Son is an athlete and has received positive prereads from:
Case Western (with likely ~$30k scholarship)
UChicago
NYU Stern
Washington and Lee
Wesleyan
His interests are well outside of my field of expertise, so was hoping to get some guidance. We can pay for all of them, though he will contribute some for all (except Case). His older brother went to Carnegie Mellon for the same thing and found he did not enjoy it and ended up going into tech and is enjoying that. He has advised younger brother about the negatives of the banking industry based on conversations with his friends and classmates that went that route.
I’ve seen the lists of target schools, but don’t have any experience on which to base our recommendations. What if he ends up not liking the major? What would be the better school? NYU Stern would be the only school where transferring might be an issue, but talking to people, it doesn’t seem like that would be terribly difficult.
My naive dad list would be Chicago, NYU, W&L, Wesleyan, Case.
Under the impression that you have to apply to the other major. Like I said, I don’t think it would be too tough, based on conversations, but just don’t know if it is guaranteed. The other schools you are accepted to the school, not the major. So, was just kind of pointing out the difference that we saw.
They are.such different schools with different environments (ex. university v LAC, very urban v suburban, geographic location, etc.). Does the student have a preference? Also your S should consider the team/coach if a recruited athlete.
I’m confused - he wants IB but is this a - what if he doesn’t what IB and then who is best?
You can afford $90K a year but do you want to?
You’ve seen target lists so you know where the best bet for IB is but these are so different - and other schools don’t have finance - specifically Wesleyan. Chicago has financial mathematics.
What’s he want to study?
What’s the team situation, etc?
Has he visited all?
Is he ok smack in a city vs. a city environment with a campus vs. being in the middle of nowhere in a tiny school?
He’s not a very picky kid which is the problem. Left all of the visits liking all of the schools. One more overnight visit to W&L though he has visited a couple times and that is the school that we know the coaches the best. Has overnighted at Wesleyan and Case and really liked both. Camped at NYU and really liked it. Visited Chicago and worked out with the team and really liked it. Just wants to go to school and play his sport. Hasn’t really shown a preference and we have always preached no such thing as a “dream” school, so maybe it’s our fault!
Transferring into Stern is difficult, but transferring out of it is a lot easier. If he transfers at the end of freshman year it would just be into (probably) CAS as a school - NYU only declares majors at the end of sophomore year.
Sorry for any confusion. I try not to get enamored with lists and rankings, so I was hoping to get some recommendations for or against any of the schools based on personal experiences. Is one more collaborative than the others or all they all pretty cutthroat? Or do people really just go with the highest on the list? The one list that was published had NYU #1 for total placements, but W&L was higher per capita if I remember correctly. So which is better? I believe most would say Stern, but I don’t know. I was also interested in thoughts on backup plans since we already had one kid go into college with the same idea, but ended up graduating with essentially a computer science degree and is now a data scientist (although the business degree supposedly made him stand out to the recruiter). Let me know if that still doesn’t clear it up. Thanks.
Definitely agree on the “no dream school.” I preached that as well. But my kids still had definite preferences (ex. D liked LACs, S liked mid-sized urban universities) so we focused on schools in those categories. Guess your S is more flexible!
One suggestion is for your S to look at the course catalogs/available majors for the final choice colleges.
I’m going to go against the consensus and call this a good list. They’re all “name“ schools. None have any problem placing graduates with JPMorgan, Citi, Evermore and other major banks. And he seems to like them all. Count your blessings.
I think it’s also worth pointing out that just because one son didn’t enjoy doesn’t mean the other won’t, especially at a different college. That said, I think it’s always good to keep an eye on opportunities to/difficulty of changing major, just because many students do. I can’t speak to the other colleges on this list but the only really difficult transfer between schools at NYU is into Stern so as long as he starts out there he should be fine. (Disclaimer: assuming he doesn’t decide he wants to do engineering.)
Also to add: as he has visited all and likes all, I don’t see an issue with the list. Some students genuinely just don’t care whether the school is big/small/rurual/urban etc .
All of those schools have networks that can help get him into I Banking and be prepared once he gets there. Not sure how much prep you really need, since they assume you know nothing useful and teach you everything themselves.
So I would figure out what team and coach he would bond with best. He will be spending most of his time with them.
Stern and Chicago IMO a cut above the others in terms of IB placement, the others are fine. If he hasn’t yet, check the team schedule to see how far and how often he will need to travel. While D3 is not like D1 in terms of time commitment, it will be a significant time commitment nevertheless.
And that is totally subjective, because D19 would have gone crazy in “stunning small rural” anywhere and loved NYU. If the kid himself is happy with the options after having visited all of them, it doesn’t matter what random strangers on the internet think about how the campuses differ in physical terms.
If enjoying life and playing his sport is his priority, I would take Chicago off the list.
It is a wonderful education with a lot of academic intensity which means it’s likely the wrong place for a kid who isn’t absolutely in love with it. Nobody skates through it.
