I go to a top ranked, albeit bone-crushinly expensive private school in New England. I come from a very TBM family in Utah.

During my college application, I didn't apply to any of the BYUs or any Utah state schools - much to the dismay of my parents and family. I just wanted to get out of the whole Mormon bubble and live in a liberal, accepting environment. I love New England and its cosmopolitan and liberal environment.

However, I am under a lot of debt as my parents would only pay for my education if I go to the BYUs. I will probably graduate with around $80,000 to $100,000.

To be honest, I don't really mind the debt but it definitely is stressful. My parents keep pressuring me apply to BYU or BYUI as a transfer student. They will pay for my tuition and housing which means I will graduate with 0 debt.

Is it worth it? What is the reputation of BYU or BYUI outside the Mormon Corridor? Would it be possible for me to find a good job in New England or California after I graduate? Should I stick to my school here, despite the debt.

Please help!

I'm studying Economics and Politics. Hopefully plan to go to law school.

BYU-I is more like a 64th-tier school.
It was ranked 64th overall out of 200 "similar" small colleges and universities in the western region. Even among mormons, it's largely thought of as a slightly-glorified community college.

BYU-Provo ranks better nationwide, depending on the field of study. Business, law, economics, even (some) medical fields -- good to very good rankings. Sciences, history, not so much (with some engineering fields being the exception). It is, however, so stiflingly mormon, and so beholden to the "honor code," that I can't imagine you could thrive there after what you've already been to.

If your family is Utah-resident, you can go to the U -- which has just as good or better rankings compared to BYU-P -- for a lot less than you're paying now. Maybe your parents would compromise on that? While still in mormon country, and having mormon influence, it's much more liberal and doesn't carry the burden of an ecclesiastical endorsement requirement or the BYU "honor code."

My daughter did just that. Went to a liberal arts college for her undergraduate, then Ivy League law school. Left with a ton of debt, but paid it all off within five or six years.

She loves the northeast and will probably make that her home.

You're better off where you are if you want to be taken seriously outside of Utah.

Graduate, get a good job, and just pay off those loans. That's what most of us are doing, anyway.

I graduated from BYU and now live on the East coast. I so very much regret having BYU on my transcript and on my resume. I don't think it has influenced whether I've been able to get a job, but I absolutely hate that people in my workplace would assume I'm an active Mormon because of it. When we have an annual day when everyone is supposed to wear a shirt from their alma mater, I *forget* to wear mine, and then button a sweater over my shirt so no one can tell I'm not wearing my college one. I hate not being able to share stories from my college days because I don't want someone asking where I went to college because then they'll assume----that I'm a Mormon. I can't afford to be associated with the racism and homophobia of that organization.

I totally agree with you. I attended Ricks, BYU-H, and BYU Provo. I hated all three and finally went to San Jose State University my last year of college. When I apply for jobs I only put SJSU on my resume because I swear, here in California, BYU on a resume/job application means you are homophobic. I don't want anyone to know that I used to be a Mormon.

I think it really depends on your intended field and ambitions. If you are at an Ivy League school, that can build your network and open a lot of doors for you. If you see yourself headed toward an Ivy League or similar grad degree (business, law, etc.,) you might consider staying the course. Your debt should be proportionate to what you expect the payoff to be.

Think Bob Jones or Oral Roberts. Same thing. BYU is a very large bible college that displays very little knowledge of the Bible. But it does control your moves just like Bob Jones and Oral Roberts. Any state university system is better than BYU.

Just about any private school in New England (even one barely known to anyone outside of NE) would eat BYU for lunch, academically and intellectually.

BYU-I is an even bigger joke.

Simple...Ask yourself how much respect you have for an institution named after a racist polygamist?

Do BYU and BYU-I have curriculum based on the blubbering drivel of Joseph Smith?

Its law school named after an anti-Semite.

My two cents: the BYU system is basically an extension of adolescence. It is populated and managed by people for whom getting educated is the least important thing one could possibly do in life. Yes, there are teachers and students there who want to provide/receive a real education, but they are quickly buried under the sheer weight of the extreme emphasis on socializing leading to a fun wedding. Note that I didn't use the term "marriage". Marriage is for grown-ups. A serious, adult-based marriage is not the goal. The goal is a fairy-tale romance leading to a fairy-tale wedding in the fairy-tale castle called a Temple.

Note that becoming educated is not on the list of things to do at BYU.

I have known lots of people who transferred to BYU from other schools,and they are appalled. They go there expecting the best that God's true Church can provide. They find the worst that a bunch of anti-education wackos can devise to promote their own world-views.

Thank you.

slskipper Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> They find the worst that a bunch of
> anti-education wackos can devise to promote their
> own world-views.

No school that puts religious orthodoxy above academic exploration is going to provide the "best" education. The "best" education is one that challenges your assumptions -- whether they're "right" or "wrong," and that teaches you how to think critically, not just "follow" what you're told.

