Brown vs. Cornell

College Search & Selection
21

<p>I don't see how you can argue that Brown doesn't have more things to do around campus than Cornell. Providence has a population of over 125,000 while Ithaca's is about 30,000. Furthermore, Providence offers better internship possibilities because of its proximity to major cities. Cornell, on the other hand, is four hours away from New York City.</p>

<p>Brown's open curriculum is also ideal for those who want to explore. In fact, you can choose to take your some (maybe all?) classes as Pass/D/F, so there is less pressure.</p>

22

<p>nobody is smoking anything.</p>

<p>it's pure numbers</p>

<ol>
<li><p>In 2008, the admit rate at Brown was 13.2% and the admit rate at Cornell was 20.4%
By definition, Brown is much more selective
Ivy</a> League Admission Statistics</p></li>
<li><p>Prestige is determined by how desirable a school is. According to the New York Times, 76% of those who are admitted to both Brown and Cornell choose to go to Brown.
The</a> New York Times > Week in Review > Image > Collegiate Matchups: Predicting Student Choices</p></li>
<li><p>The gap between Brown and Cornell holds up in multiple ranking systems including the 2007 gold standard composite of all available rankings (US News, Gourman, Princeton Review, etc). Brown is ranked 8th and Cornell is ranked 20th.
The</a> Consus Group: Composite College and University Rankings (2007) : The Consus Group Rankings</p></li>
<li><p>Even in a random sampling of CC'ers there is a clear preference for Brown
on CC, Brown is ranked "favorite ivy" more than any other ivy and is third overall. Cornell is ranked last overall.
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/427356-your-favorite-ivy-28.html?highlight=favorite+ivy+league%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/427356-your-favorite-ivy-28.html?highlight=favorite+ivy+league&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li>
</ol>

23

<p>
[quote]
I don't see how you can argue that Brown doesn't have more things to do around campus than Cornell. Providence has a population of over 125,000 while Ithaca's is about 30,000.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>There are 20,000 students at Cornell, compared to only 8,000 students at Brown. Do you doubt that 20,000 students aren't able to occupy themselves with extra-curricular activities and a social life when they aren't busy studying, attending classes, holding down a work-study job, eating, and sleeping?</p>

<p>Trust me. There is very little difference in the day to day life of a student, whether you are at Cornell, Brown, NYU, or Williams.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Providence offers better internship possibilities because of its proximity to major cities. Cornell, on the other hand, is four hours away from New York City.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>So you honestly think that Brown students are commuting to Boston on a weekly basis to hold down an internship during the school year? Get real. </p>

<p>For a student taking a full academic course load on campus, the idea of having an internship during the semester is pretty far fetched -- they should be focused on academics, extra-curricular activities, and research pursuits, if interested.</p>

<p>And for what it is worth, Cornell students have tons of opportunities to intern and get involved within Ithaca. Like at most other college campuses, students run tons of different volunteer programs, from Habitat for Humanity to homeless shelters, they start their own business, or they run local radio stations. They have exposure to the real world through shadowing programs at local hospitals, businesses, government agencies, etc. And there are also a handful of Cornell students who every year hold elected office in the City of Ithaca or Tompkins County.</p>

<p>And if that's not enough, Cornell offers tons of formal programs in NYC, D.C., Albany, Rome, Geneva, Dublin, Beijing, NH, etc. that provide students with internships.</p>

<p>Bottom line: Some students greatly overstate the importance of being in a large city for job and internship opportunities. The OP should choose between Brown and Cornell based on student culture and college town campus life vs. mid-size city.</p>

24

<p>dcircle...
Ok, first of all, you cannot compare Brown's 13.2% acceptance to Cornell's larger 20.4%. Brown has only a liberal arts college at the undergrad level. Cornell has 7 undergrads colleges (including a liberal arts college). You can't compare Hotel, ILR, CALS, etc to Brown. Also, Cornell has an overall much larger undergraduate population, and so Cornell is forced to accept a larger number of students than Brown just to fill its class. Comparing apples to apples (Brown to Cornell CAS), the numbers are similar. </p>

