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> I ended up going to Virginia Tech on a full scholarship. I think compared to Boston, Pasadena or Stanford, Blacksburg is far more conducive to mental and phy

> I ended up going to Virginia Tech on a full scholarship. I think compared to Boston, Pasadena or Stanford, Blacksburg is far more conducive to mental and physical health. And even without your scholarship, VA Tech is cheap, and absurdly cheap compared to you backup schools. Well done. Go Hokies. FWIW my first choice was CMU, got in early acceptance, but my father's income prevented financial aide. It has increased since, but at the time CMU was $22K/semester while VA Tech in state tuition was $2500/semester. Rents are also much more affordable in SW Virginia than they are in Pgh (or Boston, Pasadena or Stanford). I looked at MIT, but I could not identify the campus; it was just city buildings. To me, Harvard reminded me of a penitentiary.

lisper 5y ago
> I think compared to Boston, Pasadena or Stanford, Blacksburg is far more conducive to mental and physical health. And I agree. Blacksburg was certainly better for my mental health than Boston. But again, this all turns on what you want out of life. Mental and physical health are not the only things a person could possibly desire. If what you really want is to be on the bleeding edge of something like science and technology, and you're willing to endure some stress and physical discomfort in order to achieve that, then Boston is probably a better place to be. This is why figuring out what you really want is really important and really hard. Case in point for me: what I really want out of life is freedom: not being beholden to anyone, being able to do whatever I want whenever I want to. I've more or less achieved that, but it comes at a cost: I have no children because if you have children then you are beholden to them (or at least you should be). I have absolutely no regrets about this, but obviously many people want children more than they want freedom, and that's probably a good thing or we'd go extinct. Different strokes for different folks. That plus a free market is what makes technological civilization work.
- Maursault 5y ago
  > If what you really want is to be on the bleeding edge of something Sure, but I don't think undergraduates are really bleeding edge participants, more like a necessary evil for bleeding edge participants.
  - lisper 5y ago
    If your goal is to be on the bleeding edge, the best way to get there is to forge relationships with people who are already there. There are many more opportunities to do that at MIT or Stanford than Virginia Tech. The actual education you get is very much a secondary consideration.
    - Maursault 5y ago
      I just disagree fundamentally with what you are floating. Undergraduate educations (meaning where the degree is awarded) could not matter less if continuing to graduate level education, and yet what is learned during undergraduate studies is pretty important. If you don't learn Calculus, and get decent grades doing so, you're not going to be able to get a Masters in Math or CS because you won't get accepted into the program. Though I know of seniors planning on graduate education becoming more active in a department, maybe getting an internship to make photo copies and coffee, I've never really heard of undergraduates "forging relationships" with faculty, at least not beyond a particular semester course. Take two students, all things being equal, but one goes to MIT and learns a lot and ingratiates themselves to faculty, but gets B grades, while the other goes to NC State, ignores faculty, parties for 4 years, but gets straight A's... guess which will be accepted into an MIT graduate program? Grad schools are not political. Graduate acceptance is based on merit, not popularity. Unfortunately, academic merit is based on grades, which are evil, and not based on whether you graduated from Yale or Mountain Springs Community College.
      - jjav 5y ago
        > Graduate acceptance is based on merit, not popularity. For common people, yes. I know first-hand people who are very politically connected who went into and graduated from MIT, who are dumb as a rock. With enough money and connections, nothing else matters.
        Throwawayaerlei 5y ago
        > I know first-hand people who are very politically connected who went into and graduated from MIT, who are dumb as a rock. With enough money and connections, nothing else matters. I've watched how MIT "processes" undergraduate students all the way through graduation, and this would require corrupting the Registrar's office to create a fake transcript and adding names to the list of graduates after the departments and that office submit their perfected lists to the people who handle the details of graduation. It's theoretically possible, but strikes me as unlikely unless those rocks can do and apply the calculus; are you really sure that's beyond them?

lisper 5y ago

> I think compared to Boston, Pasadena or Stanford, Blacksburg is far more conducive to mental and physical health. And I agree. Blacksburg was certainly better for my mental health than Boston. But again, this all turns on what you want out of life. Mental and physical health are not the only things a person could possibly desire. If what you really want is to be on the bleeding edge of something like science and technology, and you're willing to endure some stress and physical discomfort in order to achieve that, then Boston is probably a better place to be. This is why figuring out what you really want is really important and really hard. Case in point for me: what I really want out of life is freedom: not being beholden to anyone, being able to do whatever I want whenever I want to. I've more or less achieved that, but it comes at a cost: I have no children because if you have children then you are beholden to them (or at least you should be). I have absolutely no regrets about this, but obviously many people want children more than they want freedom, and that's probably a good thing or we'd go extinct. Different strokes for different folks. That plus a free market is what makes technological civilization work.

Maursault 5y ago
> If what you really want is to be on the bleeding edge of something Sure, but I don't think undergraduates are really bleeding edge participants, more like a necessary evil for bleeding edge participants.
- lisper 5y ago
  If your goal is to be on the bleeding edge, the best way to get there is to forge relationships with people who are already there. There are many more opportunities to do that at MIT or Stanford than Virginia Tech. The actual education you get is very much a secondary consideration.
  - Maursault 5y ago
    I just disagree fundamentally with what you are floating. Undergraduate educations (meaning where the degree is awarded) could not matter less if continuing to graduate level education, and yet what is learned during undergraduate studies is pretty important. If you don't learn Calculus, and get decent grades doing so, you're not going to be able to get a Masters in Math or CS because you won't get accepted into the program. Though I know of seniors planning on graduate education becoming more active in a department, maybe getting an internship to make photo copies and coffee, I've never really heard of undergraduates "forging relationships" with faculty, at least not beyond a particular semester course. Take two students, all things being equal, but one goes to MIT and learns a lot and ingratiates themselves to faculty, but gets B grades, while the other goes to NC State, ignores faculty, parties for 4 years, but gets straight A's... guess which will be accepted into an MIT graduate program? Grad schools are not political. Graduate acceptance is based on merit, not popularity. Unfortunately, academic merit is based on grades, which are evil, and not based on whether you graduated from Yale or Mountain Springs Community College.
    - jjav 5y ago
      > Graduate acceptance is based on merit, not popularity. For common people, yes. I know first-hand people who are very politically connected who went into and graduated from MIT, who are dumb as a rock. With enough money and connections, nothing else matters.
      - Throwawayaerlei 5y ago
        > I know first-hand people who are very politically connected who went into and graduated from MIT, who are dumb as a rock. With enough money and connections, nothing else matters. I've watched how MIT "processes" undergraduate students all the way through graduation, and this would require corrupting the Registrar's office to create a fake transcript and adding names to the list of graduates after the departments and that office submit their perfected lists to the people who handle the details of graduation. It's theoretically possible, but strikes me as unlikely unless those rocks can do and apply the calculus; are you really sure that's beyond them?