Yale or full ride to usd

Parent Cafe
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<p>That’s really the case for ANY of these “got money at school Y, but no money / not as much as school Z” threads. Having said that, I think the quality differentials also need to be evaluated in light of price differentials. For anyone who isn’t wealthy, I think a fair case can be made that a full-ride to USD versus full-pay to Yale (with significant sacrifice to the family - not just cutting a few corners here and there) … hey, grab the money and run. I think the case becomes a little different as the price differential narrows between the two AND if the family has more money to spare.</p>

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<p>Not so.</p>

<p>Yale is ranked #3, American is #15, and USD is not on the list of top 20, which is a far as it goes.</p>

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<p>Close relative graduated from Yale and went to Med School. Liked Yale, but said he wished he would have gone to state U saving parents money since most of his fellow med students were from state Us and he detected no advantage from having attended Yale.</p>

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<p>My impression is that at med school, everyone is starting at such ground zero anyway that there is little differentiation between the Yale grad and the Nondescript State U grad. In one sense, it’s almost like the military – it matters not where you came from, they are going to put you through their own paces at their speed.</p>

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<p>^^^ This is correct.</p>

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<p>OP, have you talked with Yale about their financial aid offer? Sometimes, schools can sweeten the pot when they learn more about your family’s situation and your son’s commitment.</p>

<p>Note, it appears Yale pays a minimum wage of $11.50 per hour for student work vs. $8-9 for entry level at USD.</p>

<p>Regarding your son’s interest in medical school, what if he changes his mind? Many kids start out in one major and graduate with a different degree altogether. Does USD offer the desired academic environment to support other possible degree plans? From both schools’ Common Data Sets, it appears the majority of USD students are in career-placement majors:</p>

<p>USD Degree Distribution
38.8% Business
10.8% Communications
37.8% Liberal Arts
12.7% STEM (science, technology, engineering & math)</p>

<p>Yale Degree Distribution
0% Business
0% Communications
68% Liberal Arts
20% STEM
2% Architecture
10% Interdisciplinary</p>

<p>Regarding the honors program at USD, as described on their website, it appears to be focused on interdisciplinary studies culminating in a senior thesis. Is that appealing to your son? Is he confident about his ability to make top grades in a program heavily dependent on writing? Although there are some holistic features to med school admissions, GPA and MCAT score are the driving factors. </p>

<p>Here are a few more basic Common Data Set-type facts I would consider if I were in your son’s shoes. For starters, I think it is striking that:</p>

<p>– The retail sticker price of Yale is only $3,720 more than USD (for tuition, fees and room/board, Yale is $52,700 vs. $48,980 for USD). Before factoring in financial aid and your family’s personal economics, do you agree or disagree that the “fair market value” of a USD education is 93% of Yale’s FMV? What credits/discounts would you make in arriving at a customized, “true value” of each institution to your son? </p>

<p>– The undergraduate populations are very similar in size, with Yale at 5,275 vs. 5,388 at USD. Comparing the composition of the roughly 5,300 student bodies and how they’re being served:</p>

<p>1-Yale’s full time teacher:student ratio is 6:1 (904 FT undergrad faculty). USD’s is 15:1 (366 FT undergrad faculty).</p>

<p>2-Yale’s 6-year graduation rate is 98%. USD’s is 74%. </p>

<p>3-USD is a fairly tuition-dependent institution. It derives 64% of operating revenue from student income and has a $260 million endowment. Yale’s student income is 8%, and it is backed by a $16.5 billion endowment.</p>

<p>4-Neither institution awards National Merit scholarships. Nonetheless, per the latest NMSC annual report, 224 National Merit scholars matriculated at Yale vs. zero at USD. 96% of Yale’s incoming freshmen graduated in the top 10% of their class. 42% of USD’s were ranked top 10%. The middle 50% of Yale freshmen scored in the 2120-2390 range on the SAT. At USD, the range is 1670-1950. (I understand your son is in an honors program composed of exceptional students with high stats. Has he been able to determine how many of his classes will be honors? What is the general intellectual vibe on campus as reflected in the student newspaper, clubs and activities, etc.? How important or not is the overall peer group to your son?)</p>

<p>5-52% of the USD student body is from California. There is no similar majority at Yale. Both campuses enroll nearly one-third minority students, although USD naturally serves more Hispanic students, thus fewer African American and Asian students. 5% are international at USD vs. 13% at Yale. </p>

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<p>Obviously, I just pulled a bunch of info and data off the Yale and USD websites. I don’t pretend to be an expert in interpreting it or drawing inferences and conclusions applicable to your family’s situation. I simply desired to highlight some of the specific issues I’d rate as important to your analysis as the overarching “Ivy elite vs. regional Catholic school” conundrum.</p>

