[mattbrewsbytes]

Never had the opportunity for someplace like MIT, I was restricted to state schools by a few factors mostly financially. Look at the size and depth of faculty in the departments of interest at school Z. We had a bummer of a faculty who got fired (he sucked) at a small school which meant that a lot of electives were not available because that small CS department was down a person. Granted this was the 90's and CS was just a few years removed from being part of the Math department.

Go to MIT and network with others (I've often heard that is the value of Ivy and top tier schools). When you land your first job, use 50% of your salary to pay off loans and you'll have that 180k wiped out in no time. I was going to joke that a college education set of loans is like a mortgage but mortgages are outpacing a lot of things these days.