<p>This may seem like a silly question, but which school should I choose? I’m going in as BME and I want to get a minor in finance. I’m also pre-med. I recently visited Case and was really impressed by it facilities and campus, and I can pay 17k less. Case is also renowned for its BME and it’s business school is pretty good. It’s also affiliated with Cleveland Clinic. Columbia does have prestige…but is it worth that much more money in this scenario?</p>
<p>17k total or 17k per year? If it’s per year then you should crunch the loan/finance numbers into and thru med school and see what comes out the other side. If it were me, I’d get that ME degree and move on to Columbia for grad school. That extra 68k+ plus you save can more than help you with the grad school costs.</p>
<p>One question though; ME is a fair amount of work as is med school are you looking to somehow combine the two(which would be interesting) or is it that you just can’t decide between the 2 careers/passions atm?</p>
<p>Yeah, it’s 17k per year extra. I chose BME because out of all the majors, that’s what I’m most interested in. But, I do want to become a neurologist, so although I probably won’t become an engineer, hopefully my major will help me out a bit in that path. I just can’t figure out if Columbia’s prestige and such is worth such money. (Also, it may be easier to get into a med school in New York if I go to Columbia…I don’t know if that is true.)</p>
<p>Wherever you attend, I’d caution against majoring in BME or any engineering discipline if you’re pre-professionally oriented. The fact remains that engineering is rigorous, time-consuming, and harshly graded. </p>
<p>When the time comes to apply, medical schools will try to account for the rigor of engineering. However, most people, the admissions committee included, don’t see much of a difference between Biochemistry and Biomedical Engineering. BME GPA’s at Columbia are 0.4-0.5 lower than comparable Biology-related majors. All things equal, what are the chances that a medical school is going to accept a 3.2 BME major over a 3.7 Biochemistry major?</p>
<p>Please don’t study engineering unless you’re genuinely passionate about the subject, i.e. willing to pursue a Ph. D, or are looking for a career in industry. Trying to use engineering as a stepping stone is a painful and needless experience.</p>
<p>My girlfriend’s boyfriend is an OB/GYN who went to Columbia undergrad. He said emphatically, that he thought Columbia was wasted money for undergrad. He recommended doing really well at “lesser” colleges and scoring well on mcats. That said, having a son is is leaning towards Case and has taken classes at Collumbia, it is a world of difference as far as campuses and environment. Columbia doesn’t have much of a campus and is pretty much all business. The neighborhood is less to be desired. But Columbia is IVY league! diverse and in NYC (but you need a subway ride to downtown - which is a turn off to some). Case is a beautiful campus with lots of cultural offerings, 3 hospitals on campus, so you can get lots of experience there. The official designation of urban, is no where the same “urban” like Columbia. To us New Yorkers, it is very suburban in feel, population and beautifulness (is that word?) Anyway, hope this helps.</p>
<p>Columbia without a doubt; college is an investment and Columbia is orders of magnitude better than Case.</p>
<p>Columbia.</p>
<p>It is worth the extra money.</p>
<p>If you want to be a doctor, do not attend Columbia SEAS. You really don’t know how hard engineering is until you matriculate and start taking 3000-4000 classes your junior year. At Columbia, you can’t transfer unless you fill out a complete application, i.e. transcript, SAT scores, and recommendations. Trust me, being pre-professional while being an engineer is tough, and many of my friends who would have applied to medical school can no longer pursue that route because their GPA’s, though average for their departments, is much to low to be considered for medical school. </p>
<p>Please, I implore you not to consider engineering as a stepping stone to a career in non-quantitative finance, medicine, or non-patent law. Your GPA and your health will suffer as a result. There’s no feeling like endlessly spinning your wheels working on tough proof-based assignments knowing that this will most likely be the one and only time that you will see or use this material. Seriously, even if Columbia were free, I’d lean towards Case because of this reason, unless Case has as stringent a transfer policy as Columbia.</p>