<p>What is the typical daily menu at Harvard? (what do you have to choose from for breakfast, lunch, and dinner?)</p>
<p>You can check out the menu at HUDS:</a> Residential Dining</p>
<p>Daily offerings include a grill with burgers, eggs, chicken breast, etc. As well as a salad bar, sandwich bar, pasta, yogurt + bagels. There are also rotating main courses, soups, and desserts.</p>
<p>Here are my 2 cents as a current freshman:</p>
<p>Neurobiology was a key factor of my decision to choose H over Y+P a year ago - H ranks #1 in the field and provides many many opportunities for undergraduate research. I have joined a neurobiology research program in HMS this semester. The professor, a member of the NAS, AAAS and Institute of Medicine, took more than two hours to show me around his lab and talk about various on-going projects in order to match my research interests during my first visit... He has three other undergrads working in the lab as well.</p>
<p>I've been taking premed required (not neuro-specific) courses and core courses so far, but I did take a neurobiology course (BIOL-80) in the Harvard Summer School 2007. Also, I have been shadowing with a psychiatrist (H alumni) at MGH (through the Harvard Premed Society's match-up program) since October 2008 and learned what and how physicians doing their daily routines. We discuss about issues regarding health care and bioethics in general, too. It's pretty cool.</p>
<p>Good luck, and hope this helps you to picture what you'll be treated here.</p>
<p>Question: How well would someone fit in if he/she were very social and loved going out with people but didn't like to "party" (drink, smoke, what have you...)</p>
<p>Adelaide - Between Harvard events (performances, talks, goofy concoctions) and the whole Boston/Cambridge scene, there's definitely more than enough to do without alcohol or drugs, and you'll definitely find people who are interested in doing those things with you.</p>
<p>My personal ("partier") take is to encourage you to consider drinking socially and responsibly. There's nothing quite like a hot chocolate with Bailey's Irish Cream on the morning before Harvard-Yale, or sharing a six pack of Harpoon IPA with your suitemates while explaining string theory or debating foreign policy, or whatnot... plus there's almost no risk of punishment here for drinking (responsibly!) underage.</p>
<p>@wishyouwerehere</p>
<p>I'm a senior getting a secondary in Computer Science - but I wish I had started taking CS classes earlier so I could have concentrated in the field.</p>
<p>I'm not a hardcore CS guy, so I can't tell you if Harvard has the best complexity theory program or anything like that. I can tell you that CS has a broad + interesting range of course offerings that spans from the practical (networks, UI design, data visualization, systems programming + operating systems) to the abstract (compilers, proofs, algorithms, crypto, etc).</p>
<p>The intro computer science class: This</a> is CS 50 is probably the most popular, difficult class at Harvard (> 300 students for a class with ~10-15 hour problem sets). The professor, David Malan, is a dynamic lecturer and uses tech in very cool ways in the class. I loved the class so much when I took it last year, I was a teaching fellow this fall (something that's very common for Harvard CS students, and a really great experience, in my opinion). CS50 is mostly C, but you also learn dynamic web programming at the end. Take a look at the problem sets online, I think they're a blast.</p>
<p>CS51 (second intro class, taught in PLTScheme, a lisp dialect) and CS61 (systems programming, writing malloc() and dealing with multithreaded software) are both excellent classes that I've taken.</p>
<p>Lots of great research opportunities in the CS department, but nothing that I can speak to personally.</p>
<p>I can speak to the incredible job and internship opportunities coming out of Harvard. Microsoft and Facebook have a particular love for hiring Harvard computer science students - especially for jobs that involve both technical and communications skills (i.e. "Program Manager"). There's a small but intense startup scene, centered around the HCEF: HCEF</a> Welcome as well as an annual innovation contest.</p>
<p>Let me know if you have more specific questions, and I can either answer them or put you in touch with someone who can!</p>
<p>I have to make a decision between Harvard and Yale, so here are a few questions and concerns I have about Harvard:</p>
<p>1) I know some intro classes, especially in popular majors, can be very large. Have you experienced any problems with class size and does this make it difficult to interact with the professor/classmates?</p>
<p>2) Do you feel that there is a strong sense of community within Harvard and between students? Although I am very individually driven myself and respect that in others, I know that it is important for me to be part of a supportive community when I go to college. </p>
