Attending the harder, more prestigious school with a more nerdy culture or the easier, relaxed scho

I think your outcomes ranking post is far more telling. I also bet that with the recent rise in popularity/prestige of UChicago, it will make that last jump to Tier 1 with HYPSM and the WAS LACs very soon. For purposes of recent graduating classes, it may already have. Cal and Michigan are several tiers lower by your estimation, which comports with my anecdotal understanding of how these things work. I stick with my belief that the middle of the class student at UChicago is likely to be in a much better position than the middle of the class student at any of these other schools on OPs list. And if OP is concerned about getting into a top law school, any grade deflation at UChicago clearly is not stopping it from being a top feeder to top law schools.

Given your preferences, Berkeley or Mich. Take your pick.

From what I have heard (mostly from a very smart very hard working friend of my daughter who goes there) the University of Chicago will be just as much work as you have imagined.

However, don’t expect the University of Michigan or U.C. Berkeley to be easy. They won’t be. They are both very strong universities and are likely to be a very significant step up from what you are used to in high school. If you go to either and slack off then you are in for a rude awakening.

Personally, given what you said if it were me then I would pick either University of Michigan or U.C. Berkeley and expect to work very hard.

How has net cost after financial aid not come up yet???

@ThankYouforHelp:

“Cal and Michigan are several tiers lower by your estimation, which comports with my anecdotal understanding of how these things work. I stick with my belief that the middle of the class student at UChicago is likely to be in a much better position than the middle of the class student at any of these other schools on OPs list.”

I have Cal and UMich half a tier lower than the “regular” Ivies/equivalents which are half a tier lower than HYPSM.
As for the U of C moving up . . . . . eh. Regardless of rankings gaming, these things are very sticky. The simple matter is that most would still reject the U of C for HYPSM if given a choice.

And as for the middle being so much better, salary is a crude guide, but by the College Scorecard average salary, while the U of C is a bit above WashU/Emory/Cal/UMich (you’d have to look up the exact ordering. . . . or maybe WashU was about the same as the U of C; can’t remember), the difference is slight.

Finally, by the same token, having a worse student body stats-wise (as well as a huge one) also isn’t stopping UMich from being a top 20 law school feeder even on a per capita basis.

I think the OP should expect to have to work hard to earn a high GPA at any of UChicago/UMich/Cal/WashU/Emory. They all are a significant step up from almost all high schools in this country.

I wouldn’t assume grading is much harder at Ivy caliber schools. If you look in some of the parents threads, a lot of posters agree with the old adage: It’s hard to get an A, but harder to get a C at an Ivy.

OP, have you actually visited any / all of these schools? They are pretty strongly different in a bunch of ways, from climate, geography, grounds, surrounding environment and housing to social priorities (incl greek life and sports) and student body make-up (aka diversity on all measures). I am sure that there are students who would be equally happy at WUSTL and UCB or Emory and UChic- but I don’t think that there are a lot of them,

And you do know about the core curriculum at UChic, yes?

IN MY HUMBLE OPINION,

I don’t think UChicago is where fun goes to die at all. The one thing that separates this school from most of the others is that there is not much of a campus social hierarchy. This is something that you’d find at more ‘conventional,’ schools, where athletes rule the roost, and people in the ‘top’ fraternities and sororities enjoy high social status and many social events to the exclusion of the rest of campus. Chicago has a bit of this, but it’s much less than other schools. In addition, the city of Chicago has a lot of things to do, and the campus generates lots of entertainment and events that are open to the whole student body. So, I think you have a wrong view of the University of Chicago - you should visit and talk to some current students, who will resolutely assure you that you can indeed have a good time here.

@lastposts Your overall quality of life and balance will probably be better at UMich/Berkeley. Probably there is a difference in terms of the difficulty of getting good grades but it is probably not that big (i don’t think UMich/Berkeley have grade inflation and they do have many top notch students). . If you are ready for a more limited social life, an intellectual/more nerdy environment and really hardcore top notch academics Chicago is the way to go. If you want a more balanced experience with a good social life and also strong academics (UMIch, Berkeley are no joke), then the other two are better options.
Another big consideration that will come not play is what you want to study.