<p>1818…ha! good catch</p>
<p>“rocketDA: as you have been rather vocal on the HMC and Caltech boards, I know that you have spent a fair bit of time at both. What insights do you have about the differences? I would not be deciding between these two if I thought that one wasn’t as strong academically, particularly in the areas I’m interested in. (math and cs, which do not require lots of funding, so they are easier to access without much trouble). I’m asking mostly about the quality of teaching at Caltech and how students at both schools approach a class where the teaching is not the best (which will happen everywhere, it’s rather inevitable, just it’s more common some places than others).”</p>
<p>to be honest, i think both programs are fantastic. i think it is incredible that the (arguably) two hardest science/engineering/math schools are 25 miles from eachother.</p>
<p>i am not one to often agree with johnadams12 on these forums… but i agree that you cannot go wrong with either institution.</p>
<p>now if you want to get into splitting hairs, my personal assessment is that undergrad is a time to get a strong foundation in a topic. this means exposure to the wide bases of mathematical modeling in different systems (mechanical, electrical, fluidic, etc) though with less emphasis on a particular field. </p>
<p>the best analogy i can make is that if one were to plot specialty vs intensity (like a frequency spectrum) caltech would have a narrow bandwidth spike and hmc would have a wide bandwidth hump. both, however, have roundly areas under the curve. therefore, the amount learned is roughly equal.</p>
<p>got to go…</p>