Our oldest chose Rutger Honors College. It was the best choice, and turned out to be awesome when the pandemic hit. Being close to home was fantastic. Loved the Honors College. Majored in Computer Science/minored in Math. Interned at a fantastic company in Wisconsin, which led to a full time job. Had lots of other opportunities but really liked the summer internship. Was scheduled to finish in May, but completed degree requirements last semester and is driving around the US having some fun before work starts.
Best part for us was total out of pocket for 3.5 years may be less than $25K. Can't beat that.
It should, but for some, an extremely large State U is not a good fit, particularly when the intro classes are 200 plus students. You can get lost in the shuffle.
I was basically forced to go to Rutgers due to financial circumstances. At the time, I would have preferred Lehigh, but in the end I'm glad I went to Rutgers.
Our youngest was admitted to RU Honors College with a similar scholarship our oldest had. But there was no interest in the college to which he was admitted. RU did not have the program he wanted to purse, which is a physician assistant program where there is guaranteed entry into the master's phase of the program if you have maintained a minimum GPA. Quinnipiac University met that requirement.
With Rutgers, you had to apply again, and their program says: "We are committed to to diversity through holistic admissions process and have intensified recruitment efforts to enroll more underrepresented groups." Not being one of those groups, we said forget about it. Youngest absolutely loves Quinnipiac, and we love it too. He loves the small class sizes, and he has been provided opportunities as a freshman and sophomore he definitely would not have had in the largess of Rutgers.
Rutgers and State U's are not for everyone. Sometimes it is money well spent when a child chooses to go elsewhere with good reasons. We have zero regrets, and we are happy that he is happy and crushing it there.