I think you son might become burned out if he studies both classics and engineering. In fact, based on my experiences at similar top schools, I predict that there is at least a 50 percent chance that:
1. He will not graduate with both degrees from Harvard or Hopkins or any similar school.
2. If he graduates with an engineering degree from Harvard, he will not have a career as an engineer. Most of my friends, and my brothers, and me, each with a degree from an engineering school at a top ranked university, do not work as engineers.
3. If he drops the engineering degree and keeps the classics degree, he will end up at law school. Everyone I knew with a classics degree (about 5 friends or so) went to law school.
You have a tough choice, but in our family we would lean towards the reputable state school with the assumption that graduate school is on the way (medical school, business school, law school, doctorate in a technical area).
“I think you son might become burned out if he studies both classics and engineering.”
Maybe. I kind of doubt it.
“2. If he graduates with an engineering degree from Harvard, he will not have a career as an engineer. Most of my friends, and my brothers, and me, each with a degree from an engineering school at a top ranked university, do not work as engineers.”
Is it that 1) you wound up with bigger and better (more exciting, or whatever) opportunities, 2) you decided you didn't want to work as engineers or 3) you couldn't find work as engineers?
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