<p>This isn’t attacking anyone, or anything. I was just wondering why winners of major scholarship money stay instate so often. Last year, the winner of Intel STS went to CUNY, and 4 years ago, Ryan Patterson had perhaps the most sweeping victory; he won Siemens, STS, and ISEF with the same project. He goes to Colorado State University now. He had 400,000 in scholarship money. What would he do with it all? Any ideas?</p>
<p>4 years undergrad…+PhD…+PostDoc…I’d say he will do some research and spend as much time as he can learning more.</p>
<p>There are many reasons why a student might choose to stay in-state. </p>
<p>Most often it is the financial considerations. An in-state public school will usually cost less than a private school or an out-of-state public school. This is especially true if the student does not qualify for needs-based financial aid (i.e., if the parents are middle or upper class) since many of the most selective schools do not offer merit aid and most public schools do not offer much aid to non-residents since their priority is educating the kids of the state’s taxpayers. And even if they can afford the private or out-of-state school, some families choose to go the cheaper route for the undergraduate school in order to reserve some money for graduate school (or law school or med school).</p>
<p>Also, some states (NY is one of them) offer scholarships that can be used ONLY at in-state schools. </p>
<p>And sometimes the student just wants to stay close to home. They may want to attend the local public school to save on room and board. Or they may have personal reasons – perhaps they have an ailing relative, or a girlfriend/boyfriend, that they don’t want to leave.</p>
<p>Maybe they’re staying close to the site of their winning research, continuing a relationship with their mentor. I did read about the student going to CUNY, but can’t for the life of me remember why he chose CUNY. I’m guessing it had everything he wanted.</p>
<p>worried_mom, I was aware of those reasons. The made this thread because I was wondering why obviously very intelligent students with lots of scholarship money would stay in state.</p>
<p>The personal reason one sounds like a possibility for Ryan Patterson. His project was a glove that translates sign language to English. He asked his girlfriend to Prom on Good Morning America with it or something. Quite the amazing.</p>