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The Insane Cost of Attending Wake Forest

Rafi said:
Did you go to your cheapest state school option?

I can’t speak to law school with any specific knowledge, but going to the cheapest state school option is horrible advice for getting into medical school.
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No, I went to a small private school. Law school and med school are very different processes.
 
inspectah said:
I will add that I say this as a third-generation WF grad. I doubt Wake thinks about families like mine when they jack up tuition every year, but they should.
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Inspectah, I just don’t understand your series of posts. Do you not read what others write or just not believe them? By USNews, Wake undergrad is the #23 best value. After 4 years at Wake the average debt is $12,000 more at Wake than UNC, but the starting salary at Wake is $5,000 more. We receive and review 10,000 med school applications per year (literally 10,000) and accept 2%. From this experience, I can tell you that your chance of success is way higher coming from Wake than your cheapest state school option.

Plus, to state that Wake has sucked at everything since the 90s? C’mon. Did you follow football in the 90s? Surely you realize the 2000s was our best decade ever in many sports, including football.
 
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You have any data on the socioeconomic status of Wake kids vs. UNC? Talking about debt difference is meaningless if Wake is brining in kids from much wealthier families.
 
I should have limited my sports critique to basketball. My frustration got the better of me.

WF is no longer within the reach of many middle-class families.

I don't dispute that getting into med school is easier with a Wake degree than one from UNC Asheville (or whatever is the cheapest state school option). But for multiple reasons, grad school admissions is mostly a numbers game. All else being equal, a Wake grad with a 3.4 is not getting priority over a UNC grad with a 3.9, not at UNC or anywhere. If that really happened more often than not, then there might be something to the "best value" stuff.
 
Also I think the distraction of cheapest was a mistake, what I meant to say was best in state option for cheap. So in North Carolina it’s UNC, and so on for other states, if you have a large respectable state school go there and then whatever grad school you want. It’s a stupid defense when enough people on here have said fuck wakes cost I’m not sending my kid there.
 
inspectah said:
I don't dispute that getting into med school is easier with a Wake degree than one from UNC Asheville (or whatever is the cheapest state school option). But for multiple reasons, grad school admissions is mostly a numbers game. All else being equal, a Wake grad with a 3.4 is not getting priority over a UNC grad with a 3.9, not at UNC or anywhere. If that really happened more often than not, then there might be something to the "best value" stuff.
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This is my argument. Students from elite private colleges get excellent advising, so their MCAT, interviews, etc. are better than those from the cheapest state school option. Essentially, all else is never equal and is in favor of the well-prepared students.
 
Say what you will about rafi, but he goes to fucking bat for Wake and the AD.
 
What about best in state school which is significantly cheaper so UNC, UVA, multiple California schools, Michigan State, and so on. The students that go there that would consider and could get into Wake will excel at those schools, same with large state schools that have honors programs. If you are a high caliber student you don’t need Wake and so cheaper is better.
 
Louis Gossett Jr said:
Also I think the distraction of cheapest was a mistake, what I meant to say was best in state option for cheap. So in North Carolina it’s UNC, and so on for other states, if you have a large respectable state school go there and then whatever grad school you want. It’s a stupid defense when enough people on here have said fuck wakes cost I’m not sending my kid there.
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Rafi said:
This is my argument. Students from elite private colleges get excellent advising, so their MCAT, interviews, etc. are better than those from the cheapest state school option. Essentially, all else is never equal and is in favor of the well-prepared students.
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Rafi, you're not really making much of a claim when saying that Wake pre-meds will do better than those at, to use another poster's example, UNC-A. Everybody knows that. As LG said, the comparison ought to be between Wake and that student's in-state flagship university, assuming a baseline level of quality (e.g. not Arizona State). You're going to have a hard time convincing me that a UNC pre-med is at a disadvantage as compared to his/her Wake counterpart with respect to interview and MCAT preparation, etc. Is there data that says Wake students perform better on the MCAT? And even if such a disadvantage exists, it would have to be sufficient to outweight the higher cost and lower GPA that typically go with a Wake degree.
 
Rafi said:
This is my argument. Students from elite private colleges get excellent advising, so their MCAT, interviews, etc. are better than those from the cheapest state school option. Essentially, all else is never equal and is in favor of the well-prepared students.
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Might have been true 20+ years ago, but I would think the skills gap between grad school candidates at strong public schools and "elite private colleges" is lessening as more and more top students pass up the high tuition at places like WF and go to places like UNC instead.