<p>Secondly, those numbers are outdated, and prestige is not necessarily determined by which school students pick most often. It is determined by name recognition, which Cornell has considerably more of. </p>

<p>Next, the gap between Cornell's ranks and Brown's rank in US News, STJU, and other major rankings works in Cornell's favor.</p>

<p>Finally, CC is in no way representative of the real world.</p>

25

<p>You 2 wouldn't happen to be a totally biased Cornell students, would you?</p>

<p>dcircle spelled out a pretty convincing, fact based arguement. Do with it what you will, but the 78% figure (choose Brown when given this choice) says it all to me. That doesn't even factor in the NY residents who choose Cornell for financial reasons.</p>

<p>The 2008 numbers are outdated? Now I've heard it all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1</p>

26

<p>Cornell, owing to its size, has a lot to offer in terms of campus life. On the other hand, Providence is definitely more exciting than Ithaca, in my opinion (not that I'm unhappy with Ithaca!).</p>

<p>Brown's open curriculum is conducive to academic exploration, but Cornell is strong in a very wide spectrum of fields, which could also be an advantage for someone who doesn't know what he wants to do. </p>

<p>Cornell is less selective overall, but this is partly because Cornell has a different mission statement and a number of very specialized colleges. Brown felt more humanities/intellectual to me... Cornell is more practical and down-to-earth. If your brother's interested in hard sciences or engineering, Cornell is almost certainly the better choice.</p>

27

<p>This thread is veering off on a deep tangent, but the bottom line to the OP is that both Cornell and Brown are great schools, and that the brother should go where the school suits him better. Not where others label as more prestigious or more fun or having a better hockey team.</p>

<p>In response to dcircle's claims:</p>

<p>1) You need to compare apples to apples. Comparing liberal arts college to liberal arts college you will not find any difference in terms of selectivity. And acceptance rates tell you nothing about the underlying quality of the applicant pool.</p>

<p>3) Ordinal rankings based on arbitrary criteria are meaningless when trying to decide on the relative quality or prominence of an institution. Nobody in the real world is going to differentiate between Brown and Cornell, and that is all that matters.</p>

<p>4) Why should a narrow-minded bunch of students on this forum decide which school is more attractive or prestigious? I can trot out the fact that Newsweek called Cornell the 'Hot Ivy' this year or that Cornell has a higher ranking in the U.S. News scheme, but both are equally worthless claims. </p>

<p>Again, you are splitting hairs and grasping at straws. Using adjectives such as "more" or "much more" when comparing Brown and Cornell is completely disingenuous.</p>

<p>2) There are fundamental flaws to the Hoxby study the NYTimes uses in its article. Without going into the methodology to deeply, I'll just mention in passing that it 1) represents a very slim sample of college applicants without a lot of geographic or socioeconomic diversity from the entering class of 2000. and 2) fails to account for students who never applied to a certain college in the first place, revealing their preference by never applying.</p>

28

<ol>
<li><p>The liberal arts portion of Cornell has relatively similar acceptance rates and scores when compared to Brown.</p></li>
<li><p>It's hard to calculate prestige and Brown's popularity among cross-admits doesn't tell the whole story. For example, Cornell is affiliated with 40 Nobel Laureates while Brown has 3. And when you're talking about schools like these, the prestige difference is minimal.</p></li>
<li><p>The "Consus Group" rankings bases almost half its score on selectivity. I don't think I need to explain why such methodology is ridiculous.</p></li>
<li><p>You can find plenty of rankings and surveys that place Cornell above Brown and vice versa. Citing one or two that favor one school over another does not make a sound argument.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>To the OP, don't make a decision based on a perceived prestige difference or the opinions of a "favorite Ivy" thread. Make a decision based on factors like Brown's modest city compared to Cornell's collegetown, Brown's open curriculum vs. Cornell's huge selection of courses, etc.</p>