<p>3) How do you like the House system and what has been your experience with living in the freshman dorms and upperclass houses? Do these forms and houses have modern/great facilities? I am trying to establish some sort of relationship between the residential colleges at Yale and the Houses at Harvard and I havent been able to tell if there is any significant difference other than when the students enter them. </p>
<p>4) Still focusing on housing, do you feel like there is a definite community atmosphere within each house?</p>
<p>5) How much time do you spend studying / doing extracurriculars?</p>
<p>6) Is it true that significant grade inflation exists at Harvard?</p>
<p>I know that allot of these questions focus on community atmosphere etc. but I'm trying to get a feel for whether I would feel at home at Harvard or simply get lost in such a large school because I believe that at the end of the day, that will play a large part in my final decision.</p>
<p>Just a smaller question - how do AP credits work at Harvard? What AP classes do they give credits for (either to place out of a class, or place into a more advanced course?) Or does Harvard not really care for AP exams?</p>
<p>seventytwo - no aps are accepted for course credit, and the only way they count here is if you choose to do advanced standing, in which case having over a certain number qualifies you.</p>
<p>kd5qdf
2) a sense of community is definitely not one of Harvard's strengths. I would say it is probably Harvard's biggest weakness that we don't have a very strong sense of school spirit. There is much more community within smaller groups - blocking groups, extracurriculars, study groups, classes, Houses, and of course friends. I feel like between all of those networks most students are extremely well supported. But there is definitely a lack of overall Harvard spirit (in the "sporty" sense as well asa general sense). If this is extremely important to you it is something to consider. </p>
<p>I think housing is fantastic here. I live in freshman housing right now and love my house and my entryway. Manyof the houses are old, but the interiors are all quite modern, with wood floors and white walls, solid A/C and heating, clean, many in-suite bathrooms.There definitely isa lot of house spirit in the majority of upperclassmen houses (only one or two of the largest ones are slightly lacking. i think this would be true of yale as well). great house community spirit, in my opinion, is the one thing that makes up for the lack of overall Harvard spirit the most. for freshmen housing because we only live here for a year people don't invest as much into their house, but there is a lot of entryway pride and interhouse competition with intramurals and so on. </p>
<p>5)I probably spend equal amounts of time divided between studying and extracurrics/a job. Most harvard students are deeply passionate about their extracurriculars and will devote a lot of time to them. </p>
<p>6) I'm not sure if I'm totally qualified to answer this but I feel that there may be grade inflation in thesense that the average grade in a lot of classes might be higher than the average grade in a class at a state school (justified in my opinion because this is Harvard). However it is still very challenging to get As or A-s in most classes, and I bet moreso than at many rival institutions. So essentially, the center of the curve might move up, but the proportion of the top grades does not increase. If you are aiming for As in your classes, you will have as hard a time here, and probably harder, as at any other school you could name, in my opinion.</p>
<br>
<blockquote> <p>"Is it true ~5 kids get into HMS from Harvard College?" No. Harvard undergrads make up the largest group of incoming students at all 10 Harvard graduate schools.<<</p> </blockquote>
<br>
<p>Unfortunately, it was true this past medical school admissions cycle. For the Harvard College '08 pre-meds, >90% got into medical school somewhere, but for some reason it was a slaughter for Harvard Medical School itself. The HMS acceptances from Harvard College were in the single digits - something like 6 or 9 kids. This from my daughter'a pre-med rooommate, who is now in her first year at Yale Medical School.</p>
<p>I once knew a young man who graduated Phi Beta Kappa, summa cum laude in Biology with a senior thesis that was of publishable quality and got rejected from HMS (but accepted at other prestigious med schools). Hard to fathom why he was rejected (that was about 15 years ago--he's now happily practicing medicine).</p>
<p>I could be completely wrong on this, but I wonder if HMS hasn't adopted a policy similar to academic graduate schools. Where graduate programs are unlikely to take members from their undergraduate college in hopes of exposing the student to a wider set of ideas and a larger set of contacts. Someone told me that UPenn Medical school has a similar policy. So I could be completely wrong, but that might be one reason the turnover is so low.</p>
