<p>Some background, a high school friend asked me for help deciding on colleges to apply to. Although she’s applying as an engineering major (partially to appease her father who’s a STEM uber alles), her real passion lies in economics and finance. She was on my academic decathlon team and scored the highest of anyone in econ as a freshman. Since then, she’s taken a formal econ course as well as done bookkeeping for a local vodka company. </p>
<p>Since that’s out of the way, here are her stats and financial information:
UW GPA: 3.75
UC GPA (weighted but excludes fluff classes): 4.2
SAT:~1800
ACT: 28
Afford: $30,000 (she’s an only child and her parents have saved for college since she was born)</p>
<p>Colleges that she’s visited but hated:
Cal Poly SLO
UCSD
UC Santa Cruz
UC Davis</p>
<p>Colleges that she’s liked
UCLA
UCSB
San Diego State</p>
<p>Colleges that she doesn’t want to consider:
-Ohio State University
-University of Alabama
-University of Puget Sound (too small although liked the business emphasis)
-Loyola Marymount University</p>
<p>Colleges that she’s applying to in addition to the ones she’s liked:
-UMass Amherst
-University of South Carolina
-University of Oklahoma
-Oregon State University
-University of Georgia</p>
<p>Does anyone have any additional suggestions? She prefers medium to larger schools anywhere in the country.</p>
<p>She’ll consider UGa which consists of nearly all instate students, but she won’t consider Alabama which has a ton of OOS students? Plus she’s from Calif and Calif is #5 in sending students to Bama. </p>
<p>Believe me, I’ve told her all about why I think Alabama is the second best school in the SEC for a high achieving OOS student… I can understand why she’s looking at South Carolina (boss graduated from there), but the UGA obsession befuddles me. </p>
<p>Also thanks for the Santa Clara suggestion. Do you think she’d get enough writ to bring the COA to a decent level? </p>
<p>If do more research, but I’m currently swamped with course work.</p>
<p>Has she looked at Industrial Engineering? It’s a very effective way of getting into Finance and Financial Consulting, but via STEM (working with economic and financial systems) . If so, Georgia Tech would be a better option than UGA.</p>
<p>It’s also fairly easy to switch from IE to Finance, since many of your first year courses are similar (Macro/Micro Econ, etc…). It’s not uncommon for IE’s who specialize in financial systems to go on and get a MS in Finance or a MBA (especially if they go into consulting). Finally, schools that have decent IE programs, will typically have decent Finance programs.</p>
<p>GT won’t be affordable since she won’t get any merit with a 28.</p>
<p>Santa Clara may not give enough merit to get it down to $30k with an ACT 28. My mistake. For some reason I was thinking that the parents had saved $30k per year, and would also contribute some out of current income. </p>
<p>With an ACT 28, her CS options are more limited if the goal is to get costs down to $30k and go OOS. ASU or UAz might work. Miss State would, too, but I don’t think a Calif girl would fit in too well there…not enough geographical diversity there…and in the middle of NOWHERE…but very nice campus. </p>
<p>USanDiego tries to get costs down to the UC level, but I don’t know if a 30+ is needed.</p>
<p>I don’t think she would like UGA. Since nearly all students live instate, I would imagine that TOO MANY go home on weekends when there isn’t a home game or something else to keep them on campus.</p>
<p>Gator88NE: I’ll suggest IE. I know there are four girls in my sorority who are doing IE and most have had excellent internships even though my school is low ranked for the field. I’ll ask them how appropriate they think IE is for a girl who seems somewhat burned out by the hard sciences although loves business. </p>
<p>M2CK: I’ll suggest University of Arizona although I don’t think her father would go for ASU (he went there and had an awful experience with unmotivated students, constant partying, etc even though he was in a heavy weed out major). If she can get into Barrett, he might be willing to consider it. Mississippi State is definitely a no go. Interesting suggestion about USD. I’ll talk to her about it. After all, who wouldn’t want to be in San Diego for four years? </p>
<p>I disagree about the UGA thing. I’ve been to the school a couple of times, once on the weekend during the school year and once ten days after UGA let out. Though there were far fewer things to do in Athens when class wasn’t in session, it wasn’t totally dead and during the school year the town and school were very vibrant. Of the UGA students I’ve worked with none have reported a suitcase feel (the same cannot be said for most of the other non Tech/ Emory schools in the state). </p>
<p>Here are some other schools I’ve thought about:
-Iowa State
-SUNY Buffalo
-Gonzaga University
-Depaul University</p>
<p>Anyone want to comment on those or have any further suggestions?</p>