EA deferred - Accepted, Dornsife, Spring admission
4.0/4.9GPA
SAT 1590
NMF
Valedictorian
legacy
Feel that S24 barely squeezed by
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I do not have personal experience with Harvey Mudd. My student did not apply there because they felt it was too small. My student wanted more of a traditional college experience (football games, diversity of interests, variety of course offerings, etc.)
What is your student looking for in their college experience? Are they thinking of a PhD? If so, you might have them look into the Rusch Honors Program. Some, but not all, research opportunities are listed on the Securing Research Opportunity page.
Viterbi (and USC in general) does a great job helping students with resumes and mock interviews. There are a couple of engineering specific career fairs on campus every year. There are summer research programs, summer smasher opportunities, and opportunities to work over the summer in the Viterbi Startup Garage. While my student participated in a lot of what Viterbi offered, ultimately their internships and job offers were secured by reaching out via LinkedIn and through job posting websites.
As far as opportunities, I would attend Explore USC. Talk to Paul Ledesma. He is obviously biased towards USC, but we found him very honest and upfront about what USC could offer compared to other programs. Note that USC offers several Explore USC dates. April 7 is their big open house with housing tours. However, Harvey Mudd’s admitted student day is the same day.
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We are digging into the special features of USC that you mentioned. For the progressive degree program is it typical that students are able to get their bachelors and masters in 5 years or even 4? S24 got an email today notifying him of the presidential scholarship which is great but as you noted that still puts USC at twice the cost of UCLA…are there opportunities once enrolled to still win large scholarships at USC and Viterbi in particular? He had applied for the town and gown but was not awarded that scholarship unfortunately since that would have eliminated the cost consideration.
Check your email - usc has a virtual event coming up on Saturday soon.
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Many students are able to complete a PDP in 4.5-5 years. It is very tough to do it in four years, but it can be done.
Thank you! I will register for it
I can’t speak to engineering at either school. But having one who attended a Claremont (Scripps) and one who attended USC, they are very different environments. I love both for different reasons but each of my kids would not have been happy at the other school. The Claremonts are an amazing consortium and my D took classes at all the campuses except HM. The HM classes are very difficult and there is massive grade deflation. Most of the partying and social events are done on campus. Claremont is a cute town but not a lot to do.
USC is a traditional campus with school spirit and sports. It’s much easier to do LA things, beach etc from USC.
Both great choices but will be very different college experiences.
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How do I register for it? I don’t see the Explore USC page anywhere
You have two amazing choices and you cannot go wrong with your decision! My daughter is at USC and has friends at tons of other colleges. The friend whose experience is the most like hers is the one at Michigan.
If you can’t get to the schools for admitted student days, definitely attend any virtual events (I remember USC had a bunch last year) and start spending a bunch of time looking at classes, clubs, instagram, etc etc online. See where you can see yourself more. Assuming cost is similar and the major is the same, you are just looking for the school where you will feel best at so that you can thrive.
Good luck and congratulations!!
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These two schools are so so different that I think you really need to attend admitted student days to see which type of school your child is more interested in. Keep in mind at Mudd, the common core is really intense:
My CS daughter did not want to take all the physical science classes, so chose not to apply to Mudd for that reason. However, one of her close friends goes there and it is exactly what he wanted in college.
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USC sent emails today with additional merits.
My son got an associates scholarship guarantee for 4 years and eligibility for housing in McCarthy. He got into USC as EA and we’ve already picked 5 best solutions for housing on 2/1, but not McCarthy since we had no idea about this scholarship until now. How do we upgrade the housing at this point?
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He changes his housing choices in his housing portal.
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btw anyone can change the order/choices of housing up the minute the housing portal closes without it affecting the time stamp they received when submitted.
While a lot of scholarship students will choose McCarthy, there are also many that choose to live in the other freshman housing. Housing is all good, just differs on how social (suite v dorm) location, AC/or not. Some like to be in the freshman quad where the majority of freshman live, some prefer the Village that McCarthy offers. There really isn’t a bad housing choice, as long as the student picks what is important to them in the housing choice.
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D24 in the same boat. We visited UMich two weeks ago and loved it! It’s a good problem to have! Two really good schools to choose from.
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Love U Mich.
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I’ve had kiddo #1, #2 and #4 attend USC for undergrad. (And I went to USC, too.) Kiddo #3 went UChicago for undergrad and to Michigan for grad school. So I may be able to give you a little bit of insight. I will say Michigan is more like a city – it is so huge it doesn’t really have the feel of a college, IMO.
That said, Ann Arbor is consistently rated one of the best towns in America.
What is your major? That could play a difference in where you should go.
Also finances could come into play. UMichigan OOS is so expensive that USC was actually a much better deal for kiddo #4 who had UMich in play for undergrad.
I was admitted to Dornslife but I’m considering switching to CS at Viterbi. Is it easy to switch majors at USC? I’ve heard the Trojan alumni network is strong and makes it easy to find jobs
Yes, I truly think we parents feel it more deeply than our kids. UW-Madison is a great school.
just got the email today confirming the presidential scholarship!
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I’m not sure how easy it is to switch, but I assume it is much easier to switch within USC than at Michigan. Did you get in for CS at UMich? 2/3 of my kids are/were CS/Games in Viterbi.
Yes, my daughter landed her “dream job” through USC’s contacts with Unity. USC is great with making contacts.
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