<p>This thread is my first post on this site and this is my first child going to college, 2nd child is currently in 7th grade.
I do appreciate all your different views on this topic knowing that everyone means well in their personal convictions.
As stated before with some more information. YALE will cost us $30000, USD will also cost us $18000 (The full ride was tuition). So the comparism is not really $120000 to $0 as initially explained. I am still learning the correct terminologies. We are californian residents and are quite new to this country. We did not go to college in the states, so the process is quite new to our family. Thank you all.</p>
<p>We may not be that far apart, Pg. I still agree with what you wrote here.</p>
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<p>As to drawing a parrallel between Rhodes and USD, the gulf between the upper-quartile at Rhodes and USD is at least “statistically significant” and IMO, enough to be a difference maker for a swan in the OP’s kid’s situation. Or is that a duck? Or a greater duck, or lesser swan? I’m not even sure where my own kid fits in this whole fowl thang. 
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<p>As to my D’s med school…it has got to be among the most unique medical school experiences in the country. So far the level of freedom to explore has been mind-boggling. We call it “Montessori Med School” at my house. And that “character” is the reason she picked it over other great but more traditional options.</p>
<p>If the goal ultimately is to be in private practice in internal medicine, pediatrics or family practice, the bedrock of primary care, it may not matter the level of medical school as long as you can pass your boards.</p>
<p>From what I understand from a faculty friend in a med school - if you ever want to teach, it is important to do a residency and fellowship at an university hospital even if not educated in US. If you want more prestigious teaching and research appointments, then you start going up the ladder to Yale or Harvard for medical school and associated residencies.</p>
<p>Freedmreigns - Yale funding is usually based on people not taking out any loans to be affordable. If you are being forced to take a loan, have you checked with Yale to see if they have your financial numbers correct, especially if you moved to US recently?</p>
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Yup. While broader than those two, and with exceptional students at other med schools making it through the guantlet, it is just about that bad.</p>
<p>“As to drawing a parrallel between Rhodes and USD, the gulf between the upper-quartile at Rhodes and USD is at least “statistically significant” and IMO, enough to be a difference maker for a swan in the OP’s kid’s situation. Or is that a duck?”</p>
<p>The Honors Program at USD is selected from among their top 10%, not from the upper quartile. This puts the students easily within the Yale range (though likely with much lower average incomes). The OP’s son is simply a case in point.</p>
<p>That may not be enough kids, mini. It may be. IMO, it needs to be investigated further. Only 6% of USD’s kids scored a 700 or above on the SAT CR according to the last CDS.</p>
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<p>If the $12k won’t put a huge dent in your family budget, Yale is the easy choice, IMO.</p>
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<p>As an international/naturalized citizen (where prestige = fit), Yale is the only choice.</p>
<p>One other thing I wanted to add, because I have a nephew at Yale, is that the research opportunities for a science student at Yale are really quite amazing. Because of their reputation as more of a humanities school, the science undegrads get to do a lot of work with some really talented professors. This may or may not matter to OP, but it is one consideration.</p>
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<p>this really made me laugh.</p>
<p>It’s soo true. Also, wherever a person’s kid goes to school is where they tend to place the “cut off” for academic excellence. As in my kid is at a top 20, so anything in a top 20 is as good as Yale. My kid is in a top 50, so any school above a top 50 is as good as Harvard.</p>
<p>Having one who turned down some top 20 acceptances for one in the top 100’s, for very valid reasons, I always find this an amusing thing to watch. As for the OP, if it is affordable, Yale is a really valuable educational experience. If it is not affordable, then your kid is quite likely to do very well at USD, given his history. The best predictor of future success is past success.</p>
<p>Good luck to you and your son.</p>
<p>25% of Yale students have a CR under 700. Again, entirely comparable.</p>
<p>I must say poetgrl you missed my whole point. I could care less where any of your kids go to school. What I didn’t like is the suggestion by some here that their children are superior to others because of the name of their school. Is this so hard to understand? If you fail to see the conceit of this type of attitude, then you are too far gone for me to try to reason with you.</p>
<p>that’s so funny Parent 57, since my response had nothing to do at all with you. In fact, up til this very moment I thought you were making valid, if a little bit harsh, points.</p>
<p>Now, I just think pshaw.</p>
<p>parent57 - please show us who on this thread has said their children are superior to others because of the name of their school. You are the one who keep on saying that is why people send their kids to elite schools. Most people are having cordial, intelligent discussion (like Pizzagirl, mini and curmudgeon…), and you just keep on coming back here to try to start a “war,” and it doesn’t help with the discussion at hand here.</p>
<p>This is not directed at either USD or the OP – but yes, I’m sure there are Yale-level smart kids at USD. And at every single school in the country – very bright kids who were just never told to seek out elite schools, or who didn’t have the money, or had other things going on such that their default was the closest or cheapest school around.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, the fact that there are smart kids at every school doesn’t transform the experience into an elite one. While I don’t slice the pie as thinly as many on CC do, I think there is a qualitative but real difference in a school where everyone is really, really smart and an environment in which this is not the case. This isn’t, say, Yale vs Vanderbilt or Kenyon (just to pick on those schools as examples). This is a school that is rated in the 90s. Why is that? That’s enough of a difference for me to say it doesn’t all just come out in the wash.</p>
<p>It is also not the difference between a full ride and a full pay situation, as I have sometimes seen on the finaid board. (the admit/reject) scenario which sometimes happens with schools with less aid to offer.</p>
<p>It is a situation with a difference in price of less than the cost of an instate flagship education. </p>
<p>this matters, too, imho.</p>
<p>If this was say, Uchicago full pay vs. USD, it would be a very different conversation, as well. People would be finding great things to say about USD. So, the variables are being considered well, imho.</p>
<p>P57, where did anyone say Yale students were superior as people?</p>
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<p>No. This is the chip on your shoulder talking.</p>
<p>Some children have superior learning abilities.
Some schools are superior learning environments.</p>
<p>The question is: are the superior learners better off attending the superior learning environments? Many of us seem to think so. Though some iconoclasts might not. The disagreements are mostly about whether the difference is worth the extra $$.</p>
<p>Re post 215:</p>
<p>I can’t find it, but I believe that somewhere early in this thread is a statement that at Yale a student will be surrounded by “the best and the brightest”. It seems to me that a whole lot of rancor could have been avoided by inserting the word “some” at the beginning of the clause. I’m sure the poster, whoever it was (and assuming my memory is correct) does, in fact, acknowledge that some of the “best and the brightest” can be found at other schools. I hope so anyway, since one of mine is–in his mother’s unbiased opinion–among the BandB, and he didn’t bother to apply to HYP because he wasn’t interested.</p>
<p>Lots of BandB aren’t interested in applying to HYP. In the Midwest, plenty of the BandB go to their state flagship without a second thought. I’m sure that’s the same in Ca with all the UCs to choose from.</p>
<p>I think the BandB who bothers to apply to Yale is signaling that indeed, he’d like to surround himself with some other of the BandB in a way that the BandB who just picks the obvious choice doesn’t. Some kids want or need a big pool of fellow BandB to succeed. Others don’t. I’m biased in that I would have been miserable without a large contingent of BandB around me, and I’ve probably projected t hat to my kids.</p>