Also, I think you're overestimating the "value add" available from WF these days. The reality is that the tuition increases at WF are no longer proportional to the advantages WF students get over students at more reasonably priced schools. The marginal tuition dollars are not being used to help students with test prep, interviews, etc., they're paying the salaries of ten assistants to Hatch and five each for every dean on campus.
 
Also the idea that Wake Alum can afford Wake for their children and that Wake prepares you for a high paying career are in contrast to each other. If Wake is so good and you end up in the upper middle class you are then expected to pay full price tag for your child to attend Wake, and therefore that pathways is a dead end for most.
 
JuiceCrewAllStar said:
Say what you will about rafi, but he goes to fucking bat for Wake and the AD.
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It really is precious. Don't really need many facts. Just post 7x24 and hope 50% of it sticks. Interesting approach. Wears me out to think about it.
 
coredeac said:
It really is precious. Don't really need many facts. Just post 7x24 and hope 50% of it sticks. Interesting approach. Wears me out to think about it.
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What are you talking about? I have 2268 posts. You have 4390.
 
JuiceCrewAllStar said:
Say what you will about rafi, but he goes to fucking bat for Wake and the AD.
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Ha, thanks Juice.

I really do try to be objective and use data, when available, with all discussions on here. I also try to avoid being dramatic. On this thread I posted the data on us news ranking, average debt, average salary, etc. I also tried to bring inside perspective regarding med school admissions. It seems the counter argument has been a lot of feelings and anecdotes, except for a few solid posts.

I don’t always agree with what’s going on with the AD. You may not have noticed, but Manning is driving me nuts and I’ve been critical of him.
 
I agree that for most folks from NC who can get into UNC or NCSU (some of the colleges/programs), Wake probably doesn't make a lot of sense. Translates variably to various states.

For those with means and outstanding credentials and a strong preference for a smaller place that offers a challenging and naturally more supportive environment, Wake is an option.

For those with means and decent but not outstanding credentials (maybe not able to get into top tier state school), Wake offers a competitive advantage over non-top public schools.

For those without means but with high-powered credentials, the world is your oyster.

For those without means but just OK credentials--probably Wake is not for you unless they give you a lot of help for some reason.

I would generally not recommend anyone go into tremendous debt to attend Wake as an undergrad. Rather, go to the best public school you can get into.

A little debt--sure.

If you can go to wake and leave with < $40,000.00 debt, that's a bargain, IMO--for most folks probably. More than $100,000.00--probably not. Just shooting from the hip wrt those numbers.
 
Rafi said:
Inspectah, I just don’t understand your series of posts. Do you not read what others write or just not believe them? By USNews, Wake undergrad is the #23 best value. After 4 years at Wake the average debt is $12,000 more at Wake than UNC, but the starting salary at Wake is $5,000 more. We receive and review 10,000 med school applications per year (literally 10,000) and accept 2%. From this experience, I can tell you that your chance of success is way higher coming from Wake than your cheapest state school option.

Plus, to state that Wake has sucked at everything since the 90s? C’mon. Did you follow football in the 90s? Surely you realize the 2000s was our best decade ever in many sports, including football.
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Wake pulls more students from the Northeast where higher COL means less aid and debt is needed, and starting salaries are inflated for the same reason. Also Wake can't be graduating people in lower paying jobs - like teachers - anymore, so that is left to the state schools. Given these factors, I would expect a bigger difference overall.
 
Louis Gossett Jr said:
What about best in state school which is significantly cheaper so UNC, UVA, multiple California schools, Michigan State, and so on. The students that go there that would consider and could get into Wake will excel at those schools, same with large state schools that have honors programs. If you are a high caliber student you don’t need Wake and so cheaper is better.
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In regards to getting into med school, I would rate your undergrad options like this: elite private school with an associated med school >> elite private school (such as Davidson) >> elite public school with a med school (Michigan, UVA) > decent private school >>> state school without an associated med school (such as NC State).
 
ConnorEl said:
I would generally not recommend anyone go into tremendous debt to attend Wake as an undergrad. Rather, go to the best public school you can get into.
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I would not recommend going into tremendous debt to go to any school. I see some residents with a tremendous amount of debt. Those students rarely have debt from elite private schools (I can't think of an example), because those schools have strong financial aid. Instead, they have debt from for-profit schools, lower-ranked undergrads, weak DO schools, and international medical schools. I've seen residents with > $400,000 in debt.
 
What med school accepts students with degrees from for-profit colleges?
 
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