On the question of is HS easier or harder than college....
College with out a doubt.
It's not only because your courses are indeed actually harder (I doubt you took calc III or differential equations in high school) but the teachers most of the time give zero fucks about you. There are different social situations you will find yourself in that will make you choose between work, and play. Time management will become harder, too.
Really the hardest part is being an adult.
And to the matter of getting in to a school...If your parents are going to write a check... And you get decent grades at a high level tech. high school... and you're asian... Hmmm yeah you are going to go where ever you want pretty much (except maybe Ivy's).
Btw, what the fuq is industrial design? Designing factories? Why the hell would you do that?
Industrial design is where you learn how many screws are needed to keep a desk from falling apart. How tall you need to make the lumbar support on a chair. How sharp the corner of a laptop can be without cutting someone typing. Okay, those are all fake examples, but the coursework revolves around learning how to design physical items so that they can hold together under use, and be useful for humans.
Industrial design is a non-ambitious career path for most people. Maybe for Yamamoto it'll be easier than highschool. He's coming from best in the state to go to a middle tier challenging program.
I'm partial to engineering degrees, but maybe it's time do consider pursuing one. You have a couple months or more before applications become due for Fall 2014.