University of Arizona

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, my daughter is applying to ASU. She toured a lot of schools on the east coast and a few out west and she absolutely loved the Tempe campus and the Barrett Honors college.

Thanks! For some reason he is just not interested in ASU. Maybe the honors college could convince him...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, I grew up in Arizona. I knew lots of people who went to ASU and U of A. My best friend's daughter is at U of A. She loves it.

I am somewhat skeptical of the idea of "neighboring states as a better launching pad for CA jobs than staying in VA." People who go to Arizona schools mostly want jobs in Arizona. I don't think AZ schools give you any advantage, relative to any other non-California state, for getting jobs in California.

What I think you should look at is the Cal State system. Some of them are in roughly the same category as U of A in terms of price and selectivity. (Some of them are even cheaper than U of A, as far as I can tell.) San Diego State, Cal State Long Beach, Cal State LA, Cal Poly Pomona - I work for an engineering company that has thousands of employees in southern California, and we definitely hire people from these schools.

I am from Los Angeles. Lol, absolutely not.

+1 sorry, but this is terrible advice. Do not listen to it.

You two are not paying attention to the OP's parameters. Her kid does not have the grades/scores or the money to go to a top-drawer school. She is looking for an equivalent to the University of Arizona. Those schools are it.

Also, I lived in LA and my company is based there, and I can tell you grads from those schools are absolutely getting jobs if they have STEM degrees.

We have company VPs who graduated from CSULB and San Diego State. They'd be sad to hear your low opinion of their alma maters. But they'd have their huge salaries to console them.

OP here. NO, that is not true. Please stop making things up. My son has excellent grades, he has a 3.85 unweighted GPA and a 32 ACT. We can afford approximately $35-$40k/year for college. He is considering Arizona because he would qualify for large amounts of merit aid that makes it fit within our budget, and satisfies his interest in attending school in a different region of the country.

erm no, hate to break it to you but those are "Very good" grades, excellent would be 4.0 and 35 ACT with a very high SAT which you aren't mentioning...

This delusional thinking that u need 4.0 and 35 is why kids cutting is on the rise.

Work on your reading comp. no one said it was needed, just that if you're going to describe grades as "excellent" they need to be excellent, not just "very good" which is what OP's kids grades actually are, just very good.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, I grew up in Arizona. I knew lots of people who went to ASU and U of A. My best friend's daughter is at U of A. She loves it.

I am somewhat skeptical of the idea of "neighboring states as a better launching pad for CA jobs than staying in VA." People who go to Arizona schools mostly want jobs in Arizona. I don't think AZ schools give you any advantage, relative to any other non-California state, for getting jobs in California.

What I think you should look at is the Cal State system. Some of them are in roughly the same category as U of A in terms of price and selectivity. (Some of them are even cheaper than U of A, as far as I can tell.) San Diego State, Cal State Long Beach, Cal State LA, Cal Poly Pomona - I work for an engineering company that has thousands of employees in southern California, and we definitely hire people from these schools.

I am from Los Angeles. Lol, absolutely not.

+1 sorry, but this is terrible advice. Do not listen to it.

You two are not paying attention to the OP's parameters. Her kid does not have the grades/scores or the money to go to a top-drawer school. She is looking for an equivalent to the University of Arizona. Those schools are it.

Also, I lived in LA and my company is based there, and I can tell you grads from those schools are absolutely getting jobs if they have STEM degrees.

We have company VPs who graduated from CSULB and San Diego State. They'd be sad to hear your low opinion of their alma maters. But they'd have their huge salaries to console them.

OP here. NO, that is not true. Please stop making things up. My son has excellent grades, he has a 3.85 unweighted GPA and a 32 ACT. We can afford approximately $35-$40k/year for college. He is considering Arizona because he would qualify for large amounts of merit aid that makes it fit within our budget, and satisfies his interest in attending school in a different region of the country.

erm no, hate to break it to you but those are "Very good" grades, excellent would be 4.0 and 35 ACT with a very high SAT which you aren't mentioning...

This delusional thinking that u need 4.0 and 35 is why kids cutting is on the rise.

Work on your reading comp. no one said it was needed, just that if you're going to describe grades as "excellent" they need to be excellent, not just "very good" which is what OP's kids grades actually are, just very good.

NP. Those are excellent grades. If you can't see that, then you're too jaded and need to step away for a bit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, my daughter is applying to ASU. She toured a lot of schools on the east coast and a few out west and she absolutely loved the Tempe campus and the Barrett Honors college.