29

<p>nowyorka, i didn't realize they were from 2008; i misread that. And of course I am biased towards Cornell, but I'm not saying its better than Brown. I'm jsut saying that there are flaws with the each of the four reasons d circle listed to choose Brown over Cornell (as somedumbnoob, cayugared, and I have pointed out)</p>

30

<p>Actually, I'm looking at that link again, and those numbers are outdated. They are not from 2008... Not that this really matters that much</p>

31

<p>OP you need to realize Cayuga and others are very biased when it comes to this topic. The idea that someone could say Cornell has better name recognition than Brown is just simply ridiculous. </p>

<p>Dcirlces numbers say pretty much everything. Brown seems to be preferred overall. Prestige wise, Brown is probably considered a little bit superior. It has smaller classes, a slightly stronger student body (by test scores) and while not a great college location, providence is up and coming while Ithaca is well.... Ithaca. I personally think you should revisit both, but at least for me Brown seems much more enticing.</p>

32

<p>


</p>

<p>How is it that Brown is more prestigious, better school, and much more selective than Cornell? Don't you think that you are a bit too inacurrate with these generalizations? What do you think, an average person in the country will be more impressed to hear about Brown, as opposed to Cornell? Or, are you referring to the prestige according to the academics or those who are well educated? PA score for Corenll is 4.6, that is pretty high to me. About selectivity, Brown is a bit more selective than Cornell. But, Cornell's CAS is comparable to Brown. Last time I knew, Brown didn't have architecture, agriculture, hotel, or human ecology schools. A better school? For some, yes. For some others, Cornell would be more suitable. Also, dcircle, are you implying that since Brown's overall acceptance rate is lower and somehow more prestigious, one should choose Brown over Cornell based on that alone? Since Harvard is more prestigious than Amherst, one should just automatically choose H over Amherst? </p>

<p>


</p>

<p>uhmm, talking about numbers, did you happen to forget about other important factual evidences, the college rankings? </p>

<p>SJTU ranking:</p>

<p>Paked.net:</a> World University Rankings - Shanghai Jia Tong University  (SJTU) - Academic Ranking of World Universities - 2007 2007</p>

<p>Cornell = 12
Brown = not top 50. (not on the list)</p>

<p>THES Ranking:</p>

<p>Paked.net:</a> THES World University Rankings 2007 - The World's Top 200 Universities</p>

<p>Cornell = 20
Brown = 32</p>

<p>USNEWS Ranking:</p>

<p>USNews.com:</a> America's Best Colleges 2008: National Universities: Top Schools</p>

<p>Cornell = 12
Brown = 14</p>

<p>Although I am aware that these rankings aren't indicative of the overall quality of the undergrad education, these rankings, however, are indicative of university's overall prestige, name recognition, and its reputation in both domestic and international scale. It is clear that Cornell gets a very high mark on most published rankings, so much for your theory of Brown being more prestigious than Cornell.</p>

<p>Btw, I would advise anyone choosing btwn Cornell and Brown to consider their different merits and choose based on fit. Although it is true that Cornell ranks higher than Brown, Brown is an excellent school with open curriculum and it happens to be very liberal, cradling to certain groups of folks. Meanwhile, Cornell's strength is diversity, different academic courses, diverse majors, etc.</p>

33

<p>I'd hafta agree, all future cow pokes should choose Cornell......j/k</p>

34

<p>


</p>

<p>Actually yes and in fact the vast majority of people do</p>

<p>If you didn't see this cross-admit data from 2006 is very very revealing. Cornell does by far the worst out of the ivies, take a look. The</a> New York Times > Week in Review > Image > Collegiate Matchups: Predicting Student Choices</p>

35

<p>
[quote]
Actually yes and in fact the vast majority of people do

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Prestige is one thing. There are other many important factors to consider for choosing a college. Some may prefer Amherst's LAC-like feel over Harvard, even if H has much more prestige and name recognition. But, maybe for you, prestige is all.</p>

<p>
[quote]
If you didn't see this cross-admit data from 2006 is very very revealing. Cornell does by far the worst out of the ivies, take a look

