<p>xiggi, you’re learning to go with the flow. My S will apply to Caltech soon, so I’ve been checking back for relevant info - but no matter. I suppose there could be a connection between Steve Jobs and Caltech, if someone cares to make one.</p>
<p>gourmetmom - the single major conclusion we have made so far is that caltech does not offer enough (or some claim none) liberal arts majors. There are enough caltech people hanging around that if you have some questions, you should feel free to ask.</p>
<p>Gourmetmom:</p>
<p>What we established on this thread was that Steve Jobs left Reed after one semester because he determined that he would have rather gone to Caltech, which he correctly predicted would eventually be ranked the No. 1 University in the world, whereas Reed refuses to fully participate in such surveys and is consistently downgraded for it. It is in those thirty two pages if you look very carefully and read between the lines here and there. :)</p>
<p>“Now, folks, get the idea — Obama was born of Caucacian mom and Nigerian Dad.”</p>
<p>It’s more than 2,100 miles from Nigeria to Kenya. This is rather like saying the father of the Queen of England comes from Uzbekhistan.</p>
<p>That is why I wrote about the links being trivial. This said, could the birth certificates look similar in Kenya and Nigeria?</p>
<p>Researching Ajami, his work as a post-Colonialist dealing with the issues of globalization, national identities, and terrorism, his opinions and how they have evolved was really fascinating!
Way off topic from this thread, but it brought me back to all the mostly non-Caltech type of stuff I so enjoyed as a multi-disciplinary Literary Theory major in college. </p>
<p>Is there enough time to do it ALL!!! </p>
<p>I got my exposure to applied math and stats and the like as an MBA student, back in the day where we had to use punch cards with mainframes in those super-cold rooms. Times have changed, and have left people like me behind (quite LOL) a bit. But my broad liberal arts education (and insatiable curiosity) has allowed me to watch and keep up from the side a bit.</p>
<p>I am in awe of the geeks and techies and the super-Mathies. But I think the world needs all types.</p>
<p>just spent a grueling 9 hours at a conference on privacy and medical records. I’ll say this much for those caltech/mit/scs/rit/etc. kids–at least mine had my computer and phone and backup systems in place in 5 minutes. Seriously, the host speaker uses same password for everything; this is something no freshman techie would do. Sorry, I’m venting…</p>
<p>Anything to derail the longest most boring thread ever. Really–Cal Tech vs MIT with a little Mudd. If you can’t pick one on your own you don’t deserve any of them. BTW SJ ignored his first born child too. Tree/apple.</p>
<p>… apple with a bite out of it…</p>
<p>This thread slays me. It is absolutely absurd and yet strangely compelling, noodling endlessly over what exactly? I don’t get it yet here I am – back trying to parse it.</p>
<p>It is a stream of consciousness revealing all sorts of Freudian stuff bubbling up from our collective (Jungian) CC sub-conscious.
CC style, bien sur!</p>
<p>Garbage in, garbage out: rankings</p>
<p>Sometimes a ranking is just a ranking…</p>
<p>I will say that there could not be a more traumatic freshman experience than for a Caltech-ie kid to be at Reed. And vice versa. Would either leave you scarred and disabled for life or morph you into a genius.</p>
<p>USNWR’s version of world rankings posted by someone on another thread related to UK schools. </p>
<p>[World’s</a> Best Universities; Top 400 Universities in the World | US News](<a href=“http://www.usnews.com/education/worlds-best-universities-rankings/top-400-universities-in-the-world]World’s”>http://www.usnews.com/education/worlds-best-universities-rankings/top-400-universities-in-the-world)</p>
<p>Interesting that the overall rankings change so much when they don’t consider undergrad alone. I can’t believe Stanford drops all the way to 13.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Look at the criteria for faculty ratio and international faculty. Re-ranking the schools with those criteria show you how misleading those rankings can be. Just as its peers, if suffers for wanting to be different and having no integrity in data collection. </p>
<p>For USNews to align themselves with the group that produced this garbage shows that Morse and his group have lost all integrity, and are probably fighting for survival as the parent company goes down the tubes. About every step USNWR has taken in the past 5 years has been in the wrong direction.</p>
<p>I doubt that for the quality of undergraduate education for the majority of students, with the possible exception of Caltech, any of these should be in the top 20. Xiggi’s school would be better than any of them (no sarcasm intended).</p>
<p>All these statements about how the top universities aren’t all that great remind me of the quote by Yogi Berra about a restaurant: “Nobody goes there any more; it’s too crowded.”</p>
<p>Or the Woody Allen joke, “the food at this restaurant is terrible - and the portions are so small.”</p>
<p>Or “Who would want to be a member of a club that would let me in?”, Groucho Marx, but the reverse:
“Since I can’t get in, I really want to be a member!”
or, conversely: “Since I can’t get in, I might as well find a way to run it down to make myself feel better.”</p>
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</p>
<p>As if they ever had any!</p>