It was for money mostly. This was many years ago before Stanford, Cal Tech, and MIT gave away more money if your parents made less than a certain amount. I switched to math and ended up going to a top 3 medical school. I didn't do engineering at BYU but I can say the math classes were on the same level.

I have enough money to send my kids to those schools if they want but I'd still send mine to BYU for undergrad. They'll have to be more proactive about internships but in many ways that's the real skill they need to learn as an undergrad.