why chose NYU

Reflection Paper 1

How and Why Did You Choose NYU? A Course-Informed Analysis of Your College Decision

Important: For information about AI use, citation format, submission requirements, extensions, and grading criteria, see the Reflection Overview page. REFLECTION PAPERS. This page focuses on the specific intellectual task for Reflection 1.

Purpose of This Reflection

Many people can write a personal story about how they chose a college. What makes this a course assignment is that your thinking should now be shaped by what youve learned in this class. Your goal is to reflect on your own college decision especially your choice to attend NYU using ideas, concepts, and evidence from the course. You are being asked to show how the course helps you see your decision more clearly, critically, or differently than you did at the time. You do not need to have consciously used these ideas when you were making your decision. You may apply them retrospectively, using what you now understand.

Core Elements to Draw From

Treat this as a guide, not a checklist. The elements below are meant to help you think about what an analytically strong reflection might include. You do not need to address every element explicitly, and you do not need to organize your paper into five sections. A strong paper will engage meaningfully with at least 3 of the 5 elements below, using course concepts in depth. Many strong papers will touch on all five but depth matters more than

do not need to label sections or follow the order above.

1. Your Decision Process

Reflect on how your decision to attend college and specifically NYU took shape. You might consider:

When you decided you would attend college

Who or what influenced you (family, teachers, rankings, counselors, social media, visits, peers, etc.)

What mattered most to you at the time

2. Comparative College Choices

Most students will find it helpful to discuss other colleges or universities they seriously considered. You might reflect on:

How those schools differed from NYU in ways that mattered to you

What trade-offs you were weighing (cost, prestige, location, majors, aid, distance from home, campus culture, etc.)

Why NYU ultimately stood out despite those trade-offs

If your choice set was limited (for example, by finances, geography, or admissions outcomes), explaining that limitation is itself analytically useful.

3. Major vs. Institution

Reflect on how your intended major and your choice of institution interacted (or didnt) in your thinking:

Did you choose your major first, or your type of college first?

What did you believe about earnings, job stability, graduate school, or career flexibility?

How do ideas like human capital or signaling help you interpret that thinking now?

If your major was uncertain or later changed, that uncertainty is worth discussing.

4. Money, Aid & Risk

You should engage seriously with the economic logic of cost, aid, and risk, even if cost was not a binding constraint for you. This might include:

Sticker price versus expected net price

Expectations about scholarships, grants, or loans

How you thought about debt, job prospects, or the possibility that things might not go as planned

Who would bear the risk if the investment didnt pay off as expected

Even students from higher-income backgrounds should reflect on how cost, investment, and risk figured into (or were consciously discounted in) their decision-making.

5. Final Choice & Trade-Offs

Bring your analysis together by reflecting on:

Why you ultimately chose NYU

What you gave up to attend NYU

What you expected to gain economically and non-economically

This is often where economic and non-economic considerations intersect most clearly.

personal information: major is communication, final year of school, future is finding a job and doing my own business.