<p>@spuding102:
It’s my own personal list (and yes, heavily influenced by Wall Street recruiting as well as access to opportunity in Silicon Valley and entrepreneurship as well as a strong alumni network). I’ll have a bigger post up later, but</p>
<p>Tier 0 (tippy top & full pay): Stanford, Princeton, Harvard, Wharton (UPenn), Dartmouth, MIT (in that order)</p>
<p>Tier 0.5: Chicago, Columbia, Yale, CalTech</p>
<p>Tier 1 (3/4 pay): Harvey Mudd, Northwestern, Cal, USC, Amherst, Williams, Swarthmore, Cornell, Brown, Duke, Rice, non-Wharton Penn, (McDonough) Georgetown, CS@CMU, Ross (UMich), CS@Illinois, CS@UDub, Stern (NYU), Oxbridge, Keio, Waseda</p>
<p>In terms of employment opportunity after school, Oxbridge is a half or full tier up, but I don’t believe that English or Japanese university <em>education</em> can match the best schools in the States. Likewise, in terms of opportunity after school, Chicago probably belongs in that mass in Tier 1, but it’s the only school that I raise up solely due to education. USC and Dartmouth, meanwhile, jump a half to full tier based solely on their alumni network. If there was a tier above the very top, Stanford and Princeton would jump as well due to their alumni network. Columbia is there instead of Tier 1 only because of the opportunities from being in NYC (also why Stern is in Tier 1 instead of lower).</p>
<p>In reality, I’d probably relent and do full-pay for all the Tier 1 places as well, but I’d want more say on the selection of majors (CS, stats, econ, becoming fluent in a couple foreign languages, or maybe something business-y) as I feel only some are worthwhile for that cost.</p>
<p>If they want to study whatever they want, they can always earn a full-tuition/full-ride scholarship to somewhere. The $120K or so that I’ve budgeted for them will be saved in case they can’t find a job with an anthropology degree and need to get a masters in something that allows them to support themselves.</p>