These are great tips since we are focused on California schools. So far we have visited USC and SLO with official tours but he has been to Berkeley (wife’s Alma mater), Stanford and UCLA for more casual looks. He walked around MIT and Harvard campuses during a trip to Boston last year. He has also been to my Alma mater Michigan. We have family in the Midwest which makes this region more familiar.
We did some thinking and talking today as a family and thought through S24s priorities….academics and being in a solid engineering program is number one. Prestige is not the draw for the big names but more what may come with those schools ie opportunities for research, etc.
A reasonable budget for us is around 40- 50 per year. We created a preliminary list of schools that meet his academic and location preferences:
Safeties:
Embry Riddle Florida
UC Boulder
Colorado Mines
RPI
Reach/target:
UCLA
UCB
UCSD
UCD
UCI
UCSC
USC
Cal Poly SLO
Purdue
Michigan
UW Madison
UIUC
Georgia tech
UT Austin
High reach:
MIT
CalTech
Stanford
Princeton
S24 is a very easy going kid and this makes it harder to decide on deal breakers other than his major but he is dead set on engineering so trying to transfer in is not an option he is willing to take but would rather go to a less prestigious school and learn what he wants.