Thanks! For some reason he is just not interested in ASU. Maybe the honors college could convince him...

What is he looking for? We never got down to Tucson, but ironically she wasn't interested in AU due to the majors she is interested in (although I told her she should look!) We were impressed with multiple aerospace engineering, planetary sciences, astrophysics, etc... She actually looked at Northern Arizona State online, but felt it might be more localized and less OOS. Both ASU and UA have over 35% OOS and yes, I am sure most is from the west coast, but like your son, my daughter is looking for a whole new culture and world. She would be excited to take quick trips to other parts of Arizona, Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, or Southern Cali. And even the in state kids come from all over and aren't suitcase kids. ASU has almost 15% international which we really liked too.

Don't let people here turn you off. I think many western colleges are great and are cheaper than many OOS on the east coast. My nephew's sons best graduated San Diego State with a degree in engineering and is working for Exxon and doing very well. I am sure no less than someone who went to U of Michigan and paid $65K a year. And he learned how to surf and toured all of Cali while he was there his 4 years. My daughter has a friend in Cal Poly SLO and she loves it there. I used to live in Morro Bay for a few years and thought SLO was a great college town. I absolutely love Tucson too. Beautiful vibe. Laid back people.

Most people around here just want the top notch schools for their kids and I guess that is fine to some extent. I just want my child to go where she wants to and see herself happy there. She definitely felt happier at ASU than most schools around here. I think the only other college she liked that much was Purdue. I am sure another school people around here would say is terrible.

Good luck!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, I grew up in Arizona. I knew lots of people who went to ASU and U of A. My best friend's daughter is at U of A. She loves it.

I am somewhat skeptical of the idea of "neighboring states as a better launching pad for CA jobs than staying in VA." People who go to Arizona schools mostly want jobs in Arizona. I don't think AZ schools give you any advantage, relative to any other non-California state, for getting jobs in California.

What I think you should look at is the Cal State system. Some of them are in roughly the same category as U of A in terms of price and selectivity. (Some of them are even cheaper than U of A, as far as I can tell.) San Diego State, Cal State Long Beach, Cal State LA, Cal Poly Pomona - I work for an engineering company that has thousands of employees in southern California, and we definitely hire people from these schools.

I am from Los Angeles. Lol, absolutely not.

+1 sorry, but this is terrible advice. Do not listen to it.

You two are not paying attention to the OP's parameters. Her kid does not have the grades/scores or the money to go to a top-drawer school. She is looking for an equivalent to the University of Arizona. Those schools are it.

Also, I lived in LA and my company is based there, and I can tell you grads from those schools are absolutely getting jobs if they have STEM degrees.

We have company VPs who graduated from CSULB and San Diego State. They'd be sad to hear your low opinion of their alma maters. But they'd have their huge salaries to console them.

OP here. NO, that is not true. Please stop making things up. My son has excellent grades, he has a 3.85 unweighted GPA and a 32 ACT. We can afford approximately $35-$40k/year for college. He is considering Arizona because he would qualify for large amounts of merit aid that makes it fit within our budget, and satisfies his interest in attending school in a different region of the country.

erm no, hate to break it to you but those are "Very good" grades, excellent would be 4.0 and 35 ACT with a very high SAT which you aren't mentioning...

God, I hate people like you

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually Arizona made a big jump in the USNWR rankings this year and passed ASU.

Typically, U of A has always surpassed Arizona State. Arizona is the flagship, while State is the land grant.

Mmm, not really. USNWR Ranking last two year.

U of A: 2018 (124 National; 58 Public. 2019 (106 and 46)
ASU: 2018 (115 and 53); 2019 (115 and 52)

I'm an ASU grad from the 1990's, and so I am biased, but Tempe is a lot nicer than Tucson in my opinion.

Also, since Phoenix is a large city (unlike Tucson), there are more internship opportunities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, my daughter is applying to ASU. She toured a lot of schools on the east coast and a few out west and she absolutely loved the Tempe campus and the Barrett Honors college.

Thanks! For some reason he is just not interested in ASU. Maybe the honors college could convince him...

What is he looking for? We never got down to Tucson, but ironically she wasn't interested in AU due to the majors she is interested in (although I told her she should look!) We were impressed with multiple aerospace engineering, planetary sciences, astrophysics, etc... She actually looked at Northern Arizona State online, but felt it might be more localized and less OOS. Both ASU and UA have over 35% OOS and yes, I am sure most is from the west coast, but like your son, my daughter is looking for a whole new culture and world. She would be excited to take quick trips to other parts of Arizona, Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, or Southern Cali. And even the in state kids come from all over and aren't suitcase kids. ASU has almost 15% international which we really liked too.

