<p>I am about to go to grad school for landscape architecture and about to incur quite a bit of debt. I applied to many programs, but in the end it was between RISD and Ball State University. BSU offered me an assistantship, which is fairly uncommon for a proffesional program, but when it gets right down to it RISD is the better school to make me a well rounded individual. I have no formal training in art (never really thought i was artistic) and have a background in horticulture and the natural sciences, so a grad degree heavy in desgin would be ideal. I had the opportunity to go to Cornell, but I turned that one down because it is in the college of ag and not as heavy an emphasis as I would like in collaborative design. Do you think I am crazy to turn down a lucrative assistantship for a better education? Also, LA is a bit more lucrative than the fine arts, but do you think i will be okay to pay off 70K in debt in five years?</p>