<p>Where someone trained, however, is where they did their residency (or fellowship). Not where they went to medical school or undergrad.</p>
<p>“Agree with PG. Wash U is well-known and highly respected in the Midwest.”</p>
<p>Right. I just get so tired of the “no one will know X … they’ll confuse it with Y and Z” types of threads. Uh, there are areas in which no one will know Y and Z either. </p>
<p>Really (and I say this as someone with two cousins who went to GWU, and whose son visited / considered it) – there’s hardly anyone I know around here who even knows what GWU is, so to say “WashU would be confused with GWU” is just silly when GWU is close to unknown in many areas.</p>
<p>thanks, bclintonk.</p>
<p>I have a relative who claims his s’s 3rd tier public directional U (a county extension) was “better than Harvard” b/c it got mentioned in that category a year or so ago. In fact, its still on that list, and Harvard isn’t there at all! Oh my-- he will be insufferable! </p>
<p>MiamiDAP- I am NOT comparing you to my relative. He is truly in a class by himself! But your statement rung very similar to his, and sorry, but I don’t think too many people are going to pick his regional/directional 3rd tier state school over Harvard :rolleyes:</p>
<p>In fairness, the school has improved a lot (not currently listed as 3rd tier like it was not long ago) but not exactly in Harvard league on many fronts</p>
<p>** edit-- they changed the “tier” requirements. If it was done this year as it was in 2008 (I dont have the 2009 or 2010 issues) the current 2011 ranking would still put that school in the third tier of 2008. The tier rankings are totally different now. Then, schools ranked 131-187 were third tier. Now schools ranked through 191 are still first tier???</p>
<p>jym626, if it is school I’m thinking of not far from you, rumors have been rampant for awhile now that school is going to be equal to the state flagship in 10 years. I don’t see that happening, but stranger things have happened.</p>
<p>No-- this school is in another state, far from here.</p>
<p>Oh, well the one I am talking about I think was on that same list, HS friends of D couldn’t stop talking about how they are just as good a Harvard!</p>
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<p>Change it to “here in Illinois” and I’d agree with you. Here in Minnesota there’s not much awareness of or interest in Wash U. Very few Minnesota kids apply, and most Minnesotans have never heard of it. I looked at some of these numbers a while ago. You can identify regional variations in a school’s reputation by examining how many kids send their SAT score reports to the school. Wash U has a huge following in Missouri and a slightly smaller but still substantial following in Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Arkansas. That’s about it. Unless you plan to be in one of those places I wouldn’t choose it for the name recognition. But then, that’s true for most top schools except HYPSM and to a lesser extent the “other” Ivies. I would choose Wash U for the education, however.</p>
<p>The question, really, is what does one think one is buying? If reputation by virtue of rankings, it is likely only of interest to the very few people who 1) have heard of the place, 2) care, and 3) use that information in any particular way. In my experience, that is desperately few (and, as others have noted, even with med school admissions, the top student at 2nd tier state u will likely have more internships, more personal contacts, more research opportunities than that very same student, now middling, at prestige u., and will likely do as well or better getting in.)</p>
<p>Second possibility is that one hopes to be buying a better education. If by education, one means better professors, maybe so, maybe not. Will depend on subject area of interest. If by education one means more intelligent student body, then possibly - except that the honors programs at many prestige state universities has student bodies that match up well with the more prestigious privates, and will often have greater opportunities for those so designated.</p>
<p>Better jobs? IF (as in #1) the employer has heard of the place, it might help - for a first job. I sit on hiring committees pretty often - and I can’t even begin to tell you how often we have turned down Ivy applicants and the like in favor of UCal-Irvine, UOklahoma, and Brigham Young (which is getting awfully hard to get into these days.) We ask “what can you do for us today?”, not, “what got you into prestige u. when you were 18?”</p>
<p>Living on the east coast, midwest (Chicago), and west coast, I have never met anyone who went to WashU as an undergrad (did know one doctor), so I have absolutely no way of judging what a degree from there is worth, relative to others, except that if it appeared on a job applicant’s sheet, it wouldn’t do particularly much for me. Most of what I’ve learned about WashU, I’ve got from this board, or the boatload of promotional mail!</p>
<p>But then my younger one is at American U., and a standard response when she tells folks is, “Which one?”</p>
<p>Is this a debate on whether this student should apply to Wash U? The answer is yes, he should apply there.</p>
<p>When the parent says the student is likely to be admitted to Wash U, is that because the high school’s Naviance shows that kids from this school with grades and scores like his are usually admitted there? Our H.S. guidance counselors have found it somewhat hard to predict who will be admitted there.</p>
<p>The debate on whether the student should GO to Wash U can occur after he is accepted to Wash U and his other safeties, matches and reaches. There will be other factors to consider, including finances and where else he has been accepted.</p>
<p>Mini - American is on my son’s list. None of us had ever heard of it before beginning a college search.</p>
<p>jym…,
Your opinion has no relevance at this point. First, ranking was done by professionals. Second my D. is college senior, who has a spot at Med. School, and nothing else is relevant, since most who strated as pre-meds will never reach this point. She would have not been where she is now if she went to Harvard.</p>
<p>You misunderstand,miamiadap. My observations were about my insufferable BIL, not you</p>