I have been receiving invitation to apply to RPI for the past month. I am planning to apply to one more university, so which one I should apply to Bucknell University or RPI? I haven’t received any invitation from Bucknell. I am planning to pursue computer engineering. Also, I’ll be applying for financial aid and that too as an international student. Which university do you think would be a good chance to be admitted to? And will give me possibly a good financial aid being an international student and last but most important a good education. I don’t care about job placements and salaries.
They are both great. Bucknell is a much more comprehensive school with lots of sports and rivalries.
RPI is 70% male.
They both are excellent schools but socially they are polar opposites.
RPI may be one of the nation’s strongest schools for engineering.
Any more suggestions please. I need help. Their deadline is 15th January. And I need to apply asap.
Agree with posts No. 2, No. 2 and No. 3.
Incidentally, all engineering schools in the U.S. are overwhelmingly male, although RPI does better at attracting and retaining female applicants. The president of RPI is a woman.
Not sure why you wouldn’t apply to both unless you already have a solid backup.
My son’s experience at RPI has not been that good. Despite saying that Bucknell is big into sports, RPI is actually quite cliquey in terms of sports and frats. Freshmen are not treated well at all from what I hear and see.
They are both excellent schools, though different from each other. Why don’t you take a look at the course requirements at each school? Since Bucknell is a liberal arts university, I am guessing it draws a more well-rounded student body, and has more required courses outside of engineering. If that appeals to you, then maybe that should be your choice over the two. If you can’t decide, apply to both. The RPI application is pretty minimal, and they do not do interviews.
Also, be careful about the ‘invitation’: is it an actual invitation, or is it a marketing invitation (even if it has your name on it). Do you have high stats for both schools (in the upper 25% of admitted students?) b/c if you are looking for financial aid as an international student, that is where you need to be.
Yes, RPI is not interested personal essays from students either. An admissions rep emphatically said so when Lake Jr. and I visited RPI.
I can’t apply to both because the cost will rise. I’ll have to send scores to both and also apply to both. This will cost me around $60-70 extra. That’s too much in India.
The invitation says that I will be given candidate choice status. And other universities that sent me invitations also said something like this. They stated that they waive my application fee and will consider me for valuable scholarships. So does RPI.
Both are fine schools that can get you where you need to go. Here are some general comments:
–I’m not so sure what an “invitation” means in terms of getting meaningful aid etc. To me, it looks like the candidates choice application is simply an alternate application sent to people who have expressed interest in RPI. These are pretty common and are meant to increase applications to the school http://admissions.rpi.edu/undergraduate/admission/freshman/application.html
–Look into which school has more overall aid to internationals.
–RPI is more of a technical/STEM-engineering based school while Bucknell is more of an all-around school with excellent engineering, business, and humanities programs.
-There is Greek life at both schools – I know that Bucknell is pretty Greek-oriented, not sure about RPI.
–RIP is a mid-sized university, Bucknell is a LAC - do you have a preference?
–And hopefully you saw these:
http://admissions.rpi.edu/undergraduate/admission/international/
http://www.bucknell.edu/admissions/international-admissions/paying-for-bucknell.html
–Since finances are an issue, I hope you are researching alternatives in India as well in case you don’t get the aid needed to come to the US for your undergraduate education.
.
The major problem I face is that Bucknell offers very few internationals. Is that true? And RPI offers only merit aid to internationals, no need based.
Any suggestions please. Deadline is approaching.
IMHO, if you want to be an engineer, RPI is a much more respected school. If you have a good reason for wanting engineering at a liberal arts college, that’s fine, but the only one I can think of is that you want to “study” engineering as a stepping stone to something else, and thus are more concerned with getting a broad education . Neither will likely give you financial aid. Don’t know your stats, so can’t tell which will accept you.
Thank you everyone.
I am applying to Bucknell