OP, Brown’s open curriculum gives you total flexibility in course selection. NU has a distribution requirements but they are pretty loose with lots of choices. NU is on quarter system so there’s a bit more flexibility in squeezing more classes into your schedule. They are both great for the undecided to explore variety of fields.
According to the internet, Brown filled 43% of the class of 2022 through ED. The acceptance rate for ED applicants was 21%, which is substantially higher than the RD rate. However, a lot of those slots went to kids with hooks (recruited athletes etc …), so an unhooked kid applying ED should take that 21% acceptance rate with a grain of salt.
Kids with hooks and unhooked kids with top quality apps. One of the fastest ways to get rejected from Brown, btw, is this idea you “want to focus exclusively on one particular academic area.”
OP hasn’t said anything about knowing the curriculum differences or that it specifically matters to his kid. Just that she has several interests. That’s not enough, by itself, to make a good case in the app/supp. How much do you really know these colleges?
Having toured both Northwestern and Brown twice, I’ll chime in!
Both campuses are beautiful–I’ll set that aside.
Northwestern
We were also looking at math, and found the math department here relatively underwhelming, but we were comparing to some powerhouse places. It seemed geared mostly towards non-majors, at least on paper. It also seemed like a nice, small department, though, where one could get personal attention. The performing arts at NU are amazing. Because of the conservatory, it’s a little harder to do music causally here than at some other places, but I’m not sure if the same is true of acting. There was a Shakespeare play the night we were visiting (we almost went–I wish we had!) and there were at least four other big shows advertised in the theatre. Seemed very serious. There’s a theatre major, but also many student groups (nine of them, I think?) that do shows throughout the year. Those groups might be more broadly accessible. I don’t know about political science, physics, or Spanish, sorry! Some other random stuff: NU has more undergrad students than Brown by a few thousand…and way more grad students! Maybe five times as many grad students. It also has more emphasis on sports, from what I could gather. The football team seems like a big deal. Also, the quarter academic schedule allows for more classes to be taken within any given year, which seems great for somebody who wants to explore and try lots of new things. There’s less pressure on any given class, and double majors would be easy (I suspect). The breaks don’t seem as long, though (?). Lake Michigan is glorious, Evanston is great–safe, affluent, accessible, lots of amenities. I found it hard to get to Evanston from the airports, though. Chicago is right there (you can see it!) but it takes about 50 minutes to ride a bus in. And it does get intensely cold and windy in the winter, especially by the water. I agree that applying early is probably a big boost here and the acceptance rate is ever-so-slightly higher than Brown’s overall.
Brown
The applied math at Brown is close to the best in the country and the major seems intense. I don’t know first-hand, though. There are a lot of math kids on campus. The performing arts are also highly valued at Brown and there are many official and student-run groups. There’s a variety of theatre on campus from bigger faculty-run productions to small student-run organizations. Some student writers produce their own shows. They were doing West Side Story when we visited and there was a student play being advertised. Overall, the arts scene felt more casual than at NU, but again–highly valued. The shows were sold out. Political science is very good at Brown and the language departments are well-liked. Not sure about physics. We thought the open curriculum sounded good both for those who know what they want to do (they can specialize right away) and those who don’t (they can explore). Brown does not have a huge cultural emphasis on sports. It’s also smaller than NU in terms of enrollment, but the campus felt bigger to me. Providence gets very cold, but probably not as windy as Evanston. There’s a street of shops right next to campus, several high-end shop/restaurant areas nearby, and a mall in Providence within (long) walking distance. Not quite as cute/compact as Evanston, but nice. It struck me that the student body at Brown was very happy, and quite diverse in terms of ethnicity and the gender spectrum. I don’t mean to imply that NU isn’t, I just didn’t notice it as much on that campus. Applying early is a boost here, but probably not as big as with NU.
I love both schools. Of the two, I’d have picked Brown for my math kid, if math were the only criterion.
My kid is at Brown and we had visited Northwestern when she was looking.
I think the distribution requirements and quarter vs semester system are very important distinctions and it depends on what kind of a learner your child is as to which would be better. A quarter system goes FAST. But at Brown kids only take 4 classes a semester, so you can’t get as many classes in. Brown will allow you to take 5 but discourages it, and you’ll find that 4 classes still requires a lot of work. IMO, this is one of the most important factors to consider.
One thing I’ve found about Brown is all the comments about distributions etc is a little deceiving. You have to look at an individual major (called concentration) to see what that actually requires. Particularly the sciences have a lot of requirements, so it might not be as open-ended as you would think, given the hype. I also think the “shopping period” for classes is over-hyped because this is only the first two weeks of classes. I don’t mean to sound negative about this because I’m not. I think it’s realistic. After all, you’ve got to get down to the nitty-gritty of studying, and if you wait too long to change classes, you’ll be too far behind. And with regards to requirements, if you’re going to be an engineer, of course you have to have certain courses so that you have the required skill-set for your job!
I also wanted to mention that it is very easy for Brown students to take classes at RISD, and that the students get together at various activities.
Finally, it is extremely easy to get involved at Brown in just about anything you would like to get involved with. There are opportunities galore, and it is an extremely warm and welcoming atmosphere. The kids are really collaberative, no one speaks about their grades, and there is very little competition. The kids are serious about their work, and are into getting their own great education.
^I think the main reason that majoring in math isn’t as big at NU is because it has other excellent programs in engineering and MMSS (math methods for social sciences) that kinda draw the students away from majoring in pure math. The MMSS program is popular with about 40 students per class and if you already do MMSS, you would double major in something else other than math (MMSS is an adjunct major). NU also has excellent engineering programs (most are ranked in the top 15) and the most popular one is industrial engineering and management sciences (top 5 in the country). The IEMS students often double major in Econ, rather than math. There’s also engineering systems and applied math in the engineering school. If NU doesn’t have those programs, math and Econ would probably have been the combination for quite a few of these students instead.
“I think she would like Brown’s notably flexible curriculum.”
As melvin123 pointed out, you still have to take many courses in the major to get a degree in that major (shocking I know). I quickly perused Brown’s website and you still have to take number theory to get the math major, just like every other school. People get this impression that Brown has students who are not serious floating through their four years, taking this course or that course, some pass/fail, some for a grade, and then getting the degree.
As for the OP, I’d lean to NU because it maybe easier to get a double majors and minors there, from what NU parents have told me, especially since all the majors are in one school (outside of theater of course). You take core courses first two years setting you up for a math/physics double major and a double minor in poly sci/Spanish. But that is such a small difference, I think, you should be able to do similar things at Brown. Semester vs. quarter and campus fit should decide it for the reasons posted - greek life, sporting scene, evanston/chicago vs providence/boston.
Thanks for all the helpful comments! Northwestern definitely gives a preference to its ED candidates (they tell you that point blank in the info sessions), so that’s why we’re trying to decide this so early. I would love to wait and see where she gets accepted in the spring, but if she wants Northwestern, she should ideally decide now.
I do think both schools sound great and it does come down to which one feels slightly better to her. I, of course, want to find the “perfect” answer and the “perfect” place, when their really isn’t a right or wrong choice.
Thanks for the feedback and suggestions!