Cornell vs UVA (Debt vs No Debt)

Proud3894
Tue, 28 Apr 2015 10:55:11 +0000

My son entered Cornell as a chemistry major (pre-med) in CAS. He realized after his first semester that becoming a medical doctor was not for him so he contacted COE in regards to transferring to ChemE. In order to affiliate into ChemE, successful completion of three or four classes including honors Physical Chemistry was required. He was able to graduate in four years (2013) even having taken three graduate level classes in ChemE with a solid GPA with minimal AP credits. There were many sleepless nights preparing for Cornell’s very demanding COE requirements.
Son’s upper level classes were augmented with internships at two different internships.

He’s become an outstanding engineer performing complex technical assignments previously assigned to senior level engineers and consultants.

In hindsight, even with these great results, I would be very apprehensive to encourage my son to graduate with $60K - $75K of student loans. My goal was to have my son graduate with no more than $20K in school debt. He had three available options that met our goal including our state flagship and Vanderbilt. We were blessed with the Cornell offer which included significant credit to eliminate all student loans, the student contribution portion, and work study due to an outside reoccurring scholarship. This enabled him to graduate debt free (parents included)). I realize that most outside scholarships are non-reoccurring but if you are awarded such then take full advantage of it.

He will be getting married in two months. I shudder to think about his impending marriage if he and his future wife had accumulated $120K+ in debt even with an excellent salary.

If after all of your research leads you to attend Cornell based on your desired goals I would recommend taking a personal finance class to manage your finances. Son took this class and has reaped wonderful benefits.