post-bacc studies. $140k might be worth it for a Harvard but not a WUSTL.</p>
<p>drdeb8 - Another intangible is there is much to be said for choosing a college/university that rolls out the red carpet to your daughter versus a university that opened the door a crack and said "we changed our mind, you can come in if you want but we don't care much either way". My son just finished his freshman year at a state university honors college and the fact that he was both subliminally and overtly encouraged to do his best as an honors college student has paid off (so far) with a 4.0 and several EC leadership roles (as Northstarmom noted in her experience with honors students at a third tier college). Also, his ACT/SAT test scores and high school GPA relative to the other honors students would not have predicted such a good start for him. I believe his good start had everything to do with the honors culture and the special treatment/encouragement accorded these students that George Mason appears to have as well.</p>