<p>Well, I don't have actual data other than the published admission rate of HMS (<5%). But my undergraduate research supervisor at HMS, a young faculty, was a graduate from both Harvard College and HMS (MD/PhD), and at least two of my soon-to-be resident tutors in Quincy House were also graduates from both the College and HMS...</p>
<p>RE: HMS. First, for prospective pre-meds, go to Harvard because of our incredible med school placement record, not because going to Harvard may bump your likelihood of getting into HMS a couple percent.</p>
<p>As to how Harvard students do at HMS... the rule of thumb I'd heard is that about 12 (~"one per house") get in each year directly from the college, and that a similar number of Harvard alums get in each year (having taken time off after graduation). If the results this year weren't as good, that could very well just be random variation.</p>
<p>(On the grad school placement note, Harvard Business School has been <strong>very</strong> friendly to Harvard undergrads lately. I personally know > 10 classmates who have been given deferred admission to HBS, mostly through the 2+2 program).</p>
<p>What is the best experience you've ever had at Harvard? Some say it's when they first move into their dorms at the start of sophomore year (I think), others when they graduate, but I wanted to know what the general consensus was.</p>
<p>Also, what are the little things that make Harvard so great?</p>
<p>It sounds really is a stupid question/ cliche but....
Is Harvard acceptance a crapshot as poeple say?</p>
<p>There are a million little things that make Harvard great! The professors are surely at the top of the list. There is just something special about having a pulitzer prize winner wave enthusiastically to you from across the library! Almost all of the professors ive had so far have been wonderfully welcoming, especially if you're willing to make the effort to talk to them! </p>
<p>The speakers are also very exciting most of the time. When Elaine Chao came, she made the effort to walk around the lounge and meet everyone who had come to talk with her. She wanted to know where we were from and if we had any questions.</p>
<p>I would also say that the IOP Fellows program is pretty impressive.</p>
<p>I know some intro classes, especially in popular majors, can be very large. Have you experienced any problems with class size and does this make it difficult to interact with the professor/classmates?
Some thoughts:
* Any large lecture class will have discussion sections (lead usually by grad students, ocasionally by undergrads). They usually have 10-15 students, meet once a week for an hour, and will let you talk about the material, ask questions, practice doing problems, etc.
* In many ways, there's not a big difference between a large lecture class with 50 students (Intro Sociology) and one with 1000 students (Justice) - in either case you're listening to the prof, with the ability to ask questions. One difference is that office hours for Justice are more likely to have small groups of students, while smaller classes will be more likely to have 1:1 office hours. But so few students actually go to office hours, if you want to spend the time to get to know your prof, you totally can do it, no matter how big the class.
* As far as I know, intro classes are taught in large lecture halls at all research universities. I think intro classes tend to be done really well at Harvard (i.e. CS50, Life Science 1a, Ec10)... I don't see them as a problem.</p>
<p>This question is a little hard for me to phrase, but i'll try my best. One of my main criteria for colleges was that it had a definite "campus feel". I didn't want a city school like NYU or Boston University because I felt like I might as well have been just walking down a city street rather than on a college campus. I've visited the Harvard campus a couple times and it feels a little diffuse and spread out, like I didn't necessarily feel like I was on a college campus. Did you get the same feeling on campus? I know that Harvard is in an urban area so it can't have a "college bubble" like other schools, but did it have a campus feel?</p>
<p>sorry if my questions seem all over the place - I'm just trying to get a feel of how prepared you have to be for the different concentrations:
1) My dad is a computer engineer, so I've had limited exposure to C, Java, Visual basic, and HTML - should that be enough to at least keep me afloat in CS50 - how hard are we talking?
2) Justforgetme, you said that you're doing a secondary in CS, what's your concentration, and do you feel like the CS secondary is worth it if you're not getting a full degree?
3) can anyone talk a bit about the humanities classes, particularly the History and Literature concentration?</p>