<p>The only right decision here is what’s right for your son consistent with your family values and what your family economics can bear. In the end, I do believe all of our children can rise to the top and live a full and happy life no matter where they matriculate. </p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

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<p>Poetgirl - The ivy leaguers must be enjoying the surrounding B and Bs because they are being visited by the Bold and the Beautiful.</p>

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<p>I probably won’t add anything that will help OP but I thought I’d through in our experience with USD. (Also a little about U of A for another poster)</p>

<p>My son was a part of the USD Symphony from age 12-15, took a year off, and now there’s no symphony but the conductor has started a community orchestra with a few USD students and lots of community members and my oldest and now my middle son are in this orchestra. The practices are on the USD campus so we’ve spent considerable time on campus.</p>

<p>The campus is beautiful and overlooks both San Diego Mission Bay and the Pacific Ocean. The weather in San Diego is divine. It tends to be cool to moderate all year round on campus. The campus is midsized and easy to get around on.</p>

<p>As far as it being Catholic, well, while you might find some Catholic students, I refer to the school as a liberal secular campus. Anyone of any or no faith would feel fine there. The concertmaster of the symphony a few years ago was openly homosexual and there was no problem with that.</p>

<p>The students tend to be from wealthier families. It’s an expensive school and I’ve seen many kids come and go because they couldn’t afford to stay.</p>

<p>Academics seem weak to me. We did meet a math professor a number of years ago and he seemed good and his coursework strong but by and large, I wouldn’t classify the student body as particularly studious. There are a number of athletes that get full rides and we know of a very talented musician/biology major who got a full ride there, as well.</p>

<p>I would never want my sons to attend USD. They’ve had a great experience with the orchestra and people are nice. Weather is great, campus is pretty and I’d never want my kids there as students.</p>

<p>Yale isn’t appealing to me for a number of reasons but based on the info the OP gave, if weather wasn’t an issue at Yale, I would definitely try to make Yale work. </p>

<p>Re. someone choosing between Stanford and U of A, I’m not a fan of U of A unless your kid knows for sure they want optics or med school. Tucson’s mountains are beautiful, the heat is dry, but U of A is just so-so. Tucson and Palo Alto are probably equal in how liberal they are as well as the diversity.</p>

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<p>Took time off from the thread for Easter festivities, but I’ll take a stab at defending the “best” part of BandB. The first year I discovered CC, I read a post in which someone made a comment to the effect of “talented slackers are a dime a dozen.” Unless your father is President of the US, or is filthy rich, you simply can’t get into schools like Yale without being BOTH smart and hard-working and there are far fewer of those students. </p>

<p>Being surrounded by diligent, responsible people is every bit as important as being surrounded by merely smart people. Also, IMO, character does enter into the equation. Being hard-working shows that the student on some level acknowleges s/he has been blessed with academic and other talents and understands that to whom much is given, much will be required. The student recognizes his moral or societal obligation to properly utilize the gifts he has been given. He or she also probably yields to the authority of parents and teachers. In that sense, this awareness is actually the opposite of arrogance and elitism. An arrogant person believes what’s his is his and he can do whatever the heck he wants with it. He can squander his time and talent goofing off if he wants to, and no one–not mom or dad or the math teacher-- should tell him he can’t.</p>

<p>What was the difference between my D and other bright kids at her high school? Not brains, but the application of those brains. While she was studying and struggling through the hardest classes, they were hanging out, going to the mall, and watcing American Idol and some were drinking and smoking pot on weekends. And what was the difference between my D and others on her sports teams? Not talent, but hours of dedicated practice. For example, she actually ran those distance runs, while her teammates skipped out to mall near the school and relaxed at the coffee shop and played video games in the electronics store, or skipped out to rest in the houses of kids who lived near the high school. Excuse me, but that IS a character issue, and my D for one, wanted to be in a college and on a college team with people who care and want to use well their God-given gifts.</p>

<p>Yes, some kids do work very hard and don’t achieve Ivy-caliber accomplishments. However, a number of recent studies have shown that talent is highly overrated. Hard work and proper practice weigh more heavily. </p>

<p>Not all kids accepted to elite schools have good character, but as pointed out, they had to have convinced 2 teachers and a guidance counselor that they do. That’s saying something, at least.</p>

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<p>I think GFG raises some good points, but I would modify it a bit. There are a lot of very smart, hardworking students with excellent grades and scores. Elite schools take a lot of these students, but they don’t take all of them. There are plenty of them at honors programs, smaller schools, regional schools, etc.</p>