Don't let people here turn you off. I think many western colleges are great and are cheaper than many OOS on the east coast. My nephew's sons best graduated San Diego State with a degree in engineering and is working for Exxon and doing very well. I am sure no less than someone who went to U of Michigan and paid $65K a year. And he learned how to surf and toured all of Cali while he was there his 4 years. My daughter has a friend in Cal Poly SLO and she loves it there. I used to live in Morro Bay for a few years and thought SLO was a great college town. I absolutely love Tucson too. Beautiful vibe. Laid back people.

Most people around here just want the top notch schools for their kids and I guess that is fine to some extent. I just want my child to go where she wants to and see herself happy there. She definitely felt happier at ASU than most schools around here. I think the only other college she liked that much was Purdue. I am sure another school people around here would say is terrible.

Good luck!

He is leaning toward something natural resources, environmental sciences, maybe conservation biology...not 100% sure. I think he wants more of a college-town vibe; the other schools we've toured are UMD (didn't like) and UConn (liked a lot) but I think is anxious to see schools in different parts of the country.

I totally agree on your last point!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually Arizona made a big jump in the USNWR rankings this year and passed ASU.

Typically, U of A has always surpassed Arizona State. Arizona is the flagship, while State is the land grant.

Mmm, not really. USNWR Ranking last two year.

U of A: 2018 (124 National; 58 Public. 2019 (106 and 46)
ASU: 2018 (115 and 53); 2019 (115 and 52)

I'm an ASU grad from the 1990's, and so I am biased, but Tempe is a lot nicer than Tucson in my opinion.

Also, since Phoenix is a large city (unlike Tucson), there are more internship opportunities.

I’m guessing you’re among the 95% of ASU grads who have never spent any time in Tucson.
Tempe and the Valley are soulless and generic, you might as well be in a suburb of LA. Plus the air pollution is terrible in Phoenix—the sky is brown all winter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually Arizona made a big jump in the USNWR rankings this year and passed ASU.

Typically, U of A has always surpassed Arizona State. Arizona is the flagship, while State is the land grant.

Mmm, not really. USNWR Ranking last two year.

U of A: 2018 (124 National; 58 Public. 2019 (106 and 46)
ASU: 2018 (115 and 53); 2019 (115 and 52)

I'm an ASU grad from the 1990's, and so I am biased, but Tempe is a lot nicer than Tucson in my opinion.

Also, since Phoenix is a large city (unlike Tucson), there are more internship opportunities.

I’m guessing you’re among the 95% of ASU grads who have never spent any time in Tucson.
Tempe and the Valley are soulless and generic, you might as well be in a suburb of LA. Plus the air pollution is terrible in Phoenix—the sky is brown all winter.

OP here. Yeah, I think this is another thing that turns him off. We've spent a lot of time in the greater Phoenix metro area (SIL is in Mesa, MIL and FIL with a condo in Sun City) and he's always found it kinda meh. But I keep trying to tell him we've never been to Tempe itself!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually Arizona made a big jump in the USNWR rankings this year and passed ASU.

Typically, U of A has always surpassed Arizona State. Arizona is the flagship, while State is the land grant.

Mmm, not really. USNWR Ranking last two year.

U of A: 2018 (124 National; 58 Public. 2019 (106 and 46)
ASU: 2018 (115 and 53); 2019 (115 and 52)

I'm an ASU grad from the 1990's, and so I am biased, but Tempe is a lot nicer than Tucson in my opinion.

Also, since Phoenix is a large city (unlike Tucson), there are more internship opportunities.

I’m guessing you’re among the 95% of ASU grads who have never spent any time in Tucson.
Tempe and the Valley are soulless and generic, you might as well be in a suburb of LA. Plus the air pollution is terrible in Phoenix—the sky is brown all winter.

Well I was a tour guide when I was a student at ASU, and pretty much all of the people on my tour (mostly from the Midwest and East Coast) were blown away by the beautiful ASU campus. I personally liked going to a college that was in a city, rather than in a college town. But to each his own!

[Anonymous]

ASU / UA chicks are so hot.

It’s unreal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, I grew up in Arizona. I knew lots of people who went to ASU and U of A. My best friend's daughter is at U of A. She loves it.

I am somewhat skeptical of the idea of "neighboring states as a better launching pad for CA jobs than staying in VA." People who go to Arizona schools mostly want jobs in Arizona. I don't think AZ schools give you any advantage, relative to any other non-California state, for getting jobs in California.