Some "liberal" schools are, sadly, becoming what they claim to detest by doing similar things -- like Cal forbidding speakers they think are too "dangerous." They seem to have forgotten that "bad" ideas aren't defeated by censoring them, but by full and open and honest discussion of them.

That is a very crucial thing you point out, that BYU does not teach critical thinking, as most universities, only obedience to authority.

It's not just the degree but also the contacts you make in college. Your network of college friends will help you find work after you graduate; you may even end up married to one of them.

My BYU degree has proved worthless in that it only helps if one is seeking a job that is somehow connected to the church. I quickly learned not to list it on a job application. I remember once a potential employer looked at my resume and asked, "Do you feel comfortable working with people who don't share your values?"

Today, I would no sooner admit to having graduated from BYU than I would confess that I once served time for murder. Which might very well be the case, had I made the mistake of marrying a BYU coed and settling down in Utah County.

A few years back my wife and I went out to dinner with our then bishop who was a professor at a mid-tier university in the Midwest.

In the dinner conversation he mentioned how he regreted earning his bachelor's and master's degrees at BYU (he earned a PhD elsewhere). In his words, other faculty never took him seriously, and few higher-tier schools would seriously consider him for preofessorships because of it. He was a professor of political science.

I don't know if all that was true (though he seemed a straight shooter). But it made me glad to not have done the BYU thing.

Any school that won't display Rodin's The Thinker, because it considered it to be obscene, will never be taken seriously anywhere.

Yeah, and it's not obscene because the guy's all nakey, it's because he is thinking!! That's BAAAAD.

kjensen Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Any school that won't display Rodin's The Thinker,
> because it considered it to be obscene, will never
> be taken seriously anywhere.

yeah, I especially take exception to that!

I don't think that having BYU on my resume has hurt me getting a job. However, I don't like everyone at work assuming I'm Mormon (and all the baggage that comes with it) when people find out where I went to school. I avoid the school topic at work whenever I can. So it's probably worth it to have BYU on your resume and 0 debt but there are costs associated with it that 'haunt' you long after. Also, your social life at BYU will be 0 if you aren't TBM.

YBU banned 4 pieces in the Rodin exhibit for "the lack of dignity" not for nudity.... yeah, right.

The 4 banned pieces were "Saint John the Baptist Preaching,""The Prodigal Son," "Monument to Baalzac" and the "The Kiss"

As I recall, banning "The Kiss" caused the most furor amongst students at the time.

My son completed his Political Science undergraduate degree at WSU. He had excellent LSAT scores and received a full scholarship to Washington & Lee Law School in Virginia which, at the time, was ranked 9th behind schools such as Yale, Stanford, and Harvard. We feel that he didn't get accepted to any of the top schools due to his State School undergraduate program. Your undergraduate choices are important in consideration of furthering your education if you intend to apply to the top law schools.

He was also offered a full scholarship at BYU, but opted to not accept. His exceptional experiences at W&L Law could have never been matched at BYU.

The best program at BYU Provo is the Accounting program, both the undergraduate and Masters programs. Both are nationally ranked and basically have 100% placements for graduates. Worth every penny for those degrees. I loved my time there and those years. I was TBM then, but even looking back on it now, I'm still glad I went.

Anon-in-NE Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The best program at BYU Provo is the Accounting
> program, both the undergraduate and Masters
> programs. Both are nationally ranked and basically
> have 100% placements for graduates. Worth every
> penny for those degrees. I loved my time there and
> those years. I was TBM then, but even looking back
> on it now, I'm still glad I went.


That is true. BYU definitely tops for accounting.

Well, first off, when ranking the 3 BYUs:

- BYU Idaho is the most Mormon of all the BYUs. Everyone and I mean EVERYONE is always looking and judging you in whatever way they can. It's like everyone is in the Honor Code committee or something.

- BYU Provo is less strict.

- BYU Hawaii is more lax and much more bearable than both BYU Idaho and Provo.

I can not tell you because the auto censor would probably block my post

"BYU: a large dating and mating pool for True-Blue-Mormons, cleverly disguised as an institute of higher learning."

The BYUs have one thing in common with your parents--none of them are about your education. I get angry when I hear parents won't help unless the child attends a church university of their choice. They are telling you that without their church, nothing else you do matters. They want you to fulfill their goals, not your own.

If you have confidence in your drive to get the good education in the East and then get your loan paid off fast, you will feel good about that for the rest of your life.

I figured out the Mormon church was a scam more than halfway through BYU. The atmosphere was suffocating once I got the pod off my back and the scales off of my eyes. I felt like an undercover agent.

On the other hand, debt free is a seductive choice. Consider that once you get a job no one cares where you went to school if you are great at it and a pleasure to have on the team. Been an employer for decades now, and I only look at the actual abilities, contribution, and professional conduct. If you make the company look good, I wouldn't even care if you had a diploma from Trump U--although I would be rolling my eyes a bit.