<p>But there are other students who are also smart and hardworking, but who are also highly accomplished in areas outside academics–music, arts, community service, leadership, other areas. Prizewinners, kids who have done research, written books, etc. In my opinion, elite colleges get more than their share of these kids–indeed, these are the ones that they are looking for with their holistic admissions. Going to school with people like that is (again, in my opinion) one of the chief benefits of going someplace like Yale. It doesn’t have much to do with moral character, I suppose–if that’s the primary concern, I think I’d probably put the service academies at the top of the pile, perhaps followed by schools with a big tradition of public service.</p>

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<p>I would agree with you in theory, but there are simply too many hs senior CC-ers who appear to be racking up accomplishments because of “how they’ll look to colleges” versus a sincere desire to do X activity, and too many hs senior CC-ers who are looking at elite colleges as their entry ticket to Wall Street riches rather than as neat places to grow, discover, learn from others, have new experiences. I don’t see a lot of humility and “to whom much has been given, much is expected” out of that. (Which is not to say that it is wrong for such a student to want to succeed financially – just that it doesn’t seem to exemplify the “to whom much has been given” attitude.)</p>

<p>I would also add that there are enough examples of boorish behavior at elite schools just like any other school (the Yale DKE thing, strippers at lacrosse parties at Duke, etc.) that I can’t really make any kind of great case that students at these schools are necessarily of better <em>character</em> than students at “lesser” schools. They might be more academically smart, they might be more driven, but I’m not quite sure I can agree that they are uniformly of better <em>character.</em></p>

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<p>I don’t think anyone has spoken up for the residential college system at Yale, but to me that’s also a huge factor. It’s not just that you are surrounded by accomplished undergrads, but that the non-academic part of the college is also designed to foster making connections both with each other and faculty outside the classroom.</p>

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<p>PG, I didn’t say they were uniformly of better character. I merely stated that I believe there IS a character component to being hard-working, and that few students gain entrance to top schools without being hard-working. That doesn’t stop them from being greedy or self-centered or intemperate or filled with any other vice common to man. But it probably does mean they did a pretty decent job of keeping that vice under wraps.</p>

<p>As a parent, I’d probably still rather my child spend time with the kid who’s racking up EC’s just to get into a top school, than the kid who spends his whole weekend playing video games. For one thing, I believe that being ambitious provides some–not complete–deterrance to stupid, illegal behavior. Felons don’t tend to land great jobs, and good students can’t spend their lives drunk if they want to earn a GPA high enough for med school or law school. Boorish behavior can be found on elite school campuses, to be sure. But I suspect there’s much worse at the local state U.</p>

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<p>I have decided to go along with the politically correct thing to say here. </p>

<p>Never mind. Best not to say.</p>

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I’d agree that ambition can provide a deterrence to stupid illegal behavior. But excessive raw ambition can also provide an impetus for intelligent illegal (or at least morally questionable) behavior. Not that I think this is the norm, but I assume everyone is aware of some recent and not-so-recent examples. In most cases I think morality and ambition are separate and fairly unrelated character traits.</p>

<p>I think to generalize without evidence is unfair to students at both state colleges and elite colleges. Many students at state schools are ex-servicepeople, or adults raising a family. I’m sure it’s not all “Spring Break Cancun.”</p>

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<p>It’s also quite possible that the USD students are hard-working, but just don’t have the academic chops (in the aggregate) that the Yale students have. Lots of people work mighty hard and diligently for their B’s.</p>

<p>Again, no dog in USD here - I know nothing about it other than its name and the fact that a friend of mine has a D who got a full ride there. I suppose what I’d look for if I were making this decision and the cost differential was daunting was the overall vibe of USD. After all, a school can be a serious school for the B student or a party school for the B student.</p>

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It’s pretty easy to go along with something when you make it up yourself.</p>

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<p>I didn’t say that! I agree there is a character component to hard work – but I can’t really evaluate whether USD students have that in the aggregate in any meaningfully different way vs Yale students without knowing more about the school in question. I mean, honestly - if we were talking Arizona State, I’d say “no” - that’s a pretty well-known party school and my experience with it tells me that in the aggregate, it doesn’t attract students who take their academics seriously – Barrett Honors notwithstanding. I know nothing about USD to make that kind of generalization one way or the other. There are places without the academic chops of Yale where the students take their studies seriously (but just aren’t at Yale-caliber academically) and there are places without the academic chops of Yale where hey, it’s a good time and maybe I’ll go to class once in a while.</p>

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<p>Dang! I edited out the most childish part of this post, then VP removed almost all of his/her post and now this post makes absolutely zero sense. Not exactly a first, I know.</p>

<p>I’m climbing back out of this thread.</p>

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<p>PG I was not responding to your post. </p>

<p>I was just responding to the general unwillingness of some on this thread to concede that at some point, the differential in quality between some colleges is just too great to ignore.</p>

<p>I think I will just stay away from this thread.</p>

<p>Sorry about that, bovertine. I decided to exercise better judgement. And my right to edit.</p>