Both are great schools. Rice sounds like it’s $40K cheaper for you and you prefer the overall atmosphere there. Your cons there are also easily mitigated:
- Rice has great name recognition and reputation where it matters.
- 35 faculty is PLENTY for an undergraduate department, especially for undergrad research opportunities. I went to an LAC with around 10 full-time faculty in my department and still did research. 35 is a wealth, especially if there are 6 in the area that you think you want to do research in.
You can’t really pay off $40K with work-study; you don’t really make that much with work-study. You could theoretically pay it off with your internships, but why do that when you can enjoy your money?
I’d choose Rice if I were you.