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Yeah, I saw that chart a while ago, actually. Although Cornell loses a lot of cross admits to other ivies, I really don't care. Why would people need to be concerned of this? Maybe Brown's open curriculum, location, and other variables appeal to greater masses than Cornell's diverse majors, programs, and its location. Or, some others, like dcircle and you, will choose colleges solely based on their perceived prestige chart regardless of schools' different academic programs and social scenes. Whatever the case, choosing a college, especially between top schools, should be up to the individual's needs and fit.</p>

36

<p>why should it be up to the individuals need and fit? If people feel they can be happy at a cross-section of schools, why not choose the most prestigious one that will serve them more later in life. If I got into U penn and Stanford, even if I think I may like Penn more..most people would consider me crazy for passing up Stanford. Things like that make a difference. Maybe its all about "fit" for you.</p>

37

<p>I don't have a dog in this fight, so I'll try to give my unbiased opinion.</p>

<p>Both Brown and Cornell are fantastic universities and have their strengths.</p>

<p>For me, I say it depends on what you want to study...Cornell for engineering/ sciences/ veterinary/ hotel/ architecture...Brown for any liberal arts/ general sciences.</p>

<p>Choose for costs, planned major, environment, and other factors.</p>

38

<p>No way, an UNBIASED opinion!!! Can I get your autograph.</p>

39

<p>

Indeed. Cornell outperforms Brown in...</p>

<p>US News ranking (since 1999)
U.S</a>. News Rankings Through the Years</p>

<p>National Research Council rankings
NRC</a> Rankings in Each of 41 Areas</p>

<p>Top American Research Universities ranking
<a href="http://mup.asu.edu/research2006.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://mup.asu.edu/research2006.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Times ranking
QS</a> Top Universities: Top 100 universities in the THE - QS World University Rankings 2007</p>

<p>Faculty Scholarly Productivity Index rankings
Chronicle</a> Facts & Figures: Faculty Scholarly Productivity Index</p>

<p>

Tsk, tsk. Read the fine print. The chart is from 2006, but the data most certainly is not. Rather than precise and complete cross-admit data, the chart is merely an estimated ranking of preference based on a survey of 3240 students who graduated eight years ago.</p>

<p>The researchers themselves put it best:</p>

<p>Rankings based on students' revealed preference merely measure a college's desirability in students' eyes. Such desirability may reflect a college's quality, but it is unlikely to be identical to quality. Indeed, the notion of what constitutes quality in a college is likely to differ from person to person. Faculty, parents, policy makers, and students may all assign different weights to colleges' characteristics.</p>

40

<p>
[quote]
why should it be up to the individuals need and fit? If people feel they can be happy at a cross-section of schools, why not choose the most prestigious one that will serve them more later in life. If I got into U penn and Stanford, even if I think I may like Penn more..most people would consider me crazy for passing up Stanford. Things like that make a difference. Maybe its all about "fit" for you.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I am not saying that prestige is not something to ignore when making college decisions, since people do care about what others think of them to certain extent. But, it isn't the only important factor. Several factors need to be considered. Even if some people may think you are a bit eccentric to choose Penn over Stanford just bc Stanford has bigger name, will that make you less successful in the long run? Or, is there really this much need for anyone to be this conscious of what others will think of you? I actually know one guy from my hs who chose Penn(non-Wharton) over Princeton and Stanford. He was an eccentric person not to like a warm weather in the first place, so he wanted to live in colder weather. Also, he felt that the social scene at Penn was better than at Princeton. He also mentioned that he felt that Princeton was a bit elitist and he didn't like that atmosphere. He also mentioned that Penn is know for its 1 university policy, although I don't know what that really is. I am not sure if this elitist thing is true of Princeton bc I never have been there, but what matters is that he is receiving a top eduction as well as enjoying his time there as well. I, too, thought that it was weird to pass up on Stanford since I am a huge fan of that school due to its gorgeous campus, location, amazing academics, etc, but, he is just different person, with different preferences.</p>