It is a major decision in your life to choose which college/university to go to and it can have serious consequences for your future. Take your time, do your homework carefully and get as much information as you can, so you can compare your choices thoughtfully.
When looking to select a graduate program, you are the best person to decide what is best and most important consideration for you. Is it the cost, courses, ease of admission, location, brand value, rankings.
It is a big accomplishment and an unforgettable moment to receive acceptance letters from colleges. But the actual work starts as soon as those letters come in. It’s important to do your homework and recognize the biggest factors in your assessment, such as cost (often a major factor) or rating, to make the best decision for you.
At collegehippo, we are proud to launch first its kind offer our compare tool that lets you compare programs side by side.
Basic factors to be considered while Comparing and Selecting Best Graduate Programs
Cost
Remember that tuition is just part of the price. It can drastically add bed, board, textbooks, and fees to your bill. Make sure you have the overall cost of attendance when looking at colleges, so you can make an accurate comparison.
Financial aid
Include financial assistance when calculating prices, too. Some schools offer very few scholarships, while others provide a significant percentage of the student body with some form of assistance. Be sure to fill out a Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) application before you apply to colleges, and list all schools you are choosing, not just the one.
School rankings
In some fields, it’s not a big deal for you to go to school as long as you have a degree. But it could have a big effect on your future if you are planning to enter a prestigious area such as law, university ranking, or even school reputation.
Graduation data
Consider how many students graduate on time when analyzing schools and costs. According to the latest data from the National Center for Education Statistics, during those four years, about 42 percent of students who began at a four-year college in 2011 graduated from the same school and that could take up to five or even six years to get a degree. That can significantly add to your expenses.
Why can you trust data at CollegeHippo?
CollegeHippo’s list of 2100 Universities offering graduate programs comes from IPEDS Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System. It is a system of interrelated surveys conducted annually by the US Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES).
How to Compare Colleges at CollegeHippo?
The steps below will assist you through the process if you’re not sure how to compare colleges:
Step 1: Visit collegehippo.com, and you will land on the homepage of the official CollegeHippo Website.
Step 2: Now hover on “Graduate Programs” located at the navigation bar. And then click on it so that will take you to the new page.
Step 3: On the new page, you will find a search bar where you can search for all the graduate programs and graduate schools.
Step 4: To search all the accredited graduate programs, you can just type in the name of the graduate program; for example Select Computer Science. Click on the program when the suggestion box appears.
Step 5: After clicking on the program name, you will be redirected to this page where you get all the list of graduate programs from different universities.
Step 6: From this page, You can customize the results as you need by tweaking the Filters section located on the left side of the page, and select the university (you can find the check box at the end of each university description), and then click on the “Compare” button to start comparing between different universities. You can select around 2-4 universities at a time.
Step 7: You will land on the result page, resulting in the data of different colleges you selected.
What are all Compared in Phase 01 of CollegeHippo’s Compare Option?
Basic Detailing of College
Basic details of the comparable colleges are shown in this comparison process, such as Acceptance Rate, College Ranking, Location, College Type, Undergraduate and Graduate Enrollment, Completion Results.
Selected Detailing of Programs
Program specifics such as Program Level, GRE Requirements, Tuition Costs such as In-State and Out-State Tuition are shown similar to colleges.
Financial Aid Details
This stage would also result in comparative scholarship specifics from the college, such as whether the scholarships are available from the chosen colleges for the same program or not.