What I think you should look at is the Cal State system. Some of them are in roughly the same category as U of A in terms of price and selectivity. (Some of them are even cheaper than U of A, as far as I can tell.) San Diego State, Cal State Long Beach, Cal State LA, Cal Poly Pomona - I work for an engineering company that has thousands of employees in southern California, and we definitely hire people from these schools.

I am from Los Angeles. Lol, absolutely not.

+1 sorry, but this is terrible advice. Do not listen to it.

You two are not paying attention to the OP's parameters. Her kid does not have the grades/scores or the money to go to a top-drawer school. She is looking for an equivalent to the University of Arizona. Those schools are it.

Also, I lived in LA and my company is based there, and I can tell you grads from those schools are absolutely getting jobs if they have STEM degrees.

We have company VPs who graduated from CSULB and San Diego State. They'd be sad to hear your low opinion of their alma maters. But they'd have their huge salaries to console them.

OP here. NO, that is not true. Please stop making things up. My son has excellent grades, he has a 3.85 unweighted GPA and a 32 ACT. We can afford approximately $35-$40k/year for college. He is considering Arizona because he would qualify for large amounts of merit aid that makes it fit within our budget, and satisfies his interest in attending school in a different region of the country.

(shrug) You were the one who said you could afford U of A, and that he had the grades and scores for U of A, U of Minnesota, Colorado Boulder, and U of SC. These are not top drawer schools. Therefore the Cal State suggestions were perfectly in line with the information you gave us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, I grew up in Arizona. I knew lots of people who went to ASU and U of A. My best friend's daughter is at U of A. She loves it.

I am somewhat skeptical of the idea of "neighboring states as a better launching pad for CA jobs than staying in VA." People who go to Arizona schools mostly want jobs in Arizona. I don't think AZ schools give you any advantage, relative to any other non-California state, for getting jobs in California.

What I think you should look at is the Cal State system. Some of them are in roughly the same category as U of A in terms of price and selectivity. (Some of them are even cheaper than U of A, as far as I can tell.) San Diego State, Cal State Long Beach, Cal State LA, Cal Poly Pomona - I work for an engineering company that has thousands of employees in southern California, and we definitely hire people from these schools.

I am from Los Angeles. Lol, absolutely not.

+1 sorry, but this is terrible advice. Do not listen to it.

You two are not paying attention to the OP's parameters. Her kid does not have the grades/scores or the money to go to a top-drawer school. She is looking for an equivalent to the University of Arizona. Those schools are it.

Also, I lived in LA and my company is based there, and I can tell you grads from those schools are absolutely getting jobs if they have STEM degrees.

We have company VPs who graduated from CSULB and San Diego State. They'd be sad to hear your low opinion of their alma maters. But they'd have their huge salaries to console them.

I see this weak argument almost daily on DCUM. So dumb. But since we’re doing it...we have a company officer with no degree at all so I guess college is a big waste of time, huh?

You are the one who is dumb. You are not paying attention to this thread. This is not one of the perennial favorites of DCUM - "should my son attend Princeton, Pomona, or Stanford?" - this is a thread about a kid who is looking at non-elite schools. Assertions that you can attend a non-elite school and still succeed in life are perfectly in order here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually Arizona made a big jump in the USNWR rankings this year and passed ASU.

Typically, U of A has always surpassed Arizona State. Arizona is the flagship, while State is the land grant.

Mmm, not really. USNWR Ranking last two year.

U of A: 2018 (124 National; 58 Public. 2019 (106 and 46)
ASU: 2018 (115 and 53); 2019 (115 and 52)

I'm an ASU grad from the 1990's, and so I am biased, but Tempe is a lot nicer than Tucson in my opinion.

Also, since Phoenix is a large city (unlike Tucson), there are more internship opportunities.

I’m guessing you’re among the 95% of ASU grads who have never spent any time in Tucson.
Tempe and the Valley are soulless and generic, you might as well be in a suburb of LA. Plus the air pollution is terrible in Phoenix—the sky is brown all winter.

I grew up in Scottsdale and went to ASU. I have spent a lot of time in Tucson. Phoenix area is far preferable. Tucson does not have more "soul" than Phoenix.

LOL at the idea winter in Phoenix is terrible. That's why thousands of people from the northeast and midwest go to Phoenix to escape their Arctic hell-holes in December and January.

[Anonymous]

ASU has some decent graduate programs, like Business and Law.