<p>Let me correct your original request. It should read “…help convince me which school is better for me.” All of those schools are very good for engineering and produce many successful graduates each year.</p>
<p>Rose-Hulman stands out to me as the smallest school by a long shot in that list. Pros: Small, personal classes, all taught by professors. The focus on undergraduate engineering education. Cons: Not as much diversity. No D-I sporting events. Not easy to blend in in the crowd.</p>
<p>It is also the only school that offers only engineering, math, and science majors. Pros: If you want to participate in extracurriculars, you will only be competing with people in the same boat as you, as far as workload and academic commitment goes. This also opens up opportunities that may not be open at other schools (i.e. no Fine Arts majors to do drama/music, no Journalism majors to run the newspaper, all that is done by engineers at RH). The other benefit is that means that the school does everything tailored to you the engineer. Cons: If you decide to change major to non-engineering, math, science you have to transfer schools.</p>
<p>Aside from UIUC, I visited all those schools when I was in HS. RH is far and away the most rural of them all. UM, GT, and Purdue are all located more or less in downtown environments in large cities. RH is located on the outskirts of Terre Haute and within a 5 minute drive of ample shopping and restaurants. Pros: Safer, friendlier, more open campus. Cons: You can’t walk to entertainment districts and shopping.</p>
<p>UM, UIUC, Purdue, and GT are, for most intents and purposes. All have good engineering programs, all are large, all are urban campuses, all are D-I, all have many other programs besides engineering. Financial aid, geography, and specific opportunities within your chosen field of study are going to be about the only distinguishing factors there. I highly encourage you to visit Rose if you are interested as well as many of those others as you are able to. That is the best way to determine if the school is better for you.</p>