Stanford/Princeton/MIT vs USC (full scholarship) for Engineering

[lkg4answers]

@neela1

If you want to be in engineering, USC is fine. If you think you may want to pivot into either finance or go the startup route, you should consider the other schools seriously. As many people say, kids change their mind many times, and you want them to be exposed to things where they consider new information and potentially change their mind. This will probably happen less at USC.

I don’t know about MIT or Princeton, but I can share about USC. Again, not trying to sway OPs decision, just providing information.

OP has not mentioned their son’s particular interest in engineering. At USC, once a student is accepted into Viterbi, they are accepted into all of the majors. There are no barriers to changing from MASC to CS or any other Viterbi major. My only concern would be, if the student decided on the change in their 2nd or 3rd year, the degree completion might take more than the 8 semesters that the scholarship covers. Trustee scholarship recipients can apply for exceptional funding to cover extra units/semester, summer abroad, Maymester, etc.

USC Viterbi Engineering Plus encourages students to combine engineering with other majors and passions. There are several joint programs between Viterbi and other schools. For example, Game Design is a joint program between Viterbi and the School of Cinematic Arts. Viterbi and Marshall School of Business offer a CS and Business Administration (BS/BA) joint degree. Starting this fall, Viterbi and Marshall will offer a joint AI for Business undergrad degree.

Regarding start ups, if that is something OP’s son is interested in, they might check out the Rusch Honors Technology Innovation and Entrepreneurship Track and the Viterbi Start Up Garage.