Click here to go to the NEW College Discussion Forum

.
My son is offered admission by Brown ,Cornell , Amherst college and University of Chicago . Uptill now the grant of Brown seems to be the best and Cornell the worst . We are yet to get the offer from Amherst. Can any one give us some advice on selecting the University

By Kengeorgesmith (Kengeorgesmith) on Wednesday, April 09, 2003 - 10:00 pm: Edit

bump

By Kengeorgesmith (Kengeorgesmith) on Thursday, April 10, 2003 - 04:14 pm: Edit

bump

By Autumnwine (Autumnwine) on Thursday, April 10, 2003 - 04:25 pm: Edit

What does your son want to study?

By Autumnwine (Autumnwine) on Thursday, April 10, 2003 - 04:27 pm: Edit

And other preferences? Geography, size (the spread from Amherst to Cornell is 500-3500), urban vs. not urban? etc etc etc

By Brownuniversity (Brownuniversity) on Saturday, April 12, 2003 - 05:33 pm: Edit

Brown or Amherst.

cornell is the worst and uchicago doesnt even compare to Brown and Amherst.

By Ndhawk (Ndhawk) on Saturday, April 12, 2003 - 06:16 pm: Edit

Brown! but yes it depends greatly on what your son wants to study

By Dream5 (Dream5) on Saturday, April 12, 2003 - 06:30 pm: Edit

I agree. You should decide between Brown and Amherst. Basically, liberal arts college vs ivy league.

By Qwer (Qwer) on Saturday, April 12, 2003 - 08:15 pm: Edit

Everything depends on the major...but if the major is anything science, premed, prelaw, engineering...

Brown is the WORST. Cornell is probably the BEST.

From another thread by another poster concerning Cornell vs Brown:

"thats funny, brown and dartmouth have always had the worst academic reputation amongst the ivies. goto any library and look at the past 10 years of US News colege rankings under the category of academic reputation/prestige. look up the facts for yourself!

i dont doubt that both are fabulous schools, but reputation for undergrad teaching...i dont know how someone can distinguish between cornell and brown.

as for medical schools, i believe cornell places students into med school at a much higher success rate (http://www.career.cornell.edu/students/grad/health/humanmedicine/humanFAQ.html)(http://www.career.cornell.edu/students/grad/health/humanmedicine/applied.html) than brown (http://www.careerservices.brown.edu/careerresources/tipgradschoolchecklist.htm).

unlike many other schools that limit and weed out as to who can apply to med schools, cornell will write evaluation letters and gather recommendations for any and all who want one provided they pass all their classes.

if i were to take a guess, in the ivy league, only HYP place students at a better rate than cornell."

I think the real choice is between CORNELL and AMHERST.

By Breeze (Breeze) on Sunday, April 13, 2003 - 11:41 am: Edit

Amherst would be my #1, followed by Chicago, Cornell, and Brown. Based on your financial aid awards thus far, I would switch the last two --

#1 Amherst (small classes, prestigious)
#2 Chicago (small classes, prestigious)
#3 Brown (no grades, hard to get into grad school)
#4 Cornell (worst financial aid, less prestigious)

They're all good schools. Amherst is probably the most prestigious in academic circles, followed closely by Chicago. Cornell and Brown are Ivy League of course, but they're both sort of the two "bottom" schools... not that any schools on the list are bad.

My perception is that Amherst has by far the best placement rates into grad schools. Brown likely the worst (no grades to go by). Chicago and Cornell both excellent rates at this, not as good as Amherst though.

Hope this helps!

By Fredmurtz2 (Fredmurtz2) on Sunday, April 13, 2003 - 07:10 pm: Edit

Brown has in past years been awarded slots in the top 6 or 7 institutions for quality of instruction, if teaching quality is the chief criteria. As far as the ratings, some claim the emphasis on the endowment when the ratings formula was recalculated is in large part to blame for Brown's falling from the 8th to 18th slot. The grades are optional and so are course performances which can requested from any Prof. (Grades do exist, on A/B/C/NC)

All of the schools are fine institutions, I have however heard some complaints about Amherst's large athlete faction and comparatively smaller course offerings which is offset by personal attention. You can't really go too wrong.

By Kengeorgesmith (Kengeorgesmith) on Sunday, April 13, 2003 - 11:36 pm: Edit

My son is planning to do a Double Major in Engineering and Finance / Economics

By Breeze (Breeze) on Monday, April 14, 2003 - 09:20 am: Edit

Fredmurtz2, the endowment is not taken into account in the US News ratings. Penn has a relatively small endowment and is always ranked in the Top 5. Brown's 18th ranking must have to do with something else.

If he is going into Economics, I would say Chicago has to be the #1 choice instead of Amherst. Chicago is regularly #1 ahead of schools like Harvard and Yale in ratings of the Economics faculty. It also has the smallest classes with a 4-to-1 student/faculty ratio, which is lower than any school in the world but Caltech.

I'm not sure that Chicago or Amherst have engineering though, if he's serious about that kind of a double-major. It's kind of hard if not impossible to double-major in two different schools (not just majors). Something like Physics and Economics would be much easier. There are just so many required classes in any Engineering curriculum that he won't be able to fill the major requirements for Economics.

If engineering is a must, that probably takes Chicago and Amherst out of it. Cornell is likely better than Brown for both economics and engineering.

Hopes this helps!

By Ravi (Ravi) on Tuesday, May 13, 2003 - 04:59 pm: Edit

bump

By Burutzagiuribe (Burutzagiuribe) on Friday, June 27, 2003 - 07:57 pm: Edit

I just want to point out that no one in this thread has any idea what he/she is talking about!

" endowment is not taken into account in the US News ratings. Penn has a relatively small endowment and is always ranked in the Top 5. Brown's 18th ranking must have to do with something else"

Lies. Endowment (disguised as teachers' pay or faculty resources) is one of the KEY criteria in US News.

"#3 Brown (no grades, hard to get into grad school"

BROWN HAS GRADES! Only very, grossly, ridiculously ignorant people make the assumption that the school is pass/fail. It's not, not by any means. 99% of students have actual grades, and Yale/Harvard/other Ivies have a similar pass/fail option. Don't spout idiocy.

By Cutie911 (Cutie911) on Wednesday, August 13, 2003 - 09:21 pm: Edit

i honestly have to agree w/ Burutzagiuribe, but some people do know what you're talking about. im not trying to be mean or anything, but the guys who don't know what they're talking about should say nothing at all, oh, and kengeorge, as for what college is best, what campus did your son like the most if he visited? which one gave him the best feel? it doesn't matter if a school is Harvard, or Christopher Columbus College (only an example), he should go to whichever is the best fit for him, and congratulations to your son for getting accepted into so many fine colleges