MIT probably has a need-blind admissions policy; they don't care whether or not you have money. When they admit you, at least. Let me plug Carnegie Mellon University, which consistently ties with MIT and one of them California schools for first place in computer science. It's not quite as hard to get into as MIT, though you do have to deal with Pittsburgh winters. The town itself is small enough to be friendly, and big enough to be interesting. Jim Morris, the head of the computer science department, was my instructor for a data structures class and truly seemed to care about his students' well-being. Oh, and I remember we had t-shirts saying: "MIT -- the CMU of Massachusetts." -Declan Rick wrote:

At 12:32 PM 1/28/97 -0500, Derek Atkins wrote:

...

This is really exagerating. You do not need a 4.0, 1600, etc. to be admitted to MIT. Sure, you need good grades, but a 3.6 average and 1350-1400 SAT scores is perfectly adequate to be admitted to MIT.

I disagree and can speak from experience. I was denied admission to MIT even thought I had a 3.82 GPA, 1440 SAT (one try), and had taken 9 AP tests with two 5's, four 4's, two 3's, and one 2. As for being well-rounded, I was on several academic teams, sang in Chorus, acted and stage managed in Drama, and played Tennis.

The only thing I didn't have that the next MIT applicant had was money. I made the mistake of letting them know that I was dirt poor and would need full aid/grants/etc, and to quote "The Great Escape" it was "Zzzt! To the Russian front!"

...

For what it's worth, I wanted to go to MIT my sophomore year in high school, too

Lucky you. It had been a dream of mine since I was an annoying overachiever of 6. Sux to be white trash, I guess.

MIT may be a great school, but they tend to be snooty assholes for the most part. (DISCLAIMER: Not all MIT grads/attendees are necessarily "snooty assholes", I'm just saying that I've yet to meet one that wasn't.) _________ o s b o r n e @ g a t e w a y . g r u m m a n . c o m _________ "He who knows, does not speak. He who speaks, does not know."

------------------------- Washington Correspondent The Netly News Network http://netlynews.com/