<p>How many super-intelligent people are there at Cornell? I'm talking like Intel Finalists, etc. </p>
<p>I'm not sure what the equivalent in the humanities/social sciences would be-- I guess like national writing champions or something.</p>
<p>How many people were Valedictorians/Salutatorians with 2300+? I'd imagine they're quite common, but we do lose in cross-admits to most other Ivies +MIT/Stanford.</p>
<p>Just curious.</p>
<p>There are a lot of really really smart people at Cornell. I don’t know the exact statistics but it wouldn’t surprise me if Cornell has as many 2300+ scorers as Harvard or Yale (the difference of course is that Cornell also has more scorers on the low end of the spectrum). </p>
<p>One of the smartest people I’ve ever met was my college roommate at Cornell (and keep in mind, I’m around a lot of smart people seeing as 70% of my med school classmates attended a top 20 university). There was another dude in my orgo class who was routinely scoring 95 on the exams back when the mean was 50-60 (and an A was a 75).</p>
<p>I’ve heard, over the years of sporadically checking in on the CC Cornell board, a number of people claim that norcalguy himself must be a “genius type,” lol…</p>
<p>A more interesting question would be: are there any visionaries at Cornell who aspire to do things that are mind-boggling (eg. discover a method for free sustainable energy, unite Africa, rid the world of poverty), possess the intelligence and drive needed AND are humble. Very few I bet?</p>
<p>It seems most people I know who go to top schools like Cornell and Harvard only possess 2 of the 3. All the ultra intelligent people who work hard usually don’t try to do anything beyond their reach, so to speak.</p>
<p>^ Cornell has its share of visionaries, as do schools like Harvard (that you cite above).</p>
<p>[Notable</a> Cornell Alumni](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Cornell_University_alumni][b]Notable”>List of Cornell University alumni - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>^^
Would you say the top 100 students at Cornell are comparable to the top 100 at each of HYPSM? It seems like we would be losing pretty badly at that considering crossadmit data.</p>
<p>Our lower end is probably also lower, but I’d imagine a lot of the students in our 25-75% range are pretty comparable to HYPSM.</p>
<p>Kind of agree with eco - usually 2/3 for most people. And yes, there are a ton of 2300+ scorers, vals, and sals too. They usually end up at the higher 50%tile of the kids at Cornell, provided that they put in the effort.</p>
<p>I honestly think that all the ivies possess more than 2 or 3 of the type of person you’re talking about. The thing is, we often don’t realize it when we see it. The brief snapshots you get of people’s lives are never enough to really understand their true identities, especially in college.</p>
<p>No you actually kind of do once you get to know them… haha…</p>
<p>Ha … in my opinion very few people even know themselves all that well, and they’ve been with themselves their entire life.</p>
<p>True visionaries are rare at any level. It seems many of the incredibly smart people use their intelligence to make a lot of money or to do really well on tests, rather than to change the world. The smartest kids in my med school class go on to become plastic surgeons or dermatologists or radiologists. No one wants to become the next Surgeon General or to reshape the US healthcare system or go into Doctors without Borders. That’s idealistic stuff you write on your med school essays. Once you come out, you’re looking for the next big paycheck. </p>
<p>Of course, it’s hard to change the world as an undergrad. Even if you have an idea for curing cancer or solving world hunger, you don’t have the resources to put those ideas into play. I have a feeling some of my colleagues who spent their nights drinking and their days acing tests will accomplish something great once they hit their 30’s and 40’s.</p>
<p>… Which is why college is there, for you to explore yourself. And sometimes, people may be able to see things in other people better than they can see their own potentials.</p>
<p>@norcal, agreed</p>
<p>You know what saugus, if you still care about that, just don’t come here. seriously.</p>
<p>So we’re underneath HYPSM in prestige. <a href=“http://www.myplan.com/education/colleges/college_rankings_8.php[/url]”>http://www.myplan.com/education/colleges/college_rankings_8.php</a>
Big Friggen Deal.</p>
<p>Here’s something I pulled from another site:
"Astonishingly dumb people will go to ivy league schools for undergrad… Only fools are impressed with what school you went to, after an initial job opportunity no one cares.</p>
<p>Stop getting excited about what school you are at, and do something impressive like win the pulitzer, the fields medal, a nobel prize in a science."
It was pulled from a thread where people were arguing about prestige.</p>
<p>By the way, anyone have crossadmit data? Parchment crossadmit data seems too ridiculous to be true.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>The Cornell alum C. Everett Koop (M.D. 1941) was a quite famous – and visionary – Surgeon General of the United States under president Ronald Reagan from 1982–1989.</p>
<p>Two things.
<p>Actually, it is true (Cornell Med school, not undergrad though). He was, indeed, a visionary:</p>
<p>[C</a> Everett Koop](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Everett_Koop][b]C”>C. Everett Koop - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>I do agree, however, that it may not matter to you.</p>
<p>…oh, Colene may not have been referring to my post I gather now.</p>
<p>I was referring to saugus.</p>
<p>Thanks, I finally saw that…</p>
<p>The super geniuses in math and science are, in my opinion, at harvard, MiT and Caltech, which is one reason cornell doesnt place high in say the Putnam competition. The Intel finalists , international oympiad medalists, MOP participants are usually accepted to HMC, but cornell certainly has some very smart individuals.</p>
<p>Uhm no we get quite a few international level math/science winners here. Intel finalists, olympiad medalists, you name it.
The thing is most of these competitions would interest the science majors, math majors, and engineers - and they really have quite a tough workload here.</p>