Are the private schools ranked 30-70...

[Anonymous]

Harder to take those claiming the public schools are stronger seriously after the revelations from UCSD this week.

[Anonymous]

My son chose Tufts over Penn (Emory too, but Penn was the harder choice because we didn’t see a “prestige” gap between Tufts and Emory). And we are full pay!
Brown was his first choice but he was waitlisted.
Tufts isn’t rah rah football but it’s lively with an active and engaged student body. Most important to my son fellow students are very academically focused but not competitive.
That’s our experience, but you should never choose a school that saddles your child with debt if you have other options. In our case we can afford Tufts and it’s worth it to us.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If you are comfortably full pay, it's all about fit. And BC and Wake in particular are very solid schools and their graduates tend to do very well.

If money is an issue - like it is for the 95 percent of Americans who think 100 grand a year for college is ridiculous - it becomes a different calculation. And it's hard to justify Tulane, BC, or Wake at $90,000 over UMD and UVA at $38,000. None of those private schools are worth going into debt over a couple of very good in-state options.

+1 We technically have the money to send our three kids to these $95K/year schools, but we would really feel it. We would sacrifice to pay for HYPPSM, but these NESCACs and the like just aren't worth it to us. The career outcomes aren't the same.

I could see how it's worth it to families with more money or if they could quality for FA though. We have some very good in-State schools or our kids can chase merit.

I went to Wake Forest. My parents were happy to pay. But if money were an issue, I could have gone to UNC and done just fine. Not everyone is so lucky to live in a state with an excellent flagship.

Places like Wake Forest, Davidson, Richmond, etc. also used to cost $25k/year all in. The cost has increased dramatically relative to incomes.

+1 This is why there are now barbell families like mine. If I'm going to spend $400K for undergrad for each of my kids, then it's going to be a top 20-ish that has superior job placement. Otherwise my kids are going to state schools or privates with significant merit $.

I'm not reducing our lifestyle to send my kids to a tier 2 or 3 private instead of a great State school with equivalent or even better career placement.

So, that’s a lot of pressure on your kids no? Given that T20 is a crapshoot?

Not at all. DC just knows that and handful of small $90-100K privates that don't offer merit are off the table.

There are still dozens of schools that would be a great fit and are either more affordable or offer merit to make it more affordable. Plus around 20 other schools that we'll pay that $400K for if DC gets in.

So you will pay $400K for Harvard, but not for Tufts?

I guess I don't get that. I don't think T10 schools are that great over the others, and if I'm willing to pay for one, I'd pay for all of them

Different poster here, and I am solidly upper class, and I would pay for Tufts, WashU, Emory, Georgetown level, but if my kids don't get into that level, I will expect them to go to our state flagship school. My view is that the top kids at flagships will do well in grad school placement (possibly better actually) and I think alumni networks and jobs are available to kids who rise to the top of their state universities, but I don't think a "no name" school is worth the squeeze when you look at job and grad school outcomes. It's not a money thing - it's more the fact that no hiring manager is going to have any familiarity with say, Rhodes College or Gettysburg College or Augustana College.

Tufts might have similar selectivity, (its still the least selective when compared to Emory, Georgetown, WashU etc.) But academically and prestige wise its not the same prestige level. Its closer to Georgia tech or BC in prestige.

PP here. Why do you think this? I don't this this is true. I think Tufts is a desirable target school for lots of private school and top public school kids - the same if not higher than Emory, Georgetown and WashU. Here is evidence that supports this: https://www.reddit.com/r/ApplyingToCollege/comments/1c6j73v/where_the_elite_study_the_t30_for_selective_prep/

The easiest way to tell prestige is rankings and on campus recruitment. We already know Georgetown, Emory, and WashU are ranked much higher than Tufts. But looking at on campus recruiting events Georgetown, Emory, WashU are also much better. Especially Emory and Georgetown.
https://cpd.emory.edu/events/
Emory- JP Morgan, Centerview Partners, New York Fed, Black Stone, Jeffries all for fall.

Washu-
https://careers.washu.edu/events/
M&T, Microsoft, Capital One, Goldman Sachs, Mastercard

Tufts
https://careers.tufts.edu/resources/career-center-events/
Bain and Co, BCG thats all listed as far as prestigious companies

Georgetown- cannot find

Do you see the prestige gap now pp?
Most of the recruitment events at Tufts deals with the art school....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you can get into Tufts or BC you can get into Oxford College at Emory, or Umich, UVa, etc. Those others are worth it over these.

Not true. My ds last year got into Tufts and not Umich or UVA

[Anonymous]

Tufts tend to attract very liberal crowd and others pointed out no school spirit. Does not have a large profile in Boston. BC has more schools spirit and has transformed from poor kids commuter school but does not have the strength of grad schools that Tufts has. Slightly advantage to Tufts for academics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Tufts tend to attract very liberal crowd and others pointed out no school spirit. Does not have a large profile in Boston. BC has more schools spirit and has transformed from poor kids commuter school but does not have the strength of grad schools that Tufts has. Slightly advantage to Tufts for academics.

When was BC ever a poor kids school???

[Anonymous]

BC was a commuter school from 1863- late 1980s lots of stories on that. Main goal was to educate working class Catholics kids in greater Boston. They didn’t have dorms till late 1960s.

[Anonymous]

I'd take the bottom quartile student from BC, Tufts or Emory over the bottom quartile student at UC San Diego. That much is for sure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:BC was a commuter school from 1863- late 1980s lots of stories on that. Main goal was to educate working class Catholics kids in greater Boston. They didn’t have dorms till late 1960s.

Serving working class (instead of running like a country club for rich folks) is nothing a great thing, but it's almost year 2026.

[Anonymous]

Tufts has a deeper and much longer academic reputation than BC. Tufts produces a lot of doctors and dentists while BC was more middle class vocational teachers, nurses, accountants. The supply of poor working class kids wanting to commute to bc dried up in the 1980s as kids would then opt for UMass big rival of bc in those days. BC transition mirrors that of Marquette, Villanova, Loyola, Providence, Dayton and lots of other Catholic schools.

[Anonymous]

Jamie Dimon is a Tufts grad!

[Anonymous]

Tufts was always better than BC. Tufts peers are Wesleyan and Emory. BC peer is Villanova.

[Anonymous]

BC has a very strong Catholic identity. It was commuter school for working class Catholics. That identity both hurts and helps in the type of applicants it gets.

Tufts was always the strongest of the Boston schools after MIT and Harvard. Over time, BU and Northeastern have become a more attractive destination relative to where they were 25 years ago (while Tufts has backslid a bit.)

I don't really think employers will look at an Emory graduate that much differently than a Tufts graduate. The students have nearly identical academic statistics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:BC was a commuter school from 1863- late 1980s lots of stories on that. Main goal was to educate working class Catholics kids in greater Boston. They didn’t have dorms till late 1960s.

Current tuition is $72k and total COA is $93k. A real working class school. /s

[Anonymous]

Tufts was always third behind Harvard and MIT. BC was the blue collar Catholic commuter school that has transformed itself much like BU has.