<p>In assembling and presenting some recent data from Sparknotes about the USNWR Top 30 National Universities, I began to ask myself if the results of these student responses mirrored the general stereotypes and my own impressions of which colleges are the most undergraduate friendly places to attend in this august group. While I fully concede that the data collection and presentation has some definite holes, I was surprised at how closely the results matched my prior beliefs, albeit with a few exceptions.</p>
<p>(Note: LACs are not included in this comparison as there is no debate about their interests vis-</p>
<p>Dartmouth is ranked number one in Commitment to Undergraduate Teaching. Princeton, Yale, and Brown are good as well. What's up with Harvard people. Why are they always dissatisfied with everything?</p>
<p>^It comes with the territory of such a high status...people build Harvard up to be this mecca of education that will blow you away completely...its an impossible standard for any school to live up to...and as a result people might be a little dissapointed I guess...either that or they're just moody Harvard kids</p>
<p>Class of 2006 Dissatisfied with Advising, Social Experience</p>
<p>As social life marks heat up, seniors still lukewarm on concentration advising**</p>
<p>Published On 10/19/2006 3:48:28 AM
By ALEXANDER D. BLANKFEIN
Crimson Staff Writer</p>
<p>Despite the Colleges recent efforts to improve the undergraduate experience, members of the Class of 2006 said that overall, they were less than satisfied with their advising and social experiences. This continues a three-year trend of dissatisfaction among undergraduates. </p>
<p>"Student life at Harvard lags peer schools, poll finds"</p>
<p>By Marcella Bombardieri, Boston Globe Staff</p>
<p>Student satisfaction at Harvard College ranks near the bottom of a group of 31 elite private colleges, according to an analysis of survey results that finds that Harvard students are disenchanted with the faculty and social life on campus.</p>
<p>While the Harvard folks also reveal themselves elsewhere (eg, COHE survey) as not greatly contented, I personally think that the student responses here were a little over the top. Harvard consistently scored among the bottom colleges for each question asked and to me, the answers sometimes bordered on ridiculous. So, take the Harvard showing here with a grain of salt (although I don't think it would or should have placed out of the bottom group of schools). </p>
<p>I think that U Penn is due for a shout-out as the only college in the Top 19 that was not recognized for Classroom Teaching Excellence. If that same teaching ranking were done today, I wonder if U Penn would crack the Top 25 this time.</p>
<p>I'm actually a little surprised by the number of public unversities on this list. Although there is no doubt these institutions are excellent, they did beat out quite a bit of strong privates.</p>
<p>Eh, Harvard as a "people build Harvard up to be this mecca of education that will blow you away completely...", You just gotta come to Cambridge here and take classes. Yeah, pls come. Blow you away...not so much...amaze you....not so much....put you in awe...thats a more correct term.</p>
<p>What will blow you away is the number of world renown scientists and professors and simply unrivaled endowment. Number of talented and potential successful ppl..yes.</p>
<p>pls don't hype Harvard to be what you want it to be. stop</p>
<p>hallowarts,
All of the USNWR Top 30 colleges are in this list. They are the entire study group from which the data was drawn. Five publics rank in the USNWR Top 30 (UC Berkeley, U Virginia, UCLA, U Michigan, and U North Carolina) and so all would be included in this list.</p>
<p>As for how the colleges place, I think that the results match the stereotypes that are assigned to these colleges. U Virginia and U North Carolina are both known more for their undergraduate dedication and less so for their graduate and research programs. If you believe the stereotypes (which seem to be supported by these responses), that translates into greater student satisfaction with regards to things like faculty involvement, balance of student work habits, etc. This may also be partly a function of size as U Virginia (14k undergrads) and U North Carolina (17k) undergrads are the smallest of the five publics under consideration. </p>
<p>I think it's pretty clear that, as one looks at data and anecdotal evidence from a wide variety of sources, that certain colleges DO live up to their reputations as great places for undergraduate education. Within the Ivies, Princeton and Dartmouth probably best fit this description, but surely Yale and Brown have their proponents with the others having some strength as well. </p>
<p>Outside of the Ivy League, the top undergraduate-focused institutions undoubtedly include Notre Dame and Vanderbilt and are followed by a strong group of five colleges- Wake Forest, Emory, U Chicago, Rice, and Duke. While Stanford scores with these colleges in this survey, the evidence for their dedication to undergraduates is less consistent.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I think that U Penn is due for a shout-out as the only college in the Top 19 that was not recognized for Classroom Teaching Excellence. If that same teaching ranking were done today, I wonder if U Penn would crack the Top 25 this time.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Penn might even be higher on this Spark Notes survey if they didn't include how students view the dorms. Over half of the upper classmen at Penn live off campus to give you an idea of how many think of the dorms as "palaces."</p>
<p>And largely because there just aren't enough dorm rooms on campus to accomodate more of them (which is why the just-off-campus Radian has just been built, and why a brand-new 400-bed college house is being planned).</p>
<p>Not that the dorms are "palaces," be any means. :)</p>
<p>i don't think i've ever seen anyone do this... calculate the percentage of undergrads in the entire Universities. To me, that might be a good metric of how undergraduate-focused the school is. If 90% of the University are undergrads, that means to me, that the school's bread and butter is in the undergraduates, and perhaps more accomodating? Strictly a theory, don't know how the numbers will play out. Obviously this list should exclude LACs.</p>
<p>keefer, cc posters have supplied that information before, after some curious claims in earlier threads that graduate/professional students "dominate" a lot of large campuses. I remember those debates, but not the original subject matter or titles of the threads, unfortunately.</p>
<p>I think the optimal percent undergraduate is about 70%. Grad programs provide valuable resources for undergraduates but shouldn't dominate undergraduates.</p>
<p>I think Wharton would do well. Well, much better than the rest of Penn anyway.
On what do you base your opinion that Wharton would do much better than the rest of Penn?</p>
<p>As I recently stated in another thread, for many posters here on CC, Wharton's preeminence among undergraduate business schools seems to obscure the excellence of Penn's liberal arts and other non-Wharton offerings. For example, many of Penn's liberal arts departments are ranked among the top 10 or top 20 in the country, its undergraduate nursing program is one of the top 2 or 3 in the country, and its bioengineering and nanotechnology programs are also top-ranked. Further, Penn provides its undergrads with an amazing selection of courses, including many small classes and seminars and opportunities to work closely (often one-on-one) with senior faculty. With its vaunted "One University" policy, Penn also strongly encourages undergrads to take courses in most of Penn's esteemed graduate and professional schools (e.g., Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Law School, Annenberg School for Communications, School of Design, School of Social Policy and Practice, Graduate School of Education, etc.) without the need for any special dispensation.</p>
<p>The shibboleth that the non-Wharton undergraduate academics, focus, teaching, and experience at Penn are inferior to those of Wharton--and to most other Ivies--is oft repeated on CC, but is never backed up with real facts beyond the occasional hearsay anecdote. Anyone who follows Penn closely knows that it strongly believes that its entire undergraduate program (and especially the College of Arts and Sciences) is central to its identity and reputation, and it has spent literally billions (with a "b") of dollars over the last couple of decades specifically to enhance the undergraduate experience. Additionally, rather than allowing its graduate and professional programs to distract from its undergraduate focus, Penn leverages those programs to add to its undergraduate focus a dimension of variety, breadth and depth not available at other schools (e.g., what other school regularly opens to its undergrads over 50 courses in its top-10 law school?).</p>
<p>
[quote]
i don't think i've ever seen anyone do this... calculate the percentage of undergrads in the entire Universities. To me, that might be a good metric of how undergraduate-focused the school is. If 90% of the University are undergrads, that means to me, that the school's bread and butter is in the undergraduates, and perhaps more accomodating? Strictly a theory, don't know how the numbers will play out. Obviously this list should exclude LACs.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Here at Caltech there's roughly 2 grads to every 1 undergrad, and I can say as a grad that this school feels fully aimed towards undergrads. I was talking with the president of their alumni association, and he told me about how they have fantastic giving rates from undergrads that loved this school, but grads tend to have a much more negative picture and, in general, felt quite neglected by the university.</p>
<p>I think people have a stronger connection with their undergraduate institution. I get the feeling that the undergraduate experience is more about the whole deal (social +academic) while the grad experience is more about academics.</p>