<p>So, it’s now May 1st - which means those waitlist offers may come and the true final decisions will be made. It’s an unfortunate reality for many kids that their decision/waiting time isn’t actually over today. They potentially miss out on being able to fully enjoy their selection, they missed all of the “accepted student” events at their WL schools, and if an offer comes they have to make a very quick decision on what to do. As a kid, my DS doesn’t want to think about it ahead of time. He wants to now be able to think about the acceptance in hand, and get excited about it - as he should. As a parent though, I want to be as prepared as possible to help answer questions for him should the situation arise.</p>
<p>So this is the position we are in today. DS has currently matriculated to UVA, and our experience at DOTL was wonderful. As a Rodman Scholar, he was excited by the engineering program offering, he loved the grounds and Charlottesville, and the people were wonderful. It certainly solidified UVA’s position as being in his top choices during the application process. He is definitely energized about UVA, so don’t let this post make you think otherwise. But there is of course that knowledge that going into the application period Vanderbilt was his first choice (although not enough to apply ED) and Cornell was in the mix. At the time we had yet to visit UVA. After visiting, they are all very close, with different pros and cons for each. He’s not necessarily a “play-hard” type - his main non-academic pursuit is marching band, and UVA’s band program exceeds expectations, which is a huge plus. He’s also neither a “city” nor “country” stereotype so he liked Charlottesville and Nashville equally well - though Ithaca not as much. And of course weather would probably rank: Nashville, Charlottesville, then Ithaca.</p>
<p>The real unknown in this for us is the engineering (non-BME) program. Obviously, on paper Cornell is ranked higher (for what rankings are worth) and supposedly has the Ivy “aura” but the reality is it’s just as large a school as UVA and at least here in the Midwest the overall engineering reputation doesn’t seem any different between the two (both are well-regarded). As for Vanderbilt, since we’re not looking at Biomed it also seems relatively on par program-wise with UVA, although that’s hard to tell. The Rodman program and Sr. project at UVA seem to give it the advantage. So the question here is more for anyone who has gone through engineering at UVA, or made a similar decision, what is your feeling on the program in comparision to the other choices. We doubt money will be much different (if it is, that’s a whole nother issue), so this is really a question about program only. Anything more that should be considered?</p>
<p>Thanks for any thoughts.</p>