IBM Co-op in Germany or University in the US?

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Hey everyone, I’m an American student studying in an International School abroad. Right now I’m deciding between going to Europe versus the traditional US college route. I’d love to hear perspectives on my case.

I was just recently accepted into a paid tech co-op (Duales Studium) bachelor’s program in Business Informatics at IBM in Germany.

It’s a structured, paid program that alternates between 3 months of theory at a university of applied sciences/Berufsakademie and 3 months of practical rotations at IBM. It seems like a strong, direct career pipeline into the tech/business field, albeit with a lesser known school that no one knows outside of Europe. I’m already at a C1 German level, so the language isn’t the main hurdle. I get paid 1500 euros a month and that isn’t even counting housing benefits yet. After graduating and working for a further two years, I will qualify for German citizenship, which is also a long-term plus.

I could attend a US university too, but I would have to take on significant student loans to cover the tuition, as my parents, although making around 250,000 USD per year, don’t want to spend at all on my tuition, meaing I have a budget constraint of around $25,000 USD per year and have to take out loans for the rest. I’m contemplating the idea that the education quality or opportunities (especially campus culture and networking) in the US might be better, but the financial difference is enormous.

My question is: Given the financial situations, would you take the paid and practically-focused program in Germany, or risk the debt for what might be a better education/experience in the States?

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Stats for US
US citizen applying from international
State/Location of residency: Maine, lived there for 5 years
Type of high school (or current college for transfers): international school
Other special factors: none
Cost Constraints / Budget
25,000 usd per year

Intended Major(s)

GPA, Rank, and Test Scores

Unweighted HS GPA: 3.8
Weighted HS GPA: 3.94/4.3 (ap class 0.5 bump)
Class Rank: n/a
ACT/SAT Scores: 1460 (700 EBRW / 760 Math) retake in December
List your HS coursework

(Indicate advanced level, such as AP, IB, AICE, A-level, or college, courses as well as specifics in each subject)

English: AP Lit AP lang
Math: Ap Calc AB, Calc C
Science: bio, chem, ap physics 1, ap bio, ap csp
History and social studies: ap macro, ap psych, humanities
Language other than English: Self-taught to C1 level german, self-took ap german, french 3, native chinese equivalent course
Visual or performing arts: band, tuba,
Other academic courses: linguistics, chinese history
College Coursework (Transfer Applicants)
(Include college courses taken while in high school if not included above.)

General education course work:n/a
Major preparation course work:n/a
Awards

ap scholar with distinction
international linguistics olympiad merit

Extracurriculars
Magazine President, lauching digital platform, advised by AP Lang teacher
Center back in Varsity Soccer
V6/V7 in Climbing/Bouldering
University-affiliated Research in Language technology project
Tuba in concert band; member of a cappella group
Co-published in juridical blog with internaitonal police on fake document prevention
Self-taught German to C1; taught weekly beginner German sessions
Ambassador for Chinese-German Youth Exchange
Ambassador of the Internaional Community at Cultural Exchange Charity Event of the German Embassy.
Organized school exchange programs and school Open Day events
Family Responsibility: caregiver for younger sister

(Include leadership, summer activities, competitions, volunteering, and work experience)

Essays/LORs/Other
AP Lang teacher (also magazine advisor) (8.5/10)
French & Linguistics teacher (8/10)
Counselor (9/10)

Personal statement + Bowdoin supplements completed. Self-rated: 8/10
wrote about navigating sexuality in supp

Schools
(List of colleges by your initial chance estimate; designate if applying ED/EA/RD; if unsure, leave them unclassified)

considering ED2 to Bowdoin College (no ed1 schools)

EA: UMich, U of Maine, UIUC, St. Olaf, Colorado College, Oberlin

RD: UPenn, Maclester, Colby, Bates, Amherst

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Can you share what your career goals are after you graduate college? Are you looking to major in business if you choose the U.S. route? If you are planning to stay in Europe, I’d definitely go with the German route.

Looking at your U.S. school list, how many of those are actually affordable? My guess is none of them. Realistically, you’d need a different list.

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Why do you need so many loans in the US? Do you not qualify for need?

Why would you apply to schools you can’t afford? And I see very few on your list that stand out for some type of informatics.

That you can go for free and get experience will matter far more than any name below, even Penn.

So from an overall, taking out where you want to be, POV, the program in Germany is far superior.

Experience begets education and you’ll have both.

If you come to the US, you need to start with a budget - and then find schools within that budget. Is that U Maine - you claim you get residency.

So that’s what I think at first blanche.

btw - a lot of German educated folks are in our country.

Good luck.

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Can I qualify for need-based aid even with a $250,000 USD yearly income? My intended US majors are Linguistics and German, and I’d likely specialize in Computational Linguistics for my Master’s.

Even for Penn? I don’t think it’s true that a Co-Op would have more opportunities than an Ivy League grad. That doesn’t seem plausible.

Regarding U of Maine, their policy is vague: they require applicants to have lived in Maine for one year prior to application, and residency is evaluated with other factors. Since our permanent US residency is in Maine, I’m registered to vote in Maine, and all years I’ve lived in Maine were for non-educational purposes, I would think I qualify as a resident.

Thank you!

5

I’d like to work with computational linguistics. So for bachelors I’d think like Linguistics or German.

Do you mind sharing some schools that are affordable? Is cornell college an option?

6

Cornell College is in Iowa, with a cost around 71k/year. If you are referring to the Ivy League school Cornell University, it will cost over 90k/year if you are not eligible for financial aid. You need to run the Net Price Calculators at every school you plan on applying to, especially your ED2 choice.

To get to a budget of 25k/year, you need to look at schools that offer big merit money. There are others here who can offer some suggestions.

FWIW, the Germany option is looking like a strong choice if you have budget issues at U.S. schools. Just my opinion.

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7

$250K may qualify for some, based on assets, at the highest level schools.

Even for Penn - in my opinion, yes? I’d also say, you’re not getting into Penn with the stats you put up (sorry).

If you only have a budget of $25K a year, you’d have to borrow - $275-300K to go to Penn. Total. Thank goodness the government limits you to 1/10 of that.

So how would you pay that back? Your parents can’t even borrow that month so unless they get need aid (little if any), you’d have to pay out of pocket. So I wouldn’t apply. But you’d have to pay back $4K a month for ten years - how would you do that? Answer - you wouldn’t - even going to Penn.

Does your family live in Maine currently? Otherwise I don’t think you’d qualify.

My original comments stand - for me anyway.

And you shouldn’t bother applying to Penn if you need to take significant loans.

But going to Penn assures nothing. And with a $25K budget, I wouldn’t bother applying. With your score, $25K would work, with auto merit, at a school like U of Alabama, as an example. The b school is excellent. It’s $50K but you’d get $28K based on your stats. Other schools, likely in the South, might get you similar or a bit higher costs. U of Kansas, WVU as well.

Having real world experience gives you a leg up so I’ll stick with, taking the emotion or desire of where you want to be out, Germany is the better plan.

Good luck.

8

Would this program result in dual citizenship or would you have to give up American citizenship?

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At least what Google AI said right now is that Germany allows dual citizenship, but that this is relatively recent. The US also allows dual citizenship, and has for a while.

One issue for US citizens working abroad is that US tax code is very complex for someone who has US citizenship and lives and works outside of the USA. It seems to be tolerable if your taxes are sufficiently simple (which they might be at least while doing a coop as a university student).

For most of your list this is likely to result in way, way, way too much debt. You do not want to go that far into debt. Any debt at all will constrain your future to some extent, and if you need to take any debt you should keep the total amount as small as possible.

This might depend upon whether you can find an affordable option in the USA. We did not find anything in the US that would be even close to $25,000 per year without need based aid except for our in-state public university with merit aid. If you can get in-state status in Maine it might be a reasonable option. I am wondering what U.Mass Amherst would cost since it has a very good math and computer science programs and also has some possibility of merit aid for out of state students. However, it is not clear to me whether a 3.8 GPA would get you merit aid, or maybe (?) even admissions out of state for either math or CS. I also do not know whether they have business informatics.

I do not know whether employers in the US have heard of the university that you are considering in Germany. However, they have definitely heard of IBM. The coop program with IBM to me sounds like a great option. Learning on-the-job practical skills in my opinion may improve the amount of practical knowledge that you are likely to pick up from the academic part of your education.

I would personally be a bit surprised if Michigan or UIUC turned out to be affordable. Ditto for Bowdoin, U.Penn, Colby, Bates, and Amherst College. You do not want to take out a huge amounts of loans. It might be worth running the NPCs.

I would not apply ED or ED2 anywhere without first running the NPC.

I am also wondering whether a bachelor’s degree in Germany plus a one-year master’s degree in the US might cost less than just a bachelor’s degree in the USA. One daughter, with dual citizenship, did get a bachelor’s outside the US (but in Canada) and is currently getting a graduate degree at a very good university in the USA (but not a masters, instead a PhD in a biomedical field). I also know multiple other people who got bachelor’s degrees outside the US and then got some form of graduate degree in the US (master’s, PhD, or both). This includes some who got their graduate degree(s) at some highly ranked and well known universities in the US.

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Both have allowed dual citizenship for a long time (I actually have both), but it can depend on how the citizenship was acquired, and in many cases of acquiring German citizenship, Germany did require renouncing the other citizenship. There is some kind of new law now, but I do not know exactly how it works or if it applies in all cases. That’s why I asked.

Personally I think dual citizenship is a benefit even if it may complicate taxes or other things. It’s hard to predict future political and economic changes and I believe it is always better to have easier freedom of movement… that’s why I also got my kids dual citizenship.

11

Can you ask your academic institute and IBM whether you could take classes in the US and/or intern at IBM-US as part of your degree?
It may allow you to enjoy some US student (college or co-op) life without getting into debt.

12

You should go with the deal in Germany.

1 Like
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Paging @dfbdfb who is a linguistics professor.

14

My son has had the privilege of working on two elite engineering teams. He worked with very bright European educated engineers on both. Your field is different, but the gist is the same…a US degree won’t guarantee you a better job. The European opposition is a known commodity, well respected, and much cheaper. I’d take it.

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15

Unless you see a low cost school in the U.S., like an Alabama, Miss State, UAH, WVU, C Michigan, U Kansas or others, you really have no choice.

I can’t imagine you’ll get need aid at a $250k salary. There are no undergrad schools worth $100k, $200k, even $300k in loans as Penn would be. Run the NPC - aid could happen but it’s doubtful.

Not a single one in my opinion.

Given kids today can’t easily find internships and you have them built in, this seems a pretty simple choice to me.

But if you stay here, it’s going to be at a budget meeting school - which I put at $30k so you can use the $5500 allowed student loan. Hence the schools - and there are others - that I mentioned.

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