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Which is more selective? Which school is better at engineering?

By Peachieva (Peachieva) on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 09:58 am: Edit

I'm pretty sure Rice is better at engineering and they're both about the same in selectivity

By Shoshie (Shoshie) on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 11:45 pm: Edit

Rice's decisions seem to make more sense. Wash U seems like it was very erratic in its decisionmaking. I got in, but some people who got into MIT didn't. Craziness.

By Dreadpirate (Dreadpirate) on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 11:11 pm: Edit

You cannot judge selectivity on the basis of percentage of applicants accepted. Wash U sends out repeated mass mailings based on fairly average psat scores. Since this practice started, the number of apps has increased significantly with a corresponding drop in acceptance percentage, creating an impression of increasing popularity and selectivity. Widespread use of the common app further distorts the picture, particularly among schools that mass mail to thousands of prospects telling them that they look like a good fit. For a more accurate picture of pure academic selectivity, disregard the bottom 200 or so admits (largely athletes, some legacies, and other hooks)and compare the rest for SAT 1 and 2 scores, percentage in top 5%, and percentage of NMS. At Rice 25% are over 1520 and 32% are NMS. I don't know how that compares to Wash, but it is in the same ballpark as HYPS and Duke and slightly higher than the Ivies other than HYP.

By Taxguy (Taxguy) on Wednesday, May 19, 2004 - 10:45 am: Edit

I have had some friends at Rice who loved the school. That said, however, I think that Wash U is, for the most part, the better choice. It has, in my opinion, are more sterling national reputation, and is higher ranked than Rice in most disciplines. Also, Wash U has been rising steadily in the rankings. I don't know why,but it is the case. Thus, it seems to be on its way to being deemed a college "dynamo." Just my opinion.

By Wlrsqtr (Wlrsqtr) on Thursday, May 20, 2004 - 11:09 pm: Edit

WUSTL rep is based largely on playing a game with USNEWS rankings better than other schools. Wash U is much easier than other top 20 schools to get into early if you can pay because it is not need blind. At my daughter's school (she was admitted to both) all ED applicants to WUSTL who did not require financial aid were admitted. No students who needed aid were admitted early (sample total 8). No top 10 % students applied early. RD only top 5-10% students were admitted or waitlisted (except for one legacy). None are attending (except the legacy). It is fairly hard to get into RD and is tends to lure top students with $. The second part is not a bad thing as far as I am concerned, but half of their class is made up of kids who would never get in RD. Rice seems to have less disparity between students admitted early and ID/RD.

By Cj3051 (Cj3051) on Thursday, May 27, 2004 - 03:29 am: Edit

Wlrsqtr, you cannot draw a conclusion based on a very small (probably biased and unreliable) sample. For selectivity, just pay $12 and log on USNEWS website and see what the percentage of top 10% among the freshmen for yourself.

Both schools are excellent. Rice is probably better engineering and physics at the moment. But you should not dismiss WUSTL simply because your daughter chooses Rice.

Every school tries hard to move up in the rankings. If you cannot do as well as other schools, blame yourself.

By Zcat18 (Zcat18) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 03:03 pm: Edit

I didn't apply to either, but in my opinion, Rice is the superior of the two. I tend to see WashU as somewhat of a pretender in the elite-college fraternity. Rice, on the other hand, is severely underrated and should be regarded as a very solid top institution along the lines of Duke, Cornell, and the like.

By Jwtullis (Jwtullis) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 03:35 pm: Edit

I do agree with you, Zcat18, but in my opinion, of those of the academic community anyway, Rice is regarded among the likes of Duke and the Ivies. It's those who have typically heard of schools through their athletic programs (i.e. Stanford, Duke, etc.) who may view Rice as less reputable. Another thing to consider is the fact that, as far as UNDERGRADUATE education is concerned, Rice certainly has the smaller class sizes of the two and the better student teacher ratio. People so often seem to consider schools according to their graduate schools and reputations therein, but that is certainly not a good criterion for prospective undergraduates to use to compare schools, as it simply does not represent the education you're going to be getting or its quality.

By Zcat18 (Zcat18) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 09:00 pm: Edit

Agreed, and I do think that the people who matter hold Rice in the highest regard. I also attend a school (Northwestern) that tends to lag in name recognition among the "man on the street" but is nevertheless, in my opinion, an institution that is well-respected by those that count (biased though I may be).

I, like you, believe that the strength of a given university's undergraduate program is only loosely related, if at all, to its graduate quality and that schools with relatively unknown/weak graduate programs can still be top undergraduate institutions (For the record, I don't view Rice's graduate programs as particularly weak or unknown). Great undergraduate programs, in my opinion, rise to the top primarily as a result of the ability level of the student body and the quality of the teaching. Take Dartmouth, for example. It's a wonderful undergraduate institution--certainly deserving of a top spot on anybody's list of colleges--but its stand-out graduate programs number relatively few. I see Rice as a similar, though not identical, institution. It is one with an undergraduate focus that provides its students with an excellent education in addition to very solid research opportunities.