Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a good problem to have! A no-lose situation, right?
Is she good at self-organizing? If not I think either of those schools could be challenging, UMich because it's so large and Brown because of their odd structure.
This is circa 1986 info but...the one girl from our private school who did choose Brown was looking for a rich Jewish husband. Just a fact. She was a talented actress and very smart, she got into a number of other top schools.
Sort of the way that the smug super smart school president with social connections went to Princeton and the science whiz went to Cal Tech and the athlete douche went to Dartmouth and those two girls who were good at everything went to Yale and Harvard. And the rest of us went to Williams and Pomona and Boston U and UC Santa Cruz.

"the rest of us went to Williams..." lol that's a hyper-elite college.

Boston U and UC Santa Cruz?? Yikes.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The girls and boys she meets at Brown at 10x the peers she will meet at UMich. That's worth the $160K alone.

Out of state students go to UMich because they were rejected from all the Ivies - notably Cornell and Penn. Just a fact.

Either there's one crazy person in this thread, or there's a whole contingent of folks who went to Brown just to find a husband.

I know where NOT to send my son

I'm the 'crazy' PP. The OP mentioned her daughter was only interested in Brown and Michigan. The things I said also go for the 20 or so colleges that are superior to Michigan: Ivy League, Stanford, Northwestern, UChicago, Georgetown, Hopkins, MIT, Duke, Notre Dame, Tufts, Vanderbilt, the elite LACs.

In what world is Notre Dame superior to the University of Michigan???

Acceptance rate, prestige, private, post grad success, salary.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think (Brown vs. Stanford) vs. Michigan is a different argument. I wouldn't take on the debt for Brown, but would do it for Stanford.

And if you were an alumni from either Brown or Stanford, you'd be among the lowest earners in your class if you needed debt to pay for your child's college.

Do you have proof for that? I know alums of both who are normal middle class people for whom sending their kids to college is a stretch. One has sent 3 to college on football scholarships. Another is getting grandparents help for private school, and will probably get that same help for college.

Isn't that the point? How many Michigan grads do you know who have grandparents paying for private school?

My Brown grad FIL could no sooner pay for my DDs' private school than the man in the moon. Fortunately, DH and I (both Michigan grads) don't need any help.

Know better

First off, correct your daughter's stinking thinking that college at Mich would be a repeat of high school. It would not and you should now better. Does the university resemble her high school? Secondly, has she articulated ANY solid reasons why Brown is an appropriate choice? I didn't hear any, but might have missed it. At that price, there needs to be a clear set of reasons to choose it, persuasive. Next, get to the library and check out some books. Get some published advisors to read. Lastly, say she goes to Brown, and you sink $600,000 by the end, 1) will there be job prospects (look it up)? 2) will there be other children expecting the same? 3) can you afford it? Maybe so, but by the time you spend 1.8 million for 3 kids, you could have opened a good business. Just a thought.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The girls and boys she meets at Brown at 10x the peers she will meet at UMich. That's worth the $160K alone.

Out of state students go to UMich because they were rejected from all the Ivies - notably Cornell and Penn. Just a fact.

Either there's one crazy person in this thread, or there's a whole contingent of folks who went to Brown just to find a husband.

I know where NOT to send my son

I'm the 'crazy' PP. The OP mentioned her daughter was only interested in Brown and Michigan. The things I said also go for the 20 or so colleges that are superior to Michigan: Ivy League, Stanford, Northwestern, UChicago, Georgetown, Hopkins, MIT, Duke, Notre Dame, Tufts, Vanderbilt, the elite LACs.

In what world is Notre Dame superior to the University of Michigan???

This is a weird question for me, since the two school are so different. Michigan is YUGE whereas Brown is a smaller New England school. A person who will fit in at Brown will find a place at Michigan but the reverse might not be true. The most important decision is where your child will fit in and Thrive. That might make a difference or maybe your child would thrive at both. Only you know that but visit both campuses to be sure and let them spend time there.

Assuming your child is fully happy at both, I unequivocally recommend Brown. Michigan is a great school and a student can get a great education there, but it's not Brown. Many student at Ivy schools are forced above their level because of the small class size and the need to compete. Michigan is huge, which means that it's easy to find a group that doesn't challenge you and makes it easier to skate by. That's death if you're paying $28,000 a year.

Don't listen to people who say that only where you go to grad school matters. A huge part of where students get in to grad school is where they went to undergrad (and where their grad school admission committee went to undergrad). Brown will get a lot less scrutiny than Michigan and that's just how it is. Just like UVA gets more scrutiny than Dartmouth even though both are great schools. A 3.5 from Brown might also carry more weight than a 3.8 from Michigan for these same reasons.

In the end, both are great schools and if your child chooses what's best, then they'll do well. If they're indifferent then I would recommend Brown for the additional opportunities it provides and the doors it might not close. But the most important criteria is that your child graduate as a happy and enthusiastic person.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think (Brown vs. Stanford) vs. Michigan is a different argument. I wouldn't take on the debt for Brown, but would do it for Stanford.

And if you were an alumni from either Brown or Stanford, you'd be among the lowest earners in your class if you needed debt to pay for your child's college.

Do you have proof for that? I know alums of both who are normal middle class people for whom sending their kids to college is a stretch. One has sent 3 to college on football scholarships. Another is getting grandparents help for private school, and will probably get that same help for college.

Isn't that the point? How many Michigan grads do you know who have grandparents paying for private school?

Not sure why you have such a chip on your shoulder about Michigan. It's a little strange. I don't think you are very current on the student body or the selectivity of the school.

The above exchange is funny to me. My sister is a UMich alum whose kids are going to private school courtesy of their grandfather (her FIL), who went to U. of Detroit. Her DH went to Oakland U. I went to Stanford, but I did not meet DH there. He and I are both high earners, though, even though DH went to a state school that is lower ranked than UMich...and *gasp* he even outearns me!

If you are choosing your school based solely on what you think your future HHI would be, you are doing something wrong. I do not regret going to Stanford. It is not the sole determinant of my current salary, but it did open a lot of doors and continues to allow me more flexibility in shaping a very non-traditional career.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think (Brown vs. Stanford) vs. Michigan is a different argument. I wouldn't take on the debt for Brown, but would do it for Stanford.

And if you were an alumni from either Brown or Stanford, you'd be among the lowest earners in your class if you needed debt to pay for your child's college.

Do you have proof for that? I know alums of both who are normal middle class people for whom sending their kids to college is a stretch. One has sent 3 to college on football scholarships. Another is getting grandparents help for private school, and will probably get that same help for college.

Isn't that the point? How many Michigan grads do you know who have grandparents paying for private school?

Not sure why you have such a chip on your shoulder about Michigan. It's a little strange. I don't think you are very current on the student body or the selectivity of the school.

No chip, just stating the obvious here. OP has a financial dilemma that many others are also having. The parents who have money don't care about the extra cost. So at Brown you are either very talented or very rich. At Michigan, you are talented, possibly rich.

Yes and no. There is also the matter of scale. These state schools are so big, there are most likely more very talented students at Michigan than there are at Brown (just compare the students numbers and the data on incoming student scores from their respective Common Data sets).

Your statement is like saying "I would never live in NYC, I would much rather live in X rich suburb because of who I might meet." Turns out, you can find almost any demographic you want in NYC.

Anonymous wrote:This is a good problem to have! A no-lose situation, right?
Is she good at self-organizing? If not I think either of those schools could be challenging, UMich because it's so large and Brown because of their odd structure.
This is circa 1986 info but...the one girl from our private school who did choose Brown was looking for a rich Jewish husband. Just a fact. She was a talented actress and very smart, she got into a number of other top schools.
Sort of the way that the smug super smart school president with social connections went to Princeton and the science whiz went to Cal Tech and the athlete douche went to Dartmouth and those two girls who were good at everything went to Yale and Harvard. And the rest of us went to Williams and Pomona and Boston U and UC Santa Cruz.

Your circa 1986 report could apply just as well to my kid's class of 2012 from a DC independent school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I believe Brown is worth more than $160k more than Mich over the lifetime of your kid who will have a much better chance of getting a higher paying job and better prep for grad school than at Mich.

I tend to agree.

Unless you're Larry Page, of course.

Anonymous wrote:This is a good problem to have! A no-lose situation, right?
Is she good at self-organizing? If not I think either of those schools could be challenging, UMich because it's so large and Brown because of their odd structure.
This is circa 1986 info but...the one girl from our private school who did choose Brown was looking for a rich Jewish husband. Just a fact. She was a talented actress and very smart, she got into a number of other top schools.
Sort of the way that the smug super smart school president with social connections went to Princeton and the science whiz went to Cal Tech and the athlete douche went to Dartmouth and those two girls who were good at everything went to Yale and Harvard. And the rest of us went to Williams and Pomona and Boston U and UC Santa Cruz.

"the rest of us went to Williams..." lol that's a hyper-elite college.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think (Brown vs. Stanford) vs. Michigan is a different argument. I wouldn't take on the debt for Brown, but would do it for Stanford.

And if you were an alumni from either Brown or Stanford, you'd be among the lowest earners in your class if you needed debt to pay for your child's college.

Do you have proof for that? I know alums of both who are normal middle class people for whom sending their kids to college is a stretch. One has sent 3 to college on football scholarships. Another is getting grandparents help for private school, and will probably get that same help for college.

Isn't that the point? How many Michigan grads do you know who have grandparents paying for private school?

Not sure why you have such a chip on your shoulder about Michigan. It's a little strange. I don't think you are very current on the student body or the selectivity of the school.

No chip, just stating the obvious here. OP has a financial dilemma that many others are also having. The parents who have money don't care about the extra cost. So at Brown you are either very talented or very rich. At Michigan, you are talented, possibly rich.

The PP has a point about who you will meet. If not a college buddy (I mean, who meets their significant other in college, right?) then the friend of a friend of said buddy. "I met a guy who knew a girl who went to XX school with so and so who spent a semester in London with XZY and moved to my city."
I laughed when I read the description of UMich grads. Describes my Gen X friends' fathers but not them, maybe because they were the ones who came to DC.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think (Brown vs. Stanford) vs. Michigan is a different argument. I wouldn't take on the debt for Brown, but would do it for Stanford.

And if you were an alumni from either Brown or Stanford, you'd be among the lowest earners in your class if you needed debt to pay for your child's college.

Do you have proof for that? I know alums of both who are normal middle class people for whom sending their kids to college is a stretch. One has sent 3 to college on football scholarships. Another is getting grandparents help for private school, and will probably get that same help for college.

Isn't that the point? How many Michigan grads do you know who have grandparents paying for private school?

Not sure why you have such a chip on your shoulder about Michigan. It's a little strange. I don't think you are very current on the student body or the selectivity of the school.