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<p>Would it be better if schools or departments just offered honors courses, without the formalized honors college? That way, they could cater to the best students in the subject and entice them more to major in the subject.</p>
<p>DG: um, almost any private school has lower fees than does UMass Amherest. Schools like Vassar, W&L, St. Olaf’s, and others are highly regarded schools that will offer full-tuition of half-tuition scholarships. Fees are a few hundred dollars a year, and living expenses are comparable to UMass prices. It can be very easy for a top student to find a better deal than Commonwealth College.</p>
<p>I’m starting as a freshman at another school but I was closely looking at UMASS Amherst.
I was admitted Early Action into Commonwealth Honors College and would have been able to use the new facility.</p>
<p>Reasons why I didn’t go.</p>
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<li><p>it was a large construction site. there were a lot of fenced off areas that were dirty and just not very appealing. They said everything would be done and ready for the fall but last May there was still a lot of work and clean-up that needed to be done…and big cranes by the Student Union building.</p></li>
<li><p>It turned out to be one of the more expensive colleges for me. I was trying to be mindful of money and initially thought UMASS would be the most affordable. it turned out that “free tuition” was only $1700 and they offered a “Presidents Scholarship” that was $2000. and the Financial aid package had a lot of loans. So cost of attendance was still around $20,000. I was comparing this with some Ivy schools and local tech schools. WPI was about $5k more … but I chose Cornell which was cheaper at $17K.</p></li>
<li><p>Also, I was looking at Electrical Engineering …and I thought the facility looked very tired and old and worn. and it was just very ugly and it looked like I was walking into some guys playroom… it just made me feel very uncomfortable and not welcome. The business school looked great, the nursing school looked great, many of the science building where very nice and the Commonwealth Honors College looked like it was going to be very nice (eventually) … but the electrical engineering department was ugly and in the basement with cinderblock walls… the lounge area (I think it was called M-5) gave me the impression that girls never walked through there… </p></li>
<li><p>I may be wrong but I think the students that can be admitted to CHC will also be admitted to other very good schools as well. </p></li>
<li><p>Also, I really wanted to go to UMASS & be part of CHC, I wanted to be close to home … I was just surprised how weak their aid packages where compare to the other places I was admitted to. and your electrical engineering basement really is ugly…</p></li>
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<p>Many universities have an honors college for top level students. I think the answer to the OP’s question is easy enough to find by looking at whether those other universities’ honors colleges pushed the reputation of their respective schools into the realm of top-tier public universities. I don’t think I’ve heard of that happening but I’m not sure.</p>
<p>(minor point: I know it’s just a saying, but the Ivy League is just an athletic conference so there’s no such thing as a “public Ivy” since there’s no such public athletic conference).</p>
<p>Whoa, I took at look at the UMass website to look at tuition and fees and it’s really messed up. The instate tuition is tiny but the “curriculum fee” alone is huge ($9000?! a year). OOS tuition is $10,000 with a $16,000 curriculum fee). If scholarships do not cover fees, I can see why people chose other schools.</p>
<p>This tuition and fees structure is the issue, not the buildings or honors college.</p>
<p>one more thing …
I know this sounds nuts.
but I was so upset at the misleading fee structure and the way they celebrated “free tuition” and the very modest aid package and the lack of “investment” in the engineering department…that I put my application into Umass Lowell for electrical engineering. I was looking at Lowell as a better engineering choice eventhough they had the new dorms as part of the Amherst Commonwealth college… again for other majors its probably great but as an engineer I definitely felt second class.</p>
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It may have started out that way, but today the Ivies are known for superior academics and high exclusivity, not athletics. A “public Ivy” is a school with similar attributes academically, so I think it is a useful expression.</p>
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It’s a by-product of the loony-tune politics we have in MA. It’s not all that helpful to consider tuition and fees separately unless you get an Adams scholarship or the like that specifically offers only free tuition.</p>
<p>Although it defies common sense, in MA tuition dollars don’t go to the school, they go into the general fund of the state. So in order to get the money needed for the school, they have extremely high “curriculum fees”, which is the real tuition. It is not well publicized and there’s some people every year who get excited when they get “free tuition” only to find out it is not worth all that much.</p>
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I’m partially responsible for this mess since I’m a voter in MA … ultimately this bizarre structure creates a communication/education hurdle for the school when dealing with applicants. That said receiving a mailing plugging the Commonwealth College with “FREE TUITION” in bold font size 50 all over the place and no mention of the other fees and no mention of the value of the “FREE TUITION” was at best poor communication and not very helpful understanding how this option stacked up against other options.</p>
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<p>From a consumer perspective, I don’t care whether you call it “tuition” or “fees” or “tuition and fees.” It amounts to the same thing. What does it cost? So for OOS, UMass is $26,000. I don’t know why people think that’s a lot. (Well, it is, but I mean comparatively.) Other OOS publics that my Ca daughter is considering are U Washington at $33,000 per year and William & Mary at $38,000 per year. Washington offers no merit aid and merit at William & Mary is not abundant. UMass seems to pass out quite a few merit scholarships for high stat OOS students in the $8,000 to $12,000 per year range. That could bring down the tuition and fees for an OOS student to @16,000. If DD lands one of those, it would be less than half the price of attending Washington and way less than half the price to attend William & Mary. Yes, those schools have better reputations (ranked higher), but if cost is a paramount factor, how can you ignore UMass?</p>
<p>It’s not so much the total cost of attendance is out of whack, it’s misleading the prospective student and parents with “free tuition” without telling them that tuition is a token charge for in state and the bulk of the cost is in a fee that isn’t covered by the scholarship. </p>
<p>Of course if you’re full pay, then this is a non-issue.</p>
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<p>While the difference between “$2,000 tuition and $10,000 fees” and “$10,000 tuition and $2,000 fees” is nil for someone paying full price or getting generic dollar amount financial aid or scholarships, it can be significant if a “full tuition scholarship” is offered. This seems to be the issue in that the school likes to give “full tuition scholarships” that sound good but are not worth that much due to the small tuition and large fees.</p>
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<p>Easy, you attend your IN-state college and live at home. :)</p>
<p>btw: William & Mary meets full financial need to OOS students.</p>
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<p>Which is exactly why it will not be allowed to flourish. I predict a low URM participation, as an example, which will not make the UMass folks happy.</p>
<p>I think an academic honors program is great, but have some squeamishness about this kind of segregation of honors students in residences and other facilities. Northeastern has built beautiful new dorms for honors students, as well. I just don’t feel comfortable with this kind of thing. So non-honors students aren’t deserving? This is all about rankings and money.</p>
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It’s not that non-honors students are deserving, but you can argue that honors students are more deserving. I don’t see why a school shouldn’t go out of their way to attract the best and brightest. </p>
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I think most of the “full tuition” scholarships are state scholarships like the Adams, which the university does not administer and could not care less about, since the school doesn’t get the tuition dollars anyway. I don’t remember seeing anything from the school promoting “free tuition”.</p>
<p>From what is reported on the accepted student threads and my own experience as a UMass student’s parent, UMass is pretty stingy with merit aid (and need-based aid, actually) which is why the honors college will never be all that great. Students in the top 5% of their HS class or higher with SATs of 1400+ are going to have other options from schools that are willing to give decent merit aid.</p>
<p>If you are a high-achieving OOS student you will likely get something to defray the OOS surcharge but that it the best you can expect. If you are IS, chances are you get close to nothing. My S had 1550 SATs and top 10% in one of the best public school systems in eastern MA, and besides the Adams scholarship the school gave him a $1000/year scholarship. It wasn’t because of his package that he chose it.</p>
<p>The John and Abigail Adams scholarships do cover only the $1715 in tuition, but there are other merit scholarships and need-based aid that lower the fees.</p>
<p>The Adams scholarships for in-state kids who did well on state testing were a political move by then-governor Romney.</p>
<p>D1 and D2 got better deals from private schools, but S got a better deal from UMass, so he’s there and enjoying it.</p>
<p>I got a $10,000 scholarship from UMass. I ended up going to my own state school but UMass would’ve been much cheaper than the privates that accepted me and gave me zero. It was a fairly tempting offer.</p>
<p>Pushing it to the same tier as Michigan, UCLA, UVA etc. I just don’t see happening at all. I could only see it possibly increase in appeal to in-staters… MAYBE.</p>
<p>(Just look at all the sweet gigs Indiana has going on (especially with Kelley), yet it continues to suffer in the rankings).</p>
<p>As a student at a college that has made its mission to be in the top 20 public colleges (and still hasn’t achieved that goal in 12 years despite making great progress), I’m going to say that no matter what UMass-Amherst does, it’s going to struggle to get into that top tier of public schools. There’s a bunch of issues with politics (funding especially) and add on to the less than stellar reputation that UMass has right now with top in-state students (went to one of the top public high schools in MA and UMass-Amherst was a “safety” school for people looking at the many private colleges in New England/New York - was mostly for people who had a B or so average). Maybe someday UMass will make it up there but it will take a long term commitment to improving the school in all areas and several buildings won’t do the trick.</p>
<p>Side note: I got that John & Abigail Adams Scholarship back when I was a high school senior. It is a joke like most people here have caught on when compared to the amount of fees they make you pay.</p>
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<p>My high-achieving CA student does not want to live at home and attend the nearby CSU, and I would not want her to. Besides, if my DD got a $10k/year scholarship from UMass like Rebeccar (#36), the COA would be comparable to attending a UC or CSU as an IS. Is UMass as good as a UC? NO, but staying in CA does not really appeal to her, so UMass would be an affordable OOS option. </p>
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<p>Well, that’s great if you qualify for FA. As I said in an earlier post, we are not going to qualify for any FA, so we would have to pay full sticker price for DD to attend W&M, i.e., more than twice what it would cost to attend UMass if DD can land a $10-12k merit scholarship like Rebeccar did.</p>
<p>DGDzDad, just curious - why is UMass one of the schools you are considering? (especially from all the way on the other side of the country) I understand that financial aid is a big deal and your DD wants to get out of CA but there are other schools there that can be comparable to the cost of UMass-Amherst (not sure what your DD’s stats are in terms of getting scholarships at other schools but some schools that come to mind are Texas A&M, Minnesota, Virginia Tech, Auburn